Published on 12, July, 2020
I saw something today, which prompted me to ask this question: Did any teachers single you out, or treat you badly at school? I was in school from the 1970’s, and things were different back then.
I recall being singled out at age 6, and forced to stand on the table during the lesson as an example of a stupid child. I was often ridiculed, and she said things like it’s typical for me to be stupid because ‘people like you’ are. (Because of my skin colour).
At 11 I was constantly picked on by my maths teacher. She would ask me questions when she knew I wouldn’t know the answer. She picked me despite others putting their hand up to answer. She tried to make me recite my times tables or give her answers to some when she called them out. She told me that I should be able to answer them, as all children my age can, and what was it that was wrong with me that I wasn’t able to learn them. And other things when I didn’t get all questions answered in the time frame, or got poor marks in a test. I wasn’t ever ‘stupid’. My auditory processing is slow, and I can’t work under pressure if I’m also anxious.
I was certainly singled out in junior school in the mid 90s. One teacher in particular who favoured the popular students used me as the most unpopular to show her favourite pupils the definition of a stupid boy. She made my school life hell and she always went out of her way to call me a stupid boy and recommended that I was put standing towards the wall most lunchtimes where she encouraged her students to pick on me and call me a stupid baby. From then I went home for lunch and as far as I know this teacher still teaches and I really hope she's changed her attitude towards kids with ASD or any other mental condition. She was to me a complete monster who was more of a bully than a respectable teacher. Shame on her!