Was my teacher's behaviour inappropriate, or just typical for the late 1990s?

25 years on and you’re thinking about it .

really don’t think anything to worry about but if you do see a counsellor to talk it over with someone impartial

Right so the teacher talked to you about work and gave you tuition at school with your mums knowledge while other staff were there. 🫣

My deputy head of year wrote ‘best legs in the school’ on my leavers shirt in 1994. Inconceivable now!

Oh, sorry to post twice, but we also offered revision sessions at Easter for gcse students (again, some of whom were made to come in) and additional access to the art room/conputers etc for finishing off course work.

so coming in in inset days or in holidays is very very common and most teachers volunteer out of the goodness of their heart to do these.

if a student can’t make the arranged sessions due to holiday/illness etc then yes absolutely the teacher might offer to do it at a time that works for both of them.

Ex teacher

offering additional support is pretty normal.

in my department for year 11s we offered drop in sessions most lunchtimes for revision/going through any questions students found difficult.

they are made compulsory for some students who don’t do enough work.

we also pay for 1:1 tutoring from (usually) outside teachers who come in and do say 10 weeks of an hour a week focusing on specific exam topics.

when I taught a gcse maths resit class I had office hours and anyone could drop in and go through questions or topics. One year I had one lad who really wanted a 5 and I arranged with him several sessions before school/lunchtkme/afterschool in the two weeks running up to the exam. He got his 5 and was very grateful I spent the time.

my school did also send tutors out to students houses for those students who were too anxious to come to school - usually senior teachers (they had the time) but sometimes anyone who had spare time.

additional 1:1 tuition is very very common and most students appreciate it.

I expect he was staring at others too....you just only noticed the times his eyes were on you.
Unless you are now trying to suggest for a whole hour his eyes were only on you which then sounds like you are a bit delusional.

Nothing wrong with that.
A dedicated teacher.
Though now-a-days teachers are advised not to be in spaces alone with students in case the student has a crush on them and imagines what is not there or make up stories, etc, They would be silly not to protect themselves these days.

You were old enough to see that the door was open, other staff about. Your mother knew you were there.

Did you have a crush on them?

Did you feel unsafe?

Yes, I remember a girl in maths class used to stare at me all the time and it unnerved me. Actually, the window cleaner does it too. Eye contact can be a minefield for some.

I was at secondary in the mid-late 00s. Had a chat with my best friend a few weeks ago about dodgy teachers. One was openly gay and added our friend who was also gay on MSN in year 8. No idea what they talked about but I do know this would not be allowed now (and probably wasn’t then tbh…)

A female PE teacher who taught there for decades and was very large and masculine (my mum said trans for sure but we had no proof) used to request some girls shower after PE and would watch… I weirdly met someone through work a couple of years ago and it transpired she also went to this school some 15 years prior to me, the first thing she mentioned was this teacher definitely being a paedo!

I had a very young science teacher in year 8 who would look up my skirt. I went through a phase of wearing a mini skirt to school with no tights and because we were on the high stools and I was front row, he’d look and it was obvious. He also brought his guitar in once to sing “You’re Beautiful” by James Blunt which was fucking weird and he kept looking directly at me.

I had another young teacher that same year comment on my skirt but in a way to humiliate me. He was a strange one. He basically intentionally asked the popular girl in our year if she would wear a skirt like mine and her being a bit of bitch sneered, looked me up and down and said of course not. He used this as proof I also shouldn’t be wearing a skirt like this because boys would be looking up my skirt on the stairwell. He used to shout at me aggressively sometimes (this is even going into further years) for something and nothing, then come to me privately afterwards to apologise. We were friends on Facebook after I left for years, he would message me happy birthday every year which I ignored. I never knew what to make of him.

We had a geography teacher who married a former pupil too. I don’t know, different times I guess even though it was 15ish years ago. Your teacher sounds pretty normal compared to those. The instance in the classroom is the weirder of the two, maybe staring was his technique to unsettle you and make you open up.

He singled you out and made you feel uncomfortable - that is not the actions of a kind helpful teacher

You knew something wasn't right but unable to describe what wasn't right

That does not happen when someone is being kind and genuine

Predatory teachers had a much easier time to groom students than they do now and we were not raised to question an adult in a position of authority. Thankfully we discuss boundaries a lot more openly now

Why would you think it a possibility?!

Are you trying to say you are reassessing him as NeuroDiverse?

I was teaching in the 1990s and think it was odd and unwise behaviour but it would seem that nothing actionable took place, unless your memory comes back and says otherwise.

Around the same time, I asked for my concerns about a school governor's behaviour to be minuted when the H/T wanted to dismiss my unease.
The governor had taken to visiting the families of some of our female pupils, without any official reason ( which there could never be). He came into the school, to offer extra support to pupils.

I insisted that he should never be alone with any child.
Eventually the H/T decided to advise him not to visit pupils' homes but schools were certainly not as hot on Safeguarding as they are now.

Sometimes teachers are just nice people! But they are influential in our lives and so the memory of them tends to remain. I still think about Mr Bradbury who was a trainee teacher in my last year of primary school. He read something I had written and told me that I was a very good writer.

I'm now a multi-published author. I don't think he was 'after' me, I think he was just spotting some talent in a child who didn't get much praise otherwise and his words in some small way helped me to stick to my ambition.

But that’s about you! And is not something that happened! Why are you determined to be seen as a hapless victim to a predatory male teacher who you seem to want to be seen as obsessed with you? a lamb to the slaughter?! 😵‍💫

All sounds pretty innocent to me. I think maybe as you say you are introverted and suspect you are on the spectrum you have misread the situation. You felt he was staring at you, you noticed him telling you off for talking more. I think that his behaviour was normal and you are now trying to turn it into something it wasn't.

This. Nothing happened, op, why is this still on your mind?

Doesn't sound particularly dodgy to me. One of our PE teachers used to shag the 6th form girls. The head teacher called him "the luckiest man in the World".

Bloody hell!!!

Difficult to say, my brother had some help from his science teacher to get grades for medical school. He did talk to my parents and it was all above board, he was a nice teacher! I guess that if the extra classes weee in school then at least it was possible appropriate place … if extra lessons were allowable one to one

One of my friends was at a school in the sixth form where she was being nailed by her art teacher. She thought he was in love with her. Turns out he was nailing half the class!

honestly, helping you with your homework is just a good teacher!

I agree with others you are over thinking this, and your last post looks like you are trying to twist the narrative.
how do you know he was trying to gauge your interest in him?