Although we have Lynne Truss's fantastic homage to the humble apostrophe, someone should perhaps write at a simple introduction to the pronunciation of the English alphabet.
But surely, we all know that "a" on its own is pronounced "ay". But what about the letter "h"? As far a junior school teacher in rural Derbyshire in concerned, the pronunciation is "haytch". Au contraire Ms Illiterate! The correct pronunciation, as verified by the Oxford English Dictionary, is actually: "aitch".
But does this matter (and should I be starting a sentence with "but")? Yes, it does matter because this is part of the foundation for our rich, expressive and diverse language. Get the sound of our letters wrong and its all down hill.
Many would disagree that such pendantic issues, including issues of grammer, should be ignored and go as far as to suggest that we should opt for a more intuitive approach to language. Some would prefer to use a phonetic approach where all our historic customs and grammar rules go out of the window with basic spelling.
The sad reality about this true story is that if our teachers are getting it wrong, what hope for those now at school? Dumbing-down may not be an actual policy for our leading and learned educationalists (the experts) but it is certainly one of the outcomes.
