Female teacher calling dc beautiful

[Minty197]

Y1 class. Teacher is female and says bye beautiful to some of the girls at drop off when dc run to their parents. Would you see this as ok

If that was the case, she'd be saying it to the boys as well.
It's all part of the messages girls get from birth about their worth and what's important. It shouldn't be happening in an educational setting. We expect girls to not wear makeup in school and just get on with the uniform, but at the same time that how they look, matters. The boys shouldn't be listening to it either.

Wouldn’t bother me. My DDs form tutor is very friendly with her form, takes time to chat to them and calls them her girls, lovelies etc. She’s been with them for 4 years now. Having met her I can see it’s just her personality which I like, and my daughter and her friends always speak so highly of her.

Every day sexism. Touring secondary schools the number of heads who called female students beautiful and male students brilliant was very jarring. They need to stop focusing on the girls appearance.

Is there awards for beauty in school? Should a primary aged girl already be getting the message that her looks matter and not her achievements? All the teachers I've experienced (I do a lot of childcare/different school pickups) compliment the good work/deeds they've done.
Would we be ok with male teachers doing this?

All these people getting in a tizz about a teacher saying ‘bye beautiful’……I hope you’re all as agitated about the 20,000 plus children killed in Gaza too? Or the children labouring as slaves in the Congo? Or enclosed in sweatshops in China making school uniforms for those same kids being called beautiful? First world problems…..

Bloody hell how do some people get through their day. Getting so worked up about a term of endearment.

@Starlight1979 good point

Girls/women over history have been valued on looks predominantly. In terms of value/worth for marriage or being sold.

Whilst we hope we live in a society that values more than looks in women there still this undercurrent there. The expectations of how women dress vs men, the culture around male gaze and the objectification of women. The fashion/make up industry. There is still this underlying belief that prettier women are more attractive , popular, successful.

The way to change this is to educate the younger generations not to value looks so strongly. This includes managing how we speaking to young children. So telling the girls they are beautiful regardless of how it is intended is a part of that because yes people do associate being beautiful with girls and their looks.

@Ponoka7 Is there awards for beauty in school? Should a primary aged girl already be getting the message that her looks matter and not her achievements? All the teachers I've experienced (I do a lot of childcare/different school pickups) compliment the good work/deeds they've done.
Would we be ok with male teachers doing this?

I would be fine with anyone calling my child beautiful. I was a teacher before retiring and I really cannot see anything wrong. A Geordie colleague called children "Pet". No one took offence, no one was that silly.

I had a Welsh teacher who called me and others "My lovely". No one was daft enough to object then. I know times have changed but people need to get a grip.

Omg I totally agree with this. My parents never said anything nice about my appearance and it would have been so good to hear. To this day I think I'm ugly. In fact I'm sure my dad said once I have a big nose (I do but it didn't exactly help 🙄).

How does she know it's not being said to the boys?? Is she stood there monitoring what the teacher calls every single child on the way out of school?!

This. FGS. My DC are beautiful in many ways and I would see nothing wrong with their teacher saying ‘bye/hi beautiful’ as a term of endearment. What is more beautiful than a little child?!

Wouldn't bother me at all.

My best mate is Geordie and calls everyone pet. Only a matter of time before that's not allowed in case someone takes offence that they're being called a dog 🙄

Sounds lovely. Being a teacher must be so hard these days with people dissecting every little thing

This. With bells on.

What's hilarious is those who are saying it's referring to their looks. I highly doubt a Y1 teacher is looking at these children and going "oh she's prettier than the others, I'm going to call her beautiful" 😂

I've said on another post but my Aunt is a teacher and calls all the kids 'lovely' (whether they're lovely or not!). It's just a nice term of affection to a small child!

This kind of thing is exactly why my 23 year old son came out of teaching (primary) after 18 months, he bent over backwards to help the kids in his class even down to doing private lessons at 8am because parents didn’t want there kids taken out of class for additional support.
every day he had parents having an issue with something, and I mean ridiculous stuff.
hes now in 30k debt and works in hospitality. Same wage and much happier.

Maybe because I'm an old retired teacher and trained eons ago, we had to strictly use the name on the register for children.

We couldn't even shorten Benjamin to Ben unless it was indicated on the admissions form.

A young trainee teacher was in floods of tears because she had been reminded not to use the term 'you guys' in earshot of children and parents.

But perhaps we were a bit more formal a few years ago.

When I dropped my grandson off at school yesterday I said 'see you soon chuckle button' - this morning he was greeted by the teacher, 'good morning chuckle button'.

I think “lovely” is nice, because it generally means you are lovely not that you just look lovely. Beautiful usually refers to looks, I think that from a very early age society communicates to girls that how they look is important. I know that sounds nitpicky but it does sink in. Women would be much happier I think if this wasn’t mentioned at all when they were little girls. If we talked more about their character.

I also know someone who calls children beautiful but only blonde ones. I wouldn’t like that at all.

I think it's September, the teacher hasn't memorised every child's name yet so has a generic name for the children whose names she can't remember.

let me guess she is Australian or has Australian family?

Christ, what a miserable lot you are. No wonder our youngsters struggle. I am sure you will all be happy when the only interactions your children have are with AI robots.

Interesting.

I’m a teacher (day off, PT before any asks why I’m on MN).

Where are you? I’m West Mids and I call kids “beaut” all the time. My HoD calls kids “babe”. We teach secondary as well!

I am so glad I retired from teaching many years ago. I'm sure I wouldn't last 10 minutes in today's schools. The teacher is being kind and unbelievably, that's that's still cause for offence.

Maybe she's trying to instill confidence in the children?

The phrase - 'I am strong, I am brave, I am beautiful' ??

I think it's lovely if positive words of affirmation are used with all the children