Hello Miss

I use to teach 16- year-olds at an FE college. One lad, when I set the class work and all their heads were down would shout,“ Arse”. It took me a while to identify the culprit but he was a nice boy and just didn’t like my subject. When I retired I movedfrom the midlands to a small south coast town. About seven years later I was walking down the Main Street when the window of a passing car was wound down and a voice shouted, “ Arse.” No escape from ex-pupils it seems.

BBbevan

Grandma70s I have been retired for sometime but when I was teaching every adult in my school was addresses as e.g. Miss,Smith, Mrs Brown, Mr White. No Miss or Sir. The children were also addressed by their first names and never just pointed at. Just good manners really.

Which teacher just points at their pupils ???

And the “Miss” thing has been standard for years .

Grandma70s I have been retired for sometime but when I was teaching every adult in my school was addresses as e.g. Miss,Smith, Mrs Brown, Mr White. No Miss or Sir. The children were also addressed by their first names and never just pointed at. Just good manners really.

On April 1st 43 years ago I got married and we went off to Tenerife on our honeymoon thinking we were very daring to travel so far. Checking in at the hotel desk a voice said 'Hello Miss, are you on your honeymoon here?' Yes, a 15 year old girl with parents out of my class! We laughed and laughed about it over the years and now her grandchildren hear the tale. I really enjoy meeting former pupils and catching up with their lives and families.

Will somebody please tell me why “Miss” without the surname is considered an acceptable form of address? I’ve been asking this for years, but nobody’s yet answered. The equivalent of Sir (the acceptable form of address for male teachers) is Madam, but I don’t think we want schoolchildren using that. It’s not Miss, not in English. So what’s wrong with Miss Smith, Miss Jones etc? Is it just laziness?

I wasn’t a teacher, but worked in the school canteen at the only High School in our immediate area. Both my daughters attended the school so I knew a lot of the kids through them as well. But, for evermore I think, if I see any of them out and about I am the ‘canteen wifie’. I lived in Scotland then and am sure when I go back, if I bump into any of them, I will get the same greeting!

My husband misses his students too. Not the machinery, admin, or stupidity of the University though!

It's nice to think that many of you enjoyed teaching as he did. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Like others, we do live away from where he worked. Seeing students when out was not something we really looked forward to. I think it's a bit different now my husband has retired.

I live in London - my cousin in West Ireland died, tragically, suddenly, and there was a rush for my sister and I to get flights, car, hotel .. Driving from the Church to the graveyard I was following another car, hoping they knew where we were going - only for them to slow and pull over, and one of the passengers to jump out and ask - in a London accent - if I knew the way. Well, both cars got there, we nodded at each other in relief at having made it to the graveyard in time but I was struck at the familiarity of the driver, a lady in her 50's.

I puzzled overnight on who or how I would know this woman in a place I've only been to once before, when it hit me. My son's Deputy Headmistress.

When he went to school the following week he struck up a conversation with her - Miss, were you in Kerry last week? She was taken aback, and said said - "how would you - Oh, Alex, was that your Mother"! She'd had the same "how do I know that lady"? Her husband is my cousins wife's Uncle.

I volunteer now at a charity bookshop which also sells lots of toys. I was an Infant teacher in the area and often get customers who come and stand in front of me saying with "Did you used to be Mrs ******?" or " You don't remember me, do you? ". I've also had some bringing their children in with the immortal words "This was my old teacher", followed by a puzzled look on child's face as to how could this old woman ever have been a teacher? I can usually remember them, maybe with a few clues and do love hearing about their lives.

Thank goodness my ex-pupil was only doing the reception in the hospital .

I love being recognised by former pupils. I find it very rewarding that they remember me fondly and that they remember the wok I did with them. One former pupil has told me that I am the reason she became a teacher.I was very touched. I was also inspired by a former teacher and took pleasure in passing on things he taught me to my pupils.

We’ve always lived in locality of where we worked. Husband was having a vasectomy and the nurse assisting was an ex pupil.

I used to work in a college refectory where we had a uniform to wear.l used to die of embrassment if l meet the students in town or out and about.As they thought it highly amusing to say in a loud voice "Hello miss, l did'nt recognise with your clothes on" it happened on many occassions! When one lady overheard and looked ay me rather suspiciously l felt the need to tell her what l did, much to her amusement.!

In hospital after my hysterectomy, the physio came into our ward of four patients to offer advice about post op activities.
I was quite miffed when I was missed out of the discussion and ignored. Not able to keep quiet, I asked why.
The physio said Miss, it's me Susan, I can't treat you, because you taught me and you know my parents. My supervisor will be dealing to with you later.
My first words to this young woman, with jet black hair, were not, How lovely to see you again, but What on earth have you done to your beautiful, long red hair?
I blame the morphine I was on for my rudeness.

The other thing that used to happen to me was that I often bumped into parents in the supermarket, as I lived in the small town, I taught in.
I would catch them scrutinising the contents of my trolley. I soon learned to hide the alcohol under everything.

Oh, I don't mind. Indeed I am Facebook friends with both my teachers and my pupils. I worked in an area school so I come across even the parents of my pupils... many of whom I knew anyway. Just say Hi! and Bye! and that's it.

A friend of mine, an overworked Probation Officer, arrived in Spain for a much needed holiday. Settling in to her apartment, she wandered out on to the balcony. She heard the words "Hi S" and looked over to the nextdoor balcony to see one of her most troublesome client families ensconced in the next apartment ?

When my son was in the 6th form he bumped into two teachers at a music festival . He said that he didn’t know who was more surprised by the encounter , but pleased when one of them said
‘ What happens here C stays here - both ways
‘ I didn’t dare enquire as to what any of them were doing!

My friend used to run the diabetic clinics in her surgery. She was always meeting patients with the most unsuitable foods in their trollies. She always commented!
Not only teachers?

A very good reason to keep your clothes on!

The problem was being hailed by pupils about whom you could not remember a thing. Changes from teenager to middle aged parents are considerable. On the other hand it is flattering to be remembered in old age. Teachers of PE in my day had problems with visualising some pupils when writing reports out of maybe 450 seen in a week. For a while reports were automated into a number of stock phrases you could recycle in any way that xeemed convincing. Parents soon saw through this demanding we return to labotiously hand written ,apparently convincing thought pieces about their special offspring. That was in the days before computers. I suspect that the same thing is still happening in typescript form and judging by a primary school report I saw a few years ago amount to many pages long, covering every subject as well as behaviour and reasons for this. Teachers accomplished the near impossible in the past. Now it is straight impossible.

I taught at the local senior school for 20 years and often met up with students I had taught. I remember two boys in particular who had both been 'difficult' at school. They happily apologised for the way they had behaved and proceeded to tell me how they had changed, got good jobs, a wife/girlfriend, their own place etc. It gave me so much pleasure.
Another girl from my tutor group used to be my hairdresser and chat about what some of the others were doing.
The only time it was a problem was when I was on holiday in Rhodes, sunbathing by the hotel pool, when a young lad surfaced from the water beside me, shouting "Hello, Miss!" Luckily I wasn't topless and his family went home after a couple of days.

My friend is a teacher. She bumped into a pupil one weekend. The pupil said "Miss, look at your hair"! Obviously it wasn't up to school standards.

My DS, who's been a teacher for twenty years, had a disconcerting experience two years ago when taking his son to an Open Day at their local high school - "Hello Sir" said the man who would be his son's teacher.... ?
DS said it made him feel ancient. I couldn't stop laughing ?

I moved to another county to train and work as an Occupational Therapist. Imagine my surprise when I bumped into my old form/chemistry teacher - he had got a job at a school in the same town I worked in.
Some time after that I had to take a patient home from the psychiatric day centre I worked at. She had forgotten her key so we had to go to her daughter's school to get her key. Guess who came to meet us..... my old teacher again!
We kept in touch after that, I went to his house and met his wife and children and when I got married I invited them. We still meet up occasionally and stay in touch on Facebook - I am 53 now!

I should have previewed this post!