Saturday 7 November 2009

Differences In Addressing People

An idiosyncracy of mine is that I have always called my aunties and uncles by their first name. I have NEVER used the prefix Aunt or Uncle when talking to them. When addressing my parents, I use mam and dad. I answer to both Kevin or Kev with people who know me. I don't mind being called either.

At Secondary School, most teachers called the male pupils by their christian or first name name. The addressing of pupils by their first name had mainly died out by the time I got there, but one or two old fashioned teachers still addressed us by our surname. Those who did, both taught Mathematics. As I have wrote on my website, there would be no place now for those two.

At my cousin's Prom in 2007, the pupils who were leaving were addressing teachers by their first name, like "Dave", "Andy", "Rob" and "Chris", as if they were the pupils mates. My aunt said it was very much a "We are all mates now" type of atmosphere. I wonder if they are allowed to do that nowadays in Secondary Schools generally or if that rule just applied because the pupils were leaving? We never did that because we weren't allowed, but also, we didn't know what most of the teachers first names were. Besides, I wouldn't have liked it if we could have called them by their first names anyway. It would have seemed so false. I think pupils addressing teachers Sir or Miss, and in return, teachers addressing pupils by their first name is appropriate and balanced.

Teachers are not there to be pupils friends or enemies. They are there primarily to do their jobs, though nowadays, they have other functions, such as being a psychologist and counsellor.

1 Comments:

Blogger Adelaide Dupont said...

These days teachers put their names on Facebook and become friends with their students.

For example, girls in primary school or at least their final year can become a teacher's friend.

8 November 2009 at 03:50  

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