When Hugh Lunn began to write his memoirs of growing up in the 1940s and 1950s, he found that he had to remember the phrases and words of that time to recapture the essence of that era of his life. Only then did he come to realise that we, Aussies, were losing something special of our Australian character and heritage – our Aussie Lingo.
The experience of trying to recapture those words and phrases became the impetus to record over a period of sixteen years as much of our disappearing Aussie Lingo as he could. That record became the basis of his book, “Lost for Words”. A second book, “Words Fail Me” resulted from many calls, letters and emails with other stories and Aussie idiom from Aussies from all parts of Australia.
We, as teachers, have a professional responsibility to pass on to our young students, our history, our culture and our unique version of the English language. Owning these books, reading them ourselves and to our primary students is an excellent way to pass on our unique culture.
Multiple copies of Hugh Lunn’s books should be in every school library, particularly where middle school and secondary school students can be given access.
In fact, these books should be required reading for any teacher in training for primary teaching as well secondary Social Science and English teaching.
A Challenge to Teachers:
Your position as a teacher is unique. Influence the syllabus writers to add a study of our Aussie idiom/slang to our syllabuses. After all, there are many teachers on syllabus writing bodies.
I’m sure, within the present syllabus structures, teachers can use this material to teach all the required skills detailed in the syllabuses.
By doing so, you can help keep alive what has been and can continue to be our unique version of the English language.
Some Teaching Ideas
If I were a permanent primary teacher with a class in the upper school, I would read an episode of the Bert and Grace Story from “Lost for Words” on a regular basis to supplement the novel I was reading to my class.
Here are some suggested lessons on a variety of topics. The first one is the way I started in my role as a relief teacher. I have used versions of it many times when there has been spare time in my day. I find the students are fascinated by our Aussie Lingo. There are two topics that are particular favourites of primary school students. The first is one Hugh Lunn calls “Dolls”. It catalogues what Aussie men called their womenfolk, e.g. an old boiler. They love the explanation of where it came from. The second topic is “Gossip” and the favourite term is “The bush telegraph”.
There are so many different topics you could discuss that you could go on for years without repeating one.
So, help keep alive our Aussie slang and help maintain what is the Australian character and our way of life along with the new aspects of our life brought to us by our new citizens.