School calling children piglets?

[GoToSleepBabyPlease]

Came across this on another thread but felt discussing it there would constitute a derail, so bringing it up here.

On a school website (link below):

'To make table manners fun at Hanford we have devised the ‘Manners Table’, a ranking system of eleven different levels with ‘Piglet’ at the bottom and ‘Royal Guest’ at the top. Each level has a different name to describe the behaviour, for example, a messy eater will be a ‘Panda’ or even ‘Cave Lady’ whereas those girls who have mastered dining rather than merely eating will be a ‘Favourite Auntie’ or ‘Best Granny’. When new girls join they start somewhere in the middle with the aim of working their way up as quickly as possible. If they should become a ‘Royal Guest’ they are allowed to bring their own jam to breakfast. Every Friday after lunch, Miss Morrey reads out the week’s manners rankings. If a girl is moved up then they are given a sweet while others may be warned or some even moved down.

1. Royal Guest (allowed to bring their own jam or other spread and can also move people up and down)
2. Best Granny (allowed to move people up and down in manners)
3. Favourite Aunty
4. Primrose
5. Panda
6. Cat (can go to Tuck Shop on Sunday)
7. Squirrel
8. Hyena
9. Boa Constrictor
10. Cave Lady

10. Piglet'

AIBU to think that referring to children as piglets doesn't exactly model good manners?

hanfordschool.co.uk/wellbeing/manners/

Bloody hell. Do parents really pay to imprison their kids in the 1930s? Why?

I think this is wonderful. We should spend more time on etiquette. I think it's terrible that traditions and manners are dying out. Everyone should understand how proper table manners work.

It infuriates me that my in-laws don't wait for everyone to be served in a restaurant before they commence eating. Using a fork like a shovel etc is grim. Definitely piglet behaviour.

I think we should focus on grammar, etiquette, table manners much more.

@mustlovegin

In the UK we tend to eat with knives & forks, what’s wrong with children using them correctly?

^This, first and foremost

Nothing at all. When I'm on dinner duty I do my best to help kids use the utensils properly- it's a skill the same as any other.

What I object to is referred to those who've not mastered the skill as piglets or cave people.

*referring

That's awful, what kind of school is this?

@GoToSleepBabyPlease I can safely say that, despite 5 blissful years at Hanford, never have I looked at someone else's manners and wondered where they'd fit on the Hanford manners chart. Not even when in the company of other ex Hanfordians. And I seem to recall that we were taught about different cultures. As I've already said, it was much more about thinking about others and demonstrating general politeness and kindness.

Sorry to sidetrack but is this the school where they wanted to send the daughter in ‘Three Men and a Little Lady’? I loved that film as a child!

If someone posted that their dc at the state school down the road was behind called a piglet by their teacher for their table manners, replies would be rather different.

*They will be modelling a pretty universally-accepted standard of table manners befitting children from families with £30k+ a year to throw at their education.

I think it's more the point that many cultures don't use utensils at the table at all, eating with their fingers etc, and labelling people who can't use a salad fork as a 'cave lady' is a bit problematic. I work in a (very) different school environment to this one, and most kids don't use knives and forks at home, so at school you'll see them attempt to spear a slice of pizza with a fork and nibble around it, or eat baked beans with their fingers. I find the implication that that they're essentially cave people a bit troubling. Smacks a bit of calling other cultures 'savage'.*

But we aren't talking about other cultures we are talking about British people. It's sounds disgusting the way the children in your school eat and us a distinctive class marker. As such they wouldn't thrive in polite company as adults so is limiting future prospects. Imagine if schools in poker areas also focused on using cutlery politely, removing hats in doors etc.

*poor areas not poker areas

Also, no one has to send their daughter there - it's completely voluntary! And it's not for everyone by any means, but I loved it, my friends loved it, my sisters loved it, my mother loved it, and DD wants to go - because it's a really lovely, happy school.

In many respects this sounds like a delightful, eccentric, jolly hockey sticks kind of school.

But I would imagine many of the girls go on to be chronic people pleasers (which in my view is one of the most harmful things you can do to a young woman) - all that emphasis on politeness, and gendered etiquette.

I expect someone will be along in a moment to tell me I'm wrong and point out that pupils are encouraged to CLIMB TREES as evidence of their diverse and modern approach to gender..

I'm very jealous, @Puffykins! I have added it to my idle 'when I win the euromillions' daydream as unfortunately that is the only scenario I can see myself affording it!

I want to go here! I want to bring my own jam!

Sounds amazing. (For a 40 something Blyton/Brent-Dyer aficionado)

Although they did make a mistake with numbering their 11 levels. Did anyone else notice? Do I get moved up to cat for being observant or down to Cave Lady for speaking out of turn?

I think this is wonderful. We should spend more time on etiquette. I think it's terrible that traditions and manners are dying out.

Whose traditions, though? This has only just occurred to me, so I may be wrong, but aren't 'good' manners based on wealth? If you go back a ways, the poorer sectors of society had very little by the way of free time, so I imagine didn't stand on ceremony waiting for everyone to be seated and served before eating, or take tiny bites of food and chew thoroughly before swallowing and taking the next forkful. Economy of time. Many probably didn't have or use a full set of tableware, and their manners have been passed down through generations.

In these times of increased social mobility, you probably dine across those from a different background to you more often than your ancestors would have done, so where before you'd move in circles that had more or less the same manners as your own, now we've more opportunity to intermingle (and don our judgy pants).

And if you're very wealthy, it absolutely makes sense to teach the manners that will be expected of your children as adults, of course it does. But to teach them that those who don't used said manners are inferior, and apply unkind monikers? Less so. And rather poor manners, to my mind.

I’ve just downloaded and read the prospectus, and allowed myself to drift into a haze of how much I want to go there right now. And then remembered that I’m a 50 year old mother. Damn.

If I had small children, you would have to pay me a hell of a lot of money to put my kids in there for a week.
No wonder people like Johnson are fucked up.

Like a PP said, it’s one of those things that you could make up a game around and the kids would find hilarious, but it’s a bit odd to have it so formalised and on the website, table manners are important but not eleven-level-league important! That said it sounds from Puffykins that it was the same system that was in place when she went and when her mother went, and I’m sure it would take a lot for a school like that to alter something that’s been a tradition for so long.

So not a fan of the weird manner league, but can see how it could be fine and just a bit of fun if done well, and have just looked up the school website and it does sound pretty idyllic. Riding before breakfast and building dens and climbing trees, who wouldn’t want that for their children? I guess that’s then why I then bristle at the unfairness of it being only open to such a tiny select few. But that’s life I guess! Not a fan of boarding but I would love my kids to go to a school that focused on some of those things. As long as they didn’t come out feeling entitled and better than others though, that’s always my fear!

[quote Puffykins]@GoToSleepBabyPlease I can safely say that, despite 5 blissful years at Hanford, never have I looked at someone else's manners and wondered where they'd fit on the Hanford manners chart. Not even when in the company of other ex Hanfordians. And I seem to recall that we were taught about different cultures. As I've already said, it was much more about thinking about others and demonstrating general politeness and kindness. [/quote]
That's lovely @Puffykins, but for a system designed to demonstrate politeness and kindness, I think it could do with a bit of modernisation. In 2021, for it to be possible (and boasted of on a website) for your teacher to demote you to the tank of 'cave lady' (and in doing so imply that being a cave dweller is something to be ashamed of)... It just doesn't sit right with me, even if it's something that's very rarely done in practice and that everyone involved really enjoys.

I agree with PP upthread that it's probably one of those things that made sense at the time but no one has stepped back and looked at it objectively with 21st century eyes.

I'm all for rewarding good manners, but the names used are absolutely hideous.

*rank, not tank 🤦

But I would imagine many of the girls go on to be chronic people pleasers
all that emphasis on politeness, and gendered etiquette

I don't know what's 'gendered' about eating with a knife and fork.

Also, if you don't teach children basic politeness and etiquette relevant to the culture/country they are living in, it's likely that at some point they are going to become ostracised by the majority.

If this school was located in Japan, or any other country, it would be a different scenario, but it isn't.

I can see that the words 'piglet' or 'cave lady' are not the most appropriate, but what they are trying to teach is still valid.

It's not exactly 'piglets' though is it? It's taken from Winnie the poo. Piglet has no manners.

Whose traditions, though? This has only just occurred to me, so I may be wrong, but aren't 'good' manners based on wealth? If you go back a ways, the poorer sectors of society had very little by the way of free time, so I imagine didn't stand on ceremony waiting for everyone to be seated and served before eating, or take tiny bites of food and chew thoroughly before swallowing and taking the next forkful. Economy of time.

Holy moly, OP
Are you suggesting poor people can’t have nice table manners?!

(There is an excellent ‘working class traditions’ thread running atm. Go and have a look at it, and blow your assumptions out of the water...)

I love piglets. They are gorgeous.