“Miss” and “Sir” in schools

[MyCleverGrayBear]

Been to lots of secondary school open days recently. At the state secondaries the children showing parents around etc called the teachers “Sir” and “Miss”. Is that normal? I haven’t heard this IRL ever.

(To be clear, “Miss, this parent wants to know about languages at school” vs “Mrs Jones, this parent would like to see the sports centre”. But also in a couple of classrooms there were children constantly saying “Miss, look at this, Miss, I’ve out the sign up, Miss, shall I stand here” etc and it was incredibly grating.)

And why are female teachers “Miss” and make teachers “Sir”? I felt like I was in a bad 80’s Grange Hill episode and Benny Hill was about to run in and chase me 🫣

Not in any school I’ve worked in (though granted I moved from England to Wales in 2001). The same courtesy is expected to TAs as teachers.

I worked in a totally ordinary girls secondary school in the 1990s and the girls called female teachers madam. That took some getting used to.
Also it wasn't great if the kids saw me in a public place and screamed out "madam madam". I got some strange looks.

It was Miss and Sir when I went to school, because ALL female teachers were spinsters with no hope of ever getting married, whilst ALL male teachers carried a cane and so you were not going to take the chance of calling them anything else.

Jesus wept. 😂

"Miss" is from Mistress, which doesn't seem lesser or lacking in authority to me.

We knew their names (Mrs so and so, Miss so and so) but we always just said ‘Miss, I don’t understand’ or Miss can I go to the toilet? I mean that’s normal isn’t it?

When I bump into pupils from 30 years ago and they call me Miss, I find it a term of respect. And it’s rather sweet.

Totally baffled that you've never heard of it

It would usually be Mr a or Miss/Mrs a when using full name but it's often shortened by kids to just miss or sir when not using last name. Calling Mrs please look at this or Mr please look at this just sounds odd. Sir does sound more formal that miss but it's not intended that way by kids who are just lazy in addressing people. Put all the teachers in a room and they will be more specific in saying names

It's nice. They are being taught to be respectful.

It’s normal in my kids school

Very annoying. 'Sir' is a far more respectful title conferring a higher status than 'Miss'.

When I was briefly in education in the US, the equivalent term of Ma'am was routinely used.

That is much more equal in status and far more respectful, IMO.

Miss is infantilising and categorises a woman according to her marital status. *
*
And Mrs doesn't?

No they're not. They're being taught that males are of higher status than females.

As ever.

It does get ingrained in your brain

I saw a teacher much later when I was an adult? and I said to my friend "oh there's miss jones"

It was hard to say "hi margaret"

Why is Miss childish?
In context it’s the title for ‘female person in authority’. What else could be used? Lady?

Its just a tradition, it doesn't detract from peoples professional qualifications, our head is a female Dr., it says so on the board outside, and on her office door, but as a short form she is addressed as miss.

That address, as with Sir, would be in a form of - Please Miss (if asking a question) or Yes Miss (as an affirmative) or Miss (to get attention)

Pupils will often use the full name too ie Sir, can I go to see Dr. xxxx. or I'm here to see Mr. xxxxx.

It's worth noting that higher academic qualifications ie: Dr, Masters, Prof. etc don't carry much weight amongst colleagues, we are all teachers, we don't need a PhD to teach A level, fair enough if you have one, schools will exploit it as it looks good to parents - but its not relevant day to day to out work or position as it would be in an HE establishment.

yup. was going to say the same thing, a hangover from the time when all female teachers were "Miss" because they were expected to leave work when they married. Even when I was at school in the mid 50's the young teachers were all "Miss" and left work when they got married. We did have a couple of much older woman teachers who were "Mrs" but it was unthinkable then for a pregnant woman to be around primary school pupils.

No one said to use Mrs though?

We used to be called Ma’am! That was early 2000s, state school. Male staff were Sir.

A poster mention not calling them boy or girl because she wanted them to know her name and hates the term miss

well in the 70s you where yelled at that term boy or girl or worse “you there”

plus is wasn’t Miss it was mam and sir for me and it was a Scottish high school

I’m a teacher and have always been called Miss.

occasionally new 6th formers from a local school join - they call female teachers Ma’am. I always feel like the queen or a senior police officer when they call me that!

Was normal when my DP was teaching between 1986 and last year.

She did though have battle at the outset to be Ms surname not mine rather than Miss.

Ma’am?

Miss / Ms and Mr would be comparable and fairly equal in terms of respect in my personal opinion. Miss / Ms and Sir however is not.

But I am not from the UK..