Why are some teachers so unnecessarily mean?

[barhari]

DC1's new teacher is infamous for being very strict - she's fairly old school. The children are genuinely afraid of her. One mum actually specified her child not be put in this strict teacher's form.

She just has such an attitude with the kids - her only form of communication is to berate and tell off. She's fine with adults.

This particular teacher reminds me of a couple of my own - of course, I'm not saying all teachers are like this but I'm just curious how they get away with it? Are they just miserable in themselves? Surely no one thinks this is an effective way of communicating with a child.

There's strict and then there's just plain miserable. Why get into teaching?

I was referring to another post where a pp said this was like someone saying "why are ALL parents shit". So, you know, perhaps your own reading and comprehension skills could use some work

This from your post: The op said why are SOME teachers so unnecessarily mean. Perfectly fair and accurate question

So yes, you were referring to what the OP said, because you said it and it's in her thread title.

The op said why are SOME teachers so unnecessarily mean. Perfectly fair and accurate question.

A pp said "oh what a goady title. Imagine if she said 'all parents are shit' instead huh daffodil"? Well, she didn't say ALL teachers. She said some

This is the whole quote. You cut part of it off. I was, as you see, referring to another pp^^.

I can tell you aren't someone who takes being disagreed with very well though. When you responded to my post, you rudely asked "can't you read?" as if jeering people who you believe aren't as clever as you. I pointed out that actually, I think you were the one who misread or misinterpreted my meaning. You then quoted me out of context to support your incorrect position. That doesn't make you come across terribly well tbh, but perhaps it was just an innocent mistake rather than you trying to bully and manipulate the words of anyone who disagrees with you. I do hope so, since you are a teacher; a profession I generally have the utmost respect for.

I had a horror of a teacher in primary school, her thing was to get you up to demonstrate something she knew you couldn't do very well. I was a straight A student at everything but maths so she would make me come up and show my working out on the blackboard then berate my errors.
Never picked me for any other subject. Did it to most of us, the less bright pupils were picked on constantly. She destroyed my confidence around public speaking and within a year I went from being a kids who was the lead in the school play to one who would barely speak in class.
I'm still friends with some people from back then and they're the same.

I think the power went to her head - she now works in the DOE and I think she was frustrated and bored being in a parochial school. She was also going through a very public divorce which was unusual back then - Catholic country.

Some teachers are just mean. In my senior school the teachers were brilliant for the most part, motivating, bright, seemed happy to be teachers. For most teacher was a 2nd career, they;'d been journos, sports people, doctors, even a farmer... maybe that was the secret to their maturity and happiness with their careers.

I assume they dislike teaching, dislike children but are there because it pays the bills, and they are there out of necessity not choice. As the years go on they become more bitter and resentful.

Inspirational teachers are memorable for a whole person's life, I still remember my kind maths teacher with the patience of a saint, my science teacher that actually believed in me, these people make the world of difference to their pupils for a life time.

The nasty teachers give teaching a bad name.

Because there are unnecessarily mean people from all walks of life.
This 💯%

I think the OP is right: there is a difference between being strict and being miserable.

I know of several strict teachers who wouldn't win popularity contests, but the students respected them and trusted them. Those strict teachers inevitably had a handful of parental complaints each year from a few precious parents who didn't like the fact that the same rules applied to their child as the rest of the class (in my experience, usually the complaint is the parent of a nice child being annoyed that their child wasn't given a free pass for being nice).

The miserable ones are miserable in the staffroom too. They never have anything positive to say and suck the enthusiasm out of any room.

However, I'd still rather work with a decent miserable teacher than one of the 'cool' teachers who are inconsistent, blow hot and cold, change how they are with the students based on their ego and a desire to seem down with the kids. I find their inconsistency worse for students.

I think the difference between teachers and other professions is that we remember the worst (and best) teachers so vividly for the rest of our lives. If a bus driver/shopkeeper etc is super grumpy I might be annoyed but its not likely to stay with me as a strong impression. I think everyone (as evidenced on this thread) can describe in detail there favourite and least favourite teachers. I can almost smell the pencil shavings now.
The only comparable profession probably is midwifery (where we are also vulnerable and where impressions are similarly heightened)

I think the difference between teachers and other professions is that we remember the worst (and best) teachers so vividly for the rest of our lives. If a bus driver/shopkeeper etc is super grumpy I might be annoyed but its not likely to stay with me as a strong impression.

I agree, and would add that we also have the lasting impression because we had to see them repeatedly, and equally we are remembering them from our immature child's impression rather than as a rational adult.

My DD attends the same small school I did and there are still some teachers there that taught me and my siblings. We moved back from Spain when DD was due to go into a school year that is still taught by the teacher I hated as a child because in my eyes she was horrible and always mean to the point I was genuinely tempted to send DD to a different school. I put that to one side to at least visit and talk to her and whilst the teacher hadn't really changed, the "horrible, meanness" that I remembered as a child, from an adults eyes was her being strict and firm with students who had had more jolly/relaxed teachers in the first couple of years so she comparitively came off worse. Having been able to reassess my school experience with her through rational adult eyes, I can see that she was nowhere near as bad as we all made her out to be, but once a teacher gets a reputation as the mean/strict one it often sticks regardless of what they do.

@melj1213

I think the difference between teachers and other professions is that we remember the worst (and best) teachers so vividly for the rest of our lives. If a bus driver/shopkeeper etc is super grumpy I might be annoyed but its not likely to stay with me as a strong impression.

I agree, and would add that we also have the lasting impression because we had to see them repeatedly, and equally we are remembering them from our immature child's impression rather than as a rational adult.

My DD attends the same small school I did and there are still some teachers there that taught me and my siblings. We moved back from Spain when DD was due to go into a school year that is still taught by the teacher I hated as a child because in my eyes she was horrible and always mean to the point I was genuinely tempted to send DD to a different school. I put that to one side to at least visit and talk to her and whilst the teacher hadn't really changed, the "horrible, meanness" that I remembered as a child, from an adults eyes was her being strict and firm with students who had had more jolly/relaxed teachers in the first couple of years so she comparitively came off worse. Having been able to reassess my school experience with her through rational adult eyes, I can see that she was nowhere near as bad as we all made her out to be, but once a teacher gets a reputation as the mean/strict one it often sticks regardless of what they do.

True, but also, adults can change too. Your story reminded me of my friend's RE teacher, who I met socially, as an adult and found utterly charming. When I said to my friend, oh I met your old RE teacher recently. My friend then told me how the teacher had told her at secondary school, that my friend had no soul and couldn't go to heaven because she was an IVF baby . Not something she would have, or could have, made up tbh. This friend is an Oxbridge grad with a v responsible job. She definitely has no hatred for academia or authority figures in general and is not a drama llama.

I've definitely experienced both things, where I've known someone as a child and thought they were horrid, only to meet them again later and find them delightful. Also, where I've met someone later in life who I remember being an absolute twat from childhood or teen years, to discover they are indeed an absolute twat.

So, I don't think you can generalise really.

My favourite teacher at school though, was an absolute cow, but I loved her. She was so dry and sarcastic and took no shit. She was also fabulous. I got an A* in her subject when I went into her class a low achiever in the subject. I then went on to study it at a really good university. I have to say, she was also very strict with me; this wasn't a "I loved how strict she was", because she was horrible to everyone else. She was pretty snarky with me, but I found her brilliant.

I had a terrible primary school teacher. She had her little group of teachers pets, and then the other group of kids she hated.
I was hated because she decided I was thick. Actually I was left handed so got things backwards a bit. She seemed to enjoy publicly shouting at children who'd not done so well with their work. I know she enjoyed making me cry, I remember her crowing "Oh here come the waterworks!" almost gleefully on one occasion.
There was a boy in the class who obviously had additional needs and she took great delight in winding him up and setting him off. Always had to be public.
I know she intentionally held me back with schoolwork as when I finally changed teachers for the last year of primary my new teacher couldn't understand why I was working on such low levels.
My son's school has a teacher who seemed to develop a scary reputation. On talking to my son it seems this is down to her enforcing silence on occasion (yr 1) and actually making them try hard. She was the one who spotted my son needed some help from the SENCo for a while and it made a massive difference.
Strict can seem scary when you're small, but that's not the same as nasty.

Maybe they learnt it from the former mean and unpleasant Education Secretary, Michael Gove.

Do we have a yawning icon?

Why are some teachers so unnecessarily mean?

Because some people are mean, and teachers are just people like everyone else. And because, like people in other jobs, teachers get ground down over the years - by the system and by the people they have to deal with (kids and adults).

A better question might be "Why wouldn't you expect a small proportion of teachers to be mean, when that applies to literally the whole population?".

When you decide on teaching as a career, you're probably about 18 (12 in my case!). You tend to change a bit over the decades. Sure, the vast majority of teachers go into the job because they want to do it,but that doesn't mean 100% of them are all sweetness and light even to start with!

Every profession has its good and its bad. There's no earthly reason why teaching should be the exception to that or why it should be surprising that some people are arseholes.

I worked in a school office with a woman who literally swore under her breath about every child that came to the office for help, medicine, lost stuff. Anything seemed to make her mad, and she has apparently been reported multiple times for being rude to other staff, but weirdly, you can't actually fire someone from working at a school who just generally hates children/people. She did her job, just badly and begrudgingly. All the kids referred to her as Trunchbull, which was fitting.

@Marshmallow91 I was on the receiving end of a teacher like that in what is now year 1 in 1982/3. The classrooms had heavy old fashioned doors. I let go of the door as I was coming in and the door banged. She grabbed me and marched me up the centre aisle hitting me. Someone was hit most days. I was also smacked by the headteacher for being slightly misaligned in the queue on the playground. She walked up and down between the lines punishing offenders until the lines were perfectly straight. I loo at the lovely schools my DC go to and how nice the staff are, especially with little ones. Coincidentally DS3's reception teacher was at "scary school" when I was.

I agree that it's just that some people are assholes and that teachers (alongside health care professionals) stick more with us when they're assholes than most other professions or random people.

These days, I'm more often having to explain to my DDs why some kids are so unnecessarily mean. School peer meanness can be another one that can stick more.

Oh god there really are some miserable teachers. I’ve just started a new job and one of the teachers is ineffective, rude to the kids and short with fellow teachers. No clue why he’s still teaching tbh.

As an ex teacher i can say one reason why I "failed" was that I was far too nice. Kids don't respect nice unfortunately. In an ideal world the perfect teacher would be firm but fair and inspirational with a big personality. But given the huge workload and the fact that teachers are human...many don't fit the brief.
And oh...kids can be meaner than parents...ive been threatened and bullied out by students. Pens thrown at heads.
Imo the teachers have to be " mean."

Has the OP given any examples of this mean teacher yet?

Or, that article's not going to write itself is it now...

In an ideal world the perfect teacher would be firm but fair and inspirational with a big personality. But given the huge workload and the fact that teachers are human...many don't fit the brief.

^This. If you weeded out all but the perfect (and almost perfect) teachers, schools would have to close. Like many jobs, it doesn't lend itself to allowing you to be perfect.

My dd's wonderful, firm but fair, hilarious, entertaining and inspiring history teacher just left for another job. There is no teacher anywhere who wouldn't want his reputation and his relationship with kids and staff, but people like him are few and far between in any sphere.

In the 60s I had a head teacher who loved to be ruthless. He wore a tweed jacket andbrogue shoes with steel tips on the heels and we could hear him a walking down the corridor..
I remember a boy being hit around the classroom scattering tables, the man was out of control.
The whole class was terrified of him.
When our usual class teacher was of with illness we had the headmaster everyday and my friend used to make herself sick in the morning so that she could miss school and we were only 8/9.
Years later I saw him walking through town and was surprised at how small and measly he looked.
I was quite pleased.
So yes, some teachers are very mean.

Perception plays a huge role in this, both from the perspective of the children and that of the parents. A teacher is more likely to be seen as 'mean' by someone that disagrees or dislikes something they have done or a decision they have made. As a PP said, it's not unusual for some parents to call teachers nasty, mean, bitches, etc. when speaking to their friends. When you drill down into it, it's typically about a seating position in the classroom, another child being elected to student council, expecting children to complete work, issuing consequences for behaviour choices, etc.

There are a small number of miserable people who have lost the joy in what they do. That's true of all professions and walks of life including those in caring professions like nursing, carers, doctors and, yes, teachers.

However, there are a lot more teachers who are perceived as 'mean' when, if examined objectively, they are not.

The teachers you really need to be worried about are the 'I'm your mate' teachers. The kids tend to be relatively happy and, by extension, so do the parents. However, what they don't see is that very little learning and progress is happening and the class are learning some terrible behaviours that future teachers will need to spend time unpicking.

@buggeroffvirus

Judging the people of 60 years ago by today's standards will always show them finding wanting. In the 60s, it was acceptable and common for parents to beat their children and legal for men to rape their wives. That doesn't mean that parents nor husbands are like that now.

Iamnotthe1

The teachers you really need to be worried about are the 'I'm your mate' teachers. The kids tend to be relatively happy and, by extension, so do the parents. However, what they don't see is that very little learning and progress is happening and the class are learning some terrible behaviours that future teachers will need to spend time unpicking

I would go one further and say that in today's current trend of teaching they are also responsible for some very good strict teachers seeming like the bad ones.

“Strict” can mean anything from having high expectations and good control of your class through to abusive behaviour. DD described a new teacher yesterday as “strict but in a good way” . I tend to take that word with a pinch of salt. Obviously if a teacher is genuinely inappropriate / abusive it must be raised with the Head. And please bear in mind that it needs to be investigated and they won’t just take your word for it at face value.

@FrippEnos

Agree completely.

Strict has also changed its meaning. 20 years ago, it would have been seen as a positive label: high expectations, deals with behaviour effectively, promotes great progress, etc. Those same teachers are carrying that label still but now it's seem as undesireable.