2

Spoken English and Standard English

TEACHERS' STANDARDS
A teacher must:

3. Demonstrate good subject and curriculum knowledge

• have a secure knowledge of the relevant subject{s) and curriculum areas, foster and
maintain pupils' interest in the subject, and address misunderstandings
• demonstrate a critical understanding of developments in the subject and curriculum
areas, and promote the value of scholarship
• demonstrate an understanding of and take responsibility for promoting high standards of
literacy, articulacy and the correct use of standard English, whatever the teacher's
specialist subject

4. Plan and teach well structured lessons

• impart knowledge and develop understanding through effective use of lesson time
• promote a love of learning and children's intellectual curiosity
• contribute to the design and provision of an engaging curriculum within the relevant
subject area(s).

8. Fulfil wider professional responsibilities

• take responsibility for improving teaching through appropriate professional development

Curriculum context
National Curriculum programmes of study
This knowledge is designed to underpin the teaching of the Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2
programmes of study for English, which state, for example, that children should:

• be introduced to some of the main features of spoken Standard English and be taught to use them;
• understand how word order affects meaning.

Children should learn to speak competently and creatively for different purposes and audi-
ences, reflecting on impact and response. They should learn to explain and comment on
speakers' use of language, including vocabulary, grammar and non-verbal features.

Early Years Foundation Stage

The Early Learning Goals specify that, by the end of the Early Years Foundation Stage,
children should:

• Enjoy listening to and using spoken and written language, and readily turn to it in their play and learning.
• Extend their vocabulary, exploring the meanings and sounds of new words.
• Speak clearly and audibly with. confidence and control and show awareness of the listener.

7
 Spoken English and Standard English

Introduction
English is one of the most widely spoken and written languages in the world. It is estimated
that there are 300 million native speakers and 300 million who use English as a second
language, while a further 100 million use it as a foreign language. It is the language of
science, aviation, computing, diplomacy and tourism. It is listed as the official or co-official
language of 45 countries. Chinese may be spoken by more people, but English is probably
the language used for the widest variety of purposes.

It is not surprising, then, that English is a large and flexible language. There are probably
between a million and two million words, not including the half a million abbreviations in
English. An educated English speaker may have a vocabulary of 50,000 or so active words
and half as many again that are understood without being regularly produced. Becoming a
successful speaker of English is not simply about knowing the words and how to pronounce
them. It also involves knowing the wide range of rules governing the way words and phrases
are ordered into spoken discourse as well as the conventions that govern the ways varieties
of English differ to include linguistic differences of region, class, gender, formality and
relationship.

This chapter considers what Standard English is and the main types of language variation
you will deal with as a teacher.

Standard English
There is no 'Standard' for English like the 'standard' metre or gram - something against
which all English can be measured and corrected. Standard English is a particular variety of
English which, although most educated adults recognise and use it, is difficult to define.
Standard English is largely a matter of using certain grammar, vocabulary and, when written,
spelling. It can be spoken in most English accents and does not have a correct pronuncia-
tion.

Which sentences are Standard English? How do you know?

They were just over here. I did not do it.
I've never been here. They was there a minute ago.
I ain't never been here. I never done it.
As a fluent Standard English user you may find the answers to this activity easy, but also find that
explaining your answers demands reflection on language, and vocabulary about language that you do not
use every day.

Standard English is a form of English that carries prestige within a language group (people in
Britain, in this case) and so it is the form of English usually learnt by foreigners and used by
most people in formal, business and political situations. This form of English is a 'standard' in
that the prestige of Standard English is recognised by the adults in the language community
and so it has become an educational target. In Britain we aim for all children to be able to use
Standard English in their writing and in appropriate speaking situations. Not to be able to do
so would certainly be a disadvantage in modern life and people unable to do so would be
liable to be considered poorly educated by their peers.

8
 Spoken English and Standard English

Despite the near universal recognition of Standard English as a powerful variant of English
that all children should learn and the fact that Standard English is very widely understood,
very few people actually speak only Standard English. For most of us a mixture of Standard
English and a regional variety of English is used for much of the time. Spoken Standard
English is likely to be used in situations where clarity and near universal understanding are
required - reading the television news is an obvious example. Teachers need to be able to
use, and model the use of, Standard English to their children. The most common occurrence
of Standard English is in writing and so it is not surprising that, for many of us, newsreaders
sound as though they are 'speaking in writing'.

Finally, it is important to point out that there are a number of 'Standard' varieties of English.
English has become an international language in that it has an unprecedented worldwide
presence. Yet it has also been adopted as the language of a number of countries. Because it
has been used in different countries, each country has reached agreement over language
issues so that the language reflects the identity of that country. As a result there is not one
'correct' Standard world English, but different Standard English varieties in different English-
speaking countries. You have only to look at the language section of your word processor to
be offered Standard British English, Indian English, Australian, New Zealand, American and
Canadian English spelling and grammar checkers. All these Standard English variants have
slightly different vocabularies, rules governing grammar and conventions of punctuation. In
this book, and in teaching in UK schools, we are dealing with Standard British English,
although many people say that there is also a Standard Scots English.

Although we aim to offer all children access to Standard English, there are important types
of language variation that teachers and children need to learn about. These affect the ways
we speak and write, as well as the nature of the language.

Historical variation
One way that English varies is over time. English has a long and complicated history
(discussed in more detail in Chapter 5), which partly accounts for the complexity of the
language. As a living language it is constantly changing to accommodate new situations.
This means that Standard British English gradually invents, borrows or changes words,
phrases and expressions, grammatical rules and conventions of punctuation.

In terms of grammar, there are broadly agreed grammatical rules and conventions that make
Standard English understandable and relatively stable. For example:

• It is usual for the subject and verb in a sentence to agree.

They were, NOT they was

He is, NOT he are

• There are complicated spelling and grammatical conventions about the formation of past tense verb forms.

I fell, NOT I failed

She stopped, NOT she stoped
I did, NOT I done
I have done, NOT I have did

However, there are always some 'grey areas' where standard usage is changing.

9
 Spoken English and Standard English

Which of these sentences seem like appropriate usage to you? Which do not, and why?

It was something I couldn't put up with.

I wanted to quickly leave.
I did not understand the relevance of it.

An example of change in grammatical usage is the use of the split infinitive. Less than 50
years ago many people felt that the infinitive form of a verb ('to go', 'to be' etc.} should not be
split. Today, however, most people have accepted the use of phrases such as 'to quickly
leave', while 'to boldly go' must be the most famous split infinitive in the world. This sort of
change is evident in every aspect of English. The words of English change. New words are
invented or borrowed and meanings change. Some words and expressions have changed in
our lifetime. (This topic is discussed in more detail in Chapter 5.}

PEDAGOGICAL LINK
Children need to be able to use morphology and etymology to spell new and unfamiliar words.
Dictionaries contain more than just definitions - they include information on word class, formation
and origin. All primary teachers need to become familiar with a really good dictionary such as The
Concise Oxford English Dictionary, which gives some information about word origins. The Oxford English
Dictionary contains all the information about a word you could need and is now available online.

PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAl TASK PRACTICAl TASK

Think of some modern equivalents of these words, phrases and expressions:

wireless LP
parlour charabanc
spooning vexed

How have these words and expressions changed meaning?

He is a sad little man. presently

regular gay

Here are some words from a 1990 Dictionary of New Words. Which ones remain part of Standard usage
and which ones don't? Why? How long do you think they will remain?

mad cow disease skorts

bumbag bimboy
diffuser fatwah
cardboard city

In order that children can use knowledge of word structure and origins to develop their
understanding of word meanings, they need to study and collect new words.

It is not only spoken Standard English that changes. In recent years new conventions have
entered written English. Fifteen years ago few people used bullet points to punctuate lists of
sentences, phrases or words but bullet points are now a Standard written convention. The
dash to signal parenthesis or an afterthought in writing has become a very common usage

10
 Spoken English and Standard English

and is accepted in Standard English. These changes raise the question of who decides what
is correct usage in Standard English? The answer is not simple. At root, usage that is
generally accepted as appropriate by the language group is correct - in this case, the
British public. It can be difficult to decide whether something is accepted appropriate
usage, especially when the English language is changing so quickly. It is important for
teachers to maintain awareness of language usage in society, on television and radio, in
newspapers, books and online and to keep in mind the goal of clarity of expression.
However, this underlines that there can never be an absolute statement of correct
Standard English -the aim is appropriate use of English.

Regional variation
Standard English has the features of a dialect in that it uses particular words and grammatical
forms. However, unlike most dialects it does not tell us where the speaker comes from.
Many regional varieties of English tell us about the speaker's origins in terms of geography
or class. There are two main elements of regional variation: accent and dialect.

A dialect is a variety of English that includes particular words and grammatical rules that
indicate the origins of the speaker. In UK schools one of the most obvious examples of word
variation is the word for shoes worn for PE. Do you call them daps (south west and Wales),
plimsolls (south east), pumps (midlands), sandshoes (north east) or even rubbashoes
(Gibraltar)? There are many other dialect words you might use and linguists have researched
and recorded the distribution and change of dialect words. As a teacher, it is important to
know local dialect terms that children might use appropriately in speech, if not in all types of
writing.

Each dialect may also have a consistent, but often non-Standard, grammar. For instance,
although Standard English uses the third person plural of the verb to be ('were') and
demands that it agree with the third person pronoun ('we were'), in some dialects 'we
was' is consistently used. The sentence 'I ain't never been there' is identifiably not
Standard English because of the formation of 'have not' and the double negative. In
Standard English the sentence would be 'I have never been there'. However, in parts of
north London, this is a popular dialect usage.

The dialect (or language) primarily used at home by young children is very important for a
number of reasons. It is the language variety through which they have learnt about the world
and their place in it. It is also the language variety that marks them out as part of the social
group of their home community. For these reasons it is important to recognise that non-
Standard dialects have an important role in children's lives and are not simply 'wrong' use of
words and grammar. At the same time it is also vital to teach children both how to use
Standard English and when it is appropriate to use it. Very young children will begin to use
Standard English in school discussions and structured play. As schooling progresses chil-
dren will be taught to consider critically what they speak and write and to correct Standard
English in writing and, when appropriate, in speech.

Study of direct speech in children's literature is one way in which children can study the
differences between dialect and Standard English.

11
 Spoken English and Standard English

PEDAGOGICAL LINK PEDAGOGICAL LINK

Children need to be able to identify how talk varies with age, familiarity, gender and purpose and how it
varies between formal and informal occasions. This involves both listening to speakers and study of
children's books and plays that include direct speech.

PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAl TASK PRACTICAL TASK

Here is an extract from The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. It is the story of Mary, an
orphan who is brought up in her Grandfather's house in Yorkshire.

For two or three minutes he stood looking around him, while Mary watched him, and then he began
to walk about softly, even more lightly than Mary had walked the first time she had found herself
inside the four walls. His eyes seemed to be taking in everything - the grey trees with the grey
creepers climbing over them and hanging from their branches, the tangle on the wall and among the
grass, the evergreen alcoves with the stone seats and tall flower urns standing in them.
'I never thought I'd see this place,' he said at last in a whisper.
'Did you know about it?' asked Mary.
She had spoken aloud and he made a sign to her.
'We must talk low,' he said, 'or someone'll hear us an' wonder what's to do in here.'
'Oh! I forgot!' said Mary, feeling frightened and putting her hand quickly against her mouth. 'Did
you know about the garden?' she asked again when she had recovered herself.
Dickon nodded.
'Martha told me there was one as no one ever went inside,' he answered. 'Us used to wonder
what it was like.'
He stopped and looked around at the lovely grey tangle about him and his round eyes looked
queerly happy.
'Eh! The nests as'// be here come springtime,' he said. 'It'd beth' safest nestin' place in England.
No one ever comin' near an' tangles o' trees an' roses to build in. I wonder all th' birds on th' moor
don't build here.'

Note down the grammatical and lexical features which indicate Dickon is speaking in a regional dialect,
using Standard English as a reference point. What is the effect of using this dialect in the passage?

Another feature of geographical and social variation in spoken English is accent. This is
represented in the passage above through spelling and punctuation. Standard English can
be spoken in the whole range of regional accents and there is no Standard accent. A
particular type of accent, which has been called 'BBC' or 'The Queen's English', is widely
recognised by foreign learners of English. This accent is known by linguists as RP, or
'received pronunciation'. In the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries this accent
developed as the accent spoken by those who 'were received in society'. However, in recent
years the incidence of RP has declined and now few people speak in an RP accent, with even
most RP speakers including a number of regionally identifiable sounds. It is important to
recognise that, although most regional dialects are spoken in a regional accent, Standard
English can be spoken perfectly clearly in a regional accent.

12
 Spoken English and Standard English

PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK

This is a transcript of a conversation with two twelve-year-old African-Caribbean girls and illustrates the
West Yorkshire dialect. The girls were born and live in Yorkshire but follow certain aspects of Rastafarian
culture, like beaded hair, which come into conflict with school rules.

Marilyn They (teachers) used to say we couldn't wear (beads in our hair) before.
Charleen Yeah, 'cos last- when my sister were in this school, right, 'er friend wore beads in 'er hair,
and one of t'teachers told 'er to tek 'em out, and she said no, she 'adn't to tek 'em out, so
she (teacher) just got 'er hair and just took 'em out, and she (girl) just put 'em back in.
VG But now they let you wear them do they?
Marilyn They don't say owt to me.
(from Adolescent Girls and Their Friends, Vivienne Griffiths, 1995, p45)

This passage contains some dialect words (e.g. 'owt' - anything) as well as some characteristic
grammatical structures (e.g. 'my sister were') and abbreviations. Now try to find some other examples.

The very prejudice with which people treat accents in Britain suggests it is an important
issue. In market research surveys, accents are frequently rated in terms of popularity, with
Scots accents and Newcastle accents often rated as 'warm and trustworthy' and RP rated as
'intelligent and cold'. This is pure prejudice - accents may indicate a person's social or
geographical origins but do not indicate anything about their intellectual ability or person-
ality. Accent, like dialect, can be an important part of a person's social identity. It is important
for teachers to teach children to speak clearly and use Standard English. It is not appropriate
or necessary to change a child's home accent.

PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK

'We've fallen on our feet and no mistake,' said Peter. 'This is going to be perfectly splendid. That old
chap will let us do anything we like.'
'I think he's an old dear,' said Susan.
'Oh come off it!' said Edmund, who was tired and pretending not to be tired, which always made him
bad-tempered, 'Don't go on talking like that.'
'Like what?' said Susan; 'and anyway, it's time you were in bed.'
'Trying to talk like Mother,' said Edmund. 'And who are you to say when I should go to bed? Go to bed
yourself.'
(from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, C.S. Lewis, 1950, p10)

Although the passage is written in Standard English, there are indications of the period when it was
written and the class background of the children. What are these? Find some other examples in the text
that help to date this extract.

PEDAGOGICAL LINK PEDAGOGICAL LINK

Children should be able to listen for language variation and identify how it varies, including accents. This
involves study of children's books and plays that include direct speech. Accents may also be a feature of
drama work in speaking and listening and children may find audio clips useful.

13
 Spoken English and Standard English

Individual variation
The way we speak English depends not only on which accents and dialects we have access
to, but also on the social situation in which we are speaking. The term language register has
been used to describe the way speakers (or writers} use different words and grammatical
formations depending on the situation.

RESEARCH SUMMARY RESEARCH SUMMARY

This diagram was originally used by James Murray to introduce the first volume of the Oxford English
Dictionary (1888). It describes the way word choice varies in a number of situations. Some linguists
dispute the differences between common and colloquial vocabulary, since many colloquial words
become common.

Foreign
Scientific

LITERARY

Common

COLLOQUIAL

Dialectal
Technical
Slang

When we speak (or write) in any situation the language we use reflects a number of things:
the degree of familiarity between the speaker and listener, the social situation of school,
work, home, etc. and the formality of the situation.

We use certain words and expressions for formal situations and completely different ones
for informal situations. The classroom is a relatively formal situation. A teacher might say
'Please, be quiet!' to a child, but that child might simply say to a friend 'Shuddup, you!'
without any intention of rudeness or malice. The difference between the utterances is the
relationship between the speaker and listener. Children learn the unwritten rules of vocabu-
lary selection for the classroom easily, but may need to consider and discuss their choice of
words in less familiar contexts.

PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK

There are many ways to say that someone has died, or is dead. How many can you list?
Choose words or phrases to suit these situations:
1. A lawyer discussing a client who has died, leaving a will to be administered.
2. An undertaker talking to bereaved relatives.
3. A newsreader reporting a major flood disaster in a distant country.
4. A man telling a friend about the death of a local person some 20 years ago.
5. A comedian making a joke.

14
 Spoken English and Standard English

It is not only word choice that varies according to the situation. We also use grammatical
structures differently.

This is a discussion between two seven-year-old boys finishing their work in school:

You done it?

No. Hang on.
You what? She'll do you.
Nearly done it. Not long.
Get on with it! Come on!
OK, OK keep your hair on, bro.
I got to go. Can't wait, sorry.

What evidence can you identify that tells you:

• that this is informal conversation?

• that the discussion was spoken, not written?
• that the children knew each other well?

In speech we tend only to use complete sentences when we speak in quite formal settings or
where a person is not well known to us. This is partly to do with the level of clear, explicit
information we need to put into speech. In informal conversation about a very familiar topic,
speakers can actually leave out a great deal of detail and some expression that is conveyed •
through gesture or is already known to both speakers. When we speak (or write) to someone
we do not know well or when a speaker needs to be very precise in a formal situation, full
sentences with explicit detail become useful. Informal conversation tends to consist of linked
clauses or phrases, often with sentence elements implied or left out. This is why it can be
difficult to transcribe speech.

PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAl TASK PR.ACTICAl TASK

Below is an extract from The Ghost of Thomas Kempe, by Penelope Lively (1975). Two boys are talking
about a notice they have seen, purporting to be from 'Thos. Kempe Esq. Sorcerer':

'There!' said James, with a mixture of triumph and despair. 'There! Now do you believe me?'
Simon took his glasses off, scrubbed round them with his fingers and read the notice for a second
time.
'Well,' he said cautiously.
'Well what?'
'Somebody could have put it there.'
'Such as who?'
'I don't know.'
'Such as me, perhaps?' said James in a freezing voice.
'No. Not you. You've been with me all morning ... '
'He just wants things done like they were in his time,' said James. 'With him doing them. And me
helping.'
'Oh,' said Simon. 'I see.' He sounded polite. Too polite.
James said, 'You don't believe he's a ghost, do you?'

15
 Spoken English and Standard English

'I didn't say I didn't.'

'But you don't.'
'I kind of half do and half don't,' said Simon with great honesty. 'I do when I'm with you but I think
if I was by myself I wouldn't.'

What has the author used to replace the facial expression and actions between the two characters?

What does the passage tell you about the relationship between the two characters?

PEDAGOGICAL LINK PEDAGOGICAL LINK

Children need opportunities to talk in a range of situations, including in groups, to the whole class and in
drama. Some group discussion activities (such as circle time or debates) are used to teach children
about the conventions of turn-taking. Others such as a child instructing a partner how to build a model
that cannot be seen are designed to teach children to be precise and explicit in speech. In these ways
and by discussing how to talk effectively, children can learn to use talk flexibly.

It is not only the words and grammar of speech that change depending on the situation. The
very volume and pace we use for speech and the degree to which we prepare what we say
depends on the purpose and audience for that speech. However, this is not to suggest there
are no rules. When speaking in a formal situation a speaker would try to use clear, well-
thought-out language at a volume everyone could hear. In discussion with a few friends a
speaker might produce a tentative idea, rephrase it several times and use pauses and 'urns'.

In conversation there is a clear turn-taking structure that speakers must follow if their contri-
butions are to be acceptable and there are appropriate levels of acceptable interruption. In
class we teach children that if they are chosen to speak to the whole class their contribution
will generally be listened to in full, but in a tentative discussion about a group task children
are likely to interrupt one another repeatedly, finish one another's utterances and talk at the
same time.

PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK

With a partner, choose one formal and one informal conversation to role play, as though you are on the
telephone:

Informal Formal
• asking a friend to a party (pub or club) • making a doctor's appointment
• talking to someone in your family • making a complaint about a faulty
washing machine (car, television)

Compare the way you speak in the two situations in terms of:

• vocabulary • grammatical structures

• length of utterance • acceptable interruptions

How would these utterances change if you were not on the telephone, and why?

16
 Spoken English and Standard English

PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK PRACTICAL TASK

Here are some language autobiographies. You may find it useful to read them and think about language
variation in these cases.

Maggie took A-levels and then went on to a B.Ed. course, specialising in maths.

I was born in Jersey and spent the first few years of my life there. My grandma spoke Jersey French
(a French patois) which my Mum and Dad understood but didn't really speak. Once my Nan wrote
some down for me and I took it proudly to school. The teacher took one look and said, 'That's not
proper French.'

I took quite a long time to learn to speak, which, looking back, may have been something to do with
being hearing impaired. But this wasn't diagnosed until I was at college. My Mum and Dad knew
something wasn't right, but they didn't want to acknowledge it. Now they say things like, 'When you
were little, if you went on ahead and we called you, you didn't turn round.' But at the time they
didn't do anything about it.

When I was seven we moved to Cornwall. I had a bit of a Jersey accent which I wasn't really aware
of at the time. I always remember the first day I was in the playground, a girl came up to me and
said, 'Don't worry. We'll soon teach you how to talk properly.' I used to call my Granddad 'Papa'
which was the Jersey way - and obviously came from the French - but the other children thought
that was odd so I soon learnt to say 'Granddad' instead when I was at school. Also I remember one
of my favourite things to eat as a child was Jersey pudding - made from flour, milk and suet
basically - you eat it with gravy. People used to say, 'There's no such thing as Jersey pudding!
Don't you mean Yorkshire pudding?'

Later when I went to grammar school we moved from rural Cornwall to Essex and I went to
Nellswood School for Girls [said in a 'posh' voice]. This was quite a big change too and I felt
very aware of being different. Maybe it was because of this - and my hearing impairment - but I
found it difficult to put words together and I never had the confidence to speak in groups, something
which I still find hard today.

1. What impact do you think the teacher's reaction to the Jersey French had on Maggie?
2. How did Maggie's hearing impairment affect her language development and her confidence as a
speaker? Discuss the possible effects of the late diagnosis.
3. Look at the points when Maggie moved, first to Cornwall and then to Essex. How did these moves
affect her language identity and self-esteem?

Jon took a degree in biology, then a PGCE, specialising in science.

I grew up in Eastwood, Nottinghamshire. Eastwood's a peculiar place. It's on the Nottinghamshire/

Derbyshire border so it has a dialect that's neither one nor the other but a meld of the two. It's where
DJi. Lawrence grew up, and the English side of my family is connected: my grandfather ran a pub
that's in one of Lawrence's books. My mother's family is firmly rooted in the area. My father, who's
Polish, was stationed in Hucknall nearby during the war. He was originally going to Canada, but he
met my mother at a dance, married and stayed, so the family's firmly embedded.

Some elements of my family were racist. I remember arguments over family tea about my father,
how he couldn't speak English properly. We were subject to racist attacks- windows broken- and
I was assaulted several times on the way home from school. Nottingham had a large Polish
community, which tended to cluster round certain places, so my father had some Polish friends.

17
 Spoken English and Standard English

There was a Polish school on Saturday mornings. I wanted to go to it, but my grandmother, who
was the matriarch of the family, said it would be more useful for me to go to music school than
Polish school. So I grew up with very little knowledge of Polish, no conversational Polish except a
few words: 'Jen dobre' (hello), 'badso' (my friend), 'dai bugie' (give us a kiss), and 'Jadek' (grand-
father) and 'Babja' (grandma) which my children call my parents to distinguish them from their other
grandparents.

I had a very strong sense of belonging to a time-warped community. There was a joke about
Eastwood: everywhere else had mods and rockers in the '60s, but they didn't take hold in
Eastwood till 1975. It was a small, insulated mining community, with just the pit (mine). I grew
up in an odd atmosphere, but adopted the Eastwood dialect. It's a very broad dialect, with lots of
important words. I spoke it all the time. For example, you'd say, 'Eh oop sorry, 'owta gooin' on?' The •
response is, 'Middlin', middlin'.' 'Sorry' means 'my dear', or we'd sometimes say, 'me duck'
(pronounced 'dook'). I had very little exposure to 'outside', mainly through visits to a Polish
family. They'd either speak Polish, which was a closed book, or converse in more Standardised
English than I was used to. When I left college and came to Sussex, after two to three years people
would say to me, 'You come from Birmingham.' After three or four years away I had a London
accent. I couldn't maintain the Eastwood dialect as people wouldn't understand me. But given two
weeks' immersion I'd be in it again.

Lawrence's dialect is his Standardised version, but watered down to a degree so it's accessible. The
only time I've seen it written down as I remember it is a poem which was in the Eastwood &
Kimberley Advertiser. It encapsulated my roots in terms of language.

1. How does Jon convey the sense that Eastwood was a closed community?
2. How do you think this affected his language development?
3. What attitudes did his mother's family and the community have to Jon's father being Polish and how
were these expressed?
4. Look at the dialect in one of D.H. Lawrence's novels (e.g. Mr Morel in Sons and Lovers, or Mellors
the gamekeeper in Lady Chatterley's Lover) and try to identify some of its main characteristics,
bearing in mind what Jon says about it being 'watered down'.

A SUMMARY Of KEY POINTS

> Standard English is a powerful, flexible and useful variety of English, which all speakers and
writers should be able to use. This does not mean that other language varieties will cease to be
used or should be penalised.
> Spoken English is affected by historical, regional and personal variation. This is why it is so
flexible.
> Accent is the way words are pronounced. Dialect is the grammar and vocabulary of the
language.
> It is important to teach children not only how to speak and write Standard English but also when
Standard English usage is appropriate.
> Speaking and listening about texts as part of English teaching, discussion in group and class
activities and drama all have a part to play in learning to use Standard English and other
dialects. However, such learning also involves explicit discussion of the rules covering
Standard English, as well as of dialects and accents.

18
 Spoken English and Standard English

> In practice, issues such as dialect and formality can only really be discussed when children
have knowledge of Standard English as a reference point and are able to discuss and reflect on
their own language.

M-LEVEL EXTENSION > > M-LEVEL XTENSION > > M- EVEL EXTENSI N
You might like to think about your own language biography. Do you speak Standard English or are there any
regional variations in the way you speak? (You would be very unusual if your natural way of speaking was
entirely Standard!)

If there are non-Standard features in your speech. what do you think you should do about this? There are some
possibilities you might think about. which can be illustrated by some examples.

1. One teacher found that her class did not at first understand the word 'pumps' that she used to refer to the
shoes the children wore for PE. Rather than change her word. she taught the children that this was an inter-
esting feature of her speech. They quickly got to understand the word and saw their teacher as a more
interesting person because of this slight language difference.

2. Another teacher found that her class naturally used the construction 'we was going'. In her dialect (which
she had deliberately suppressed in favour of the Standard English variant). she would have said 'we were
going' but also 'I were going'. By contrasting these usages she was able to raise her children's awareness
of Standard and local English.

FURTHER READING FURTHER READING HER READING

DfE {2011) Teachers' Standards. Available at www.education.gov.uk/publications.
Holderness, J. and Lalljee, B. {eds) {1998) An Introduction to Gracy: Frameworks for Talk. London:
Cassell.
Hughes, M. {1994) The oral language of young children, in Wray, D. and Medwell, J. {eds) Teaching
Primary English: the State of the Art. London: Routledge.
Maybin, J. {1994) Children's voices: talk, knowledge and identity, in Graddol, D., Maybin, J. and Stierer,
B. {eds) Researching Language and Literacy in Social Context. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Trudgill, P. {2nd edn) {1999) The Dialects of England. Oxford: Blackwell.

19