dss teachers not calling him by his name

[Sibble]

I can't work out whether to say something or not. Ds2s name is Max, he's been at school for a year and his teacher calls him Maximus. At first I was surprised and maybe I should have said something straight away, but also thought maybe it's like a term of endearment. Ds doesn't seem bothered but each time I here it I can't help but flinch and think - it's MAX! Anyway another Max has not joined the class ds says all the teachers and Max are now going to call him Maximus so there's no confusion. At one stage ds1 had 2 boys with the same name in his class and they were called X-surname initial e.g. John B and John A, no confusion there.

Should I say something, as I say he's not bothered, am I being precious and if I should say something, what should I say without sounding precious?

YABalittleU.

If he minded then do something about it. If he doesn't mind then leave it. I would suggest that you ask him.

My dad always insisted that no one was ever to shorten my name even though it lends itself to a very easy shortened version. He would tell off anyone who dared to use the shortened version. I did not mind in the slightest and in fact I rather like it when people call me the shorten version. I rebelled at the same age as your DS and insisted instead that everyone call me Montgomery ( I don't know why either!). Even now as an adult I still smile when people call me the shortened version of my name.

And Maximus is a cool name. (but not as cool as Montgomery naturally).

I think your are making a big deal out of nothing, it sounds like a term of endearment to me. The teacher may get upset, Why rock the boat? She probably likes your ds.

hmm you see my dd has an English name but sometimes people in other coutnries will try out their country's equivalent name, so dd sometimes gets that. Sometimes they give the local diminutive as an affectionate nickname because they feel uncomfortable using the more formal sounding full name with a dc and so we are used to that and don't mind it.

This is not my dd's real name but say it was Anne - they might call her Anna or Annuschka something like that. However to call her say Roseanne or Annabelle or something for some reason I wouldn't like ....

Say something if it bugs you sibble. Just say you hesitated to bring it up, thought you might get used to it but you have not and feel uncomfortable with it. Could she use Max S instead of Maximus to distinguish between the two boys. I don't see how the teacher would mind

My son is called Thomas - at somepoint in his life he will quite likely end up as Tom with his friends.
For now, if someone calls him Tom, he is quite insistant that he is infact Thomas. He is 6 years old.
In his class, conventiently, the other 2 Thomas' (on birth certificate) were already Tom and Tommy.
My brother insists on calling him Tom which winds both me and Thomas up.

I think that calling Max, Maximus (giving him a longer name) is the equivalent of calling Thomas, Tom.

It would wind me up!

The fact that Max is happy with it, makes it a bit different. If Thomas liked being called Tom at school, then I'd let it go (it will probably happen one day). It also would depend on the child though - Thomas is quite a confident boy (too much so sometimes!) and so would stand up for himself if he wasn't happy about it. If the same is true with your son, then maybe you should just leave it.

YANBU but I imagine they just don't know.Please have a word with them ,I am sure they would be horrified to think they have been calling him the wrong name against his will.

Archstanton that is so very rude of the teacher! Out of curiosity, did she have dc of her own?? I'm a teacher and would never, ever call a child by any name other than what they (the child) tells me they want to be called or what is on the register. You don't just make up your own nicknames for other people's dc! FFS. I can't believe people think this is ok. If the child him/herself asks to be called, for example, Beth and not Lizzie, that's one thing, but a teacher shouldn't be handing out her own nicknames like that. Incredible.

ds1 as ateen kept getting his name shortened as his first name sound slike 2 name sor that there should be a hypen but no matter what ds said teacher would not do it

So at parents evening I walked in and called teacher by first name , he corrected me i then repeated and pointed out since ds had asked him several times to use his proper name and he refused to that i felt only fair to call him by his first name

Before you have a go at the teacher, ask why she is calling him Maximus. Is it with his agreement, or even at his request?
Then you can point out that you want him to be called Max and could she please comply with your wishes.

I have three children in class with one name, and three with another. Two prefer a diminutive of the name, others prefer an initial. One asks that I use his nickname (which is fine)
One of the diminutives has a mother who freaks if he's called that in her hearing so I don't when I'm talking to her. But he's almost 11, so when he said 'Please call me x' I do.

yanbu to be pissed off I do think it's a parents and childs correct name thing.

My mum hates the fact that I use and everyone who've I've since school (and school friends) call me a shortened name which is the same as a letter from the alphabet.

Incidentally my ds 5 has a name that can be shortened and when people do he tells them my name is x My Ddad gis DGD calls him by his initials (commen combination) but he will only allow DGD to do this

When he gets labels for coat peg, books, certificates etc does it say Max? As the school will always use their correct name so this will indicate whether they realise its Max not Maximus IYSWIM.

YABa little U IMO to inforce them to stop it if DS likes it as pp said its his identity so his choice in a way.

If he's not bothered then at least that's something, but I can see why you are irritated.

When I was at school some teachers used to call me (and my sister) "Twinny" instead of our names and I hated it! I think that is really rude even if they claim they mean it in jest.

YANBU to want your child to be called by his name, however...are you sure that the teacher knows that Max is the correct name.

She may have either assumed Maximus was the correct name and Max the informal shortened one or she may have heard another member of staff refer to him as Maximus and assume that this is his name. If no one has corrected her, she may not actually know.

I have done this a couple of times. I once had a child called Ollie who was actually Ollie on his birth cert. but his previous teacher had referred to him as Oliver. I thought this was his name (I did ask him which he preferred - he said he didn't mind!). At parents evening his mum was really cross and 'told me off' - I felt awful but it really was a genuine mistake and can happen easily particuarly when it has become common usage (as Maximus has) and she hasn't been corrected.

Definitely tell her, but be gentle!

I think some teachers just read the official papers,a dn that's it.

DS's preschool teacher knew him as Jamie for a year and a half before he startedthere. he got registered at school under his actual name - James, and she started calling him that.(?!)

It was easily rectified as a) she admitted she hadn't thought it through and b) HE never even looked up when she called him James, he just didn't know that was his name!

So, when i said, oh, he only knows he is Jamie, that's all they called him, so, definitely worth a quick comment if it makes you feel better

YANBU.

I caused my headmaster to give my mother a shamefaced apology for calling me by a shortened form of a name which was similar to mine.

My mum had chosen my name because it was different and not so some twerp could change it but was too reserved and embarassed to call the HT on it.

I wasn't. I put him straight in no uncertain terms.

I was 6 years old!

The moral of this tale is, if you feel awkward pulling this rude teacher up, let your son do it!

Is he happy being called Maximus, or is he just unwilling to object? DS is 5 and I know he has strong opinions on what he wants to be called (there are two slightly different ways of pronouncing his name, which we'd always used interchangeably, but a few months after he'd started Reception he asked us to use one pronunciation (the one that we used less often) in preference to the other). So if your DS actively wants to be called Maximus I wouldn't dive in and try to stop it, but if he isn't bothered either way then I would talk to the teacher.

Starexpat, no, she did not have children at the time.
TBH, at 3yrs, even if she had said she wanted Beth instead of Lizzie, I'd still expect the teacher to call her by the same name we used. I wouldn't even have minded her calling her Elizabeth but Beth has a completely different feel to it. She's now nearly 5 and wants to be called, Ellie at the moment!

3trees OP's son's registered name is Max. all the papers would say max.

Ds is Ben, not Benjamin, plain and simple Ben. If I'd have wanted to, I would have called him Benjamin. But I didn't.

The amount of primary school teachers that call him Benjamin though!

He used to ask them not to call him Benjamin, it used to annoy him and he's get pretty wound up by it, the children picked up on this so would call him Benjamin to annoy him (as children do) I often mentioned it to the teachers too but it never stopped.

I never could understand why they continued to do something that not only upset my ds a great deal but also wasn't his name

So imo, YANBU

Presumably he will have a new teacher next year, so I would wait to see what they call him then.

If the 'Maximus' continues, I would say light heartedly to the teacher 'you do know that his name is Max and not Maximus, don't you?'' Perhaps say that you assumed the previous teacher used that name last year as a nickname rather than thinking it was his name.

My DD has had a similar thing happen to her at school. Her name can be pronounced two ways. She has had two teachers over the years that say it the'wrong' way.

I asked her if it bothered her. She said she quite liked it so I let it go. If she had not liked it then I would have said something to the teacher.

YANBU but I am not surprised. I have known children's names changed at nursery school.

Archie was called Archibald which was not his name.

Ellen was called Helen by a member of staff who said she liked it better!

Harriet was called Harry Hot.

Phoebe was called Beefy - yes, by the staff.

etc. I often wonder what they think they are doing.

Challenge the teacher - polite but firm.

think you should start referring at all times to teacher by slighly enlongated format ie : Mrs Taylor becomes Mrs Taylorington. Should she query it reply that its just theres another Mrs Taylor you know and it helps clear up any confusion

Depending on how willing your son is to stand up for himself and how much he does or doesn't like Maximus, you could tell him to not answer to maximus but only max. or max A/B/whatever if there are two max's to differentiate between.

Very politely of course, with a couple of lines ready planned in case he is challenged 'oh I didn't realise you were talking to me as my name is max not maximus' etc.

Alternatively, could you encourage him to call his teacher Mrs Smith-imus or Jones-imus and put '-imus' on the end of all his friends names and if he is asked about it he could just say that he thought it was what he was supposed to do as they were adding it to his name and he didn't know why so thought that if they did it to him they would obviously want the favour returned

Arch I didn't think she had! And yes, I quite agree at 3 it should be what the parents say it is. And Beth is an entirely different name!

Collie

Oh, sorry, should have read better!