[Steely Tom]

Both my children went through the same public school system, and both of them have a couple of quirky ways of using speech. The one that comes to mind is saying "it happened on accident" instead of "it happened by accident."

I tried to explain that "on accident" is not correct, but according to them that's what they heard at school, and "on accident" is no less legitimate as a colloquialism than "by accident."

I'm just a dumb engineer, not a linguist (cunning or otherwise) so I didn't have the ability to go any deeper into the linguistic origins or the expression "by accident," so that's where we left it. I can't figure out if it's important or not.

[litehaus]

“(cunning or otherwise)”
Wandering roun a gun store I caught a conversation and injected a comment re “The Peter Principle”..which got a reply that folks under 50 don’t know what that is...Your ‘injection’ above rings that same kinda bell.....LOL....

[Ouderkirk]

THe hardest course I too in college was not Field and Wave electromagnetics or Accelerator Physics. It was Grammar.

I had to unlearn everything I thought I knew.

[tom h]

Good points, from a Tom to a Tom. All of us learned snippets of English that no doubt violate some rules of the language.

But no doubt your kids were not raised to be so self-centered that they can’t take constructive criticism, and think they have a “right” to spell any d-mn way they please. So they would listen politely to their boss and carry out his instructions, without complaint and without whining or calling you or your wife.