Worst teacher you've ever had?

[Wampa842]

Not all teachers are made for the job. In fact, all of us have had at least one teacher who was abusive, scumbag, unprofessional, or simply incompetent.

For instance, my current English teacher should never have chosen teaching as a profession. When not blabbering about something that does not concern her, she tries teaching us something in a rather ineffective way: half of the class already knows the subject, and the other half can't even understand her (which she greatly ignores). After that, she likes undermining the success of talented students simply because she doesn't like them.

Have you ever had such a horrible (or even more so) experience with any of your teachers? What's your worst story?

[peadar1987]

We had a physics teacher whose idea of "teaching" was to get us to read out loud, in turn, from a textbook. Every. Single. Class.

He was the only truly bad teacher we ever had. There were plenty I didn't like, but that's more because they were a bit too good as stopping me from being my natural lazy self. I appreciate them a lot more now, looking back!

Now Uni lecturers on the other hand...

[pxi]

I had a maths teacher in Northern Ireland who for the three years referred to me as "the irishman", based on my being born in Dublin. Almost every question was directed at me in the form of "let's see if the irishman can figure this out", because, you know, dumb Irish.

Unless you've been living under a rock, you probably know Northern Ireland is, to say the least, a highly insular society, and this was like a signal to the class that this sort of behaviour was acceptable and encouraged.

I still to this day remember him declaring to the class that "the day you pass mathematics, is the day I win the lottery."

I got an A in GCSE maths. I doubt he won the lottery.

-edit-

Just to give you another perspective on my experiences in school in NI, I remember another time they brought a black guy into the school for a school assembly. Literally "here's a black guy to look at, because he's black." Now in fairness this was the start of the 90's, Ireland was not at all multicultural, but when I look back on it, it's just head-shakingly bad.

Edited February 10, 2014 by pxi

[Spartwo]

My primary school principal banned everyone from going to the bathroom(we were 6&7)for 3 months because somebody forgot to flush.A couple of kids wet themselves in the middle of class,wasn't until a girl did it that she stopped it.She also ignored any kind of bullying so you had to basically beat the hell outta them so they would stop.

[ZedNova]

A math teacher at a community college. She never explained the concepts very well, it's amazing i passed at all.

[John Crichton]

My first teacher of religious class in high school was appalling. He was one of the "Noah's flood was real, humans roamed the earth with dinosaurs" crowd which is super rare in Switzerland. It was so bad, I once got up and simply walked out of his class at 16 years old. He got the school board to threaten my suspension...until they caught booze in his desk leading to him getting fired on the spot.

His replacement was awesome (and I say this as an atheist), total hippy who made us collect money for animal protection for 2 straight years while hardly ever focusing on stupid literal interpretations of scripture. In short, he simply taught us the "do good" mantra, which was great.

[astropapi1]

I've had more than a couple...

- When I was in fourth grade (or was it third?), Our arts teacher had to go and his replacement was a total 'female dog'. It was a whale-like lady that had no idea what she was doing. She started teaching us stuff she took out of those "make and sell yourself!" magazines, and she was very rude to us. I didn't want to put up with her, so one day when she was arguing with a couple of classmates, I simply walked out of the classroom and called our principal. Long story short, she ended up fired and we never heard of her again.

- Last year, I had one of those hard family times, because my dad had to have heart surgery and we were outta town for half a year. In this time, a (very good) friend used to send me scans of what they had done at school that day, and I'd copy them down on my notebooks, I also had a couple of those personal teachers for mathematics, physics, and chemistry. So when I got back, I was at the same level as my classmates. BUT my spanish teacher didn't like it, and he made it very, very clear. Dude simply hated me! There were many times when I would simply lack the time to finish my homework (because I was doing lots of tests to validate my first semester), and he wouldn't even take my notebook. He rated my work very low just because he wanted to. One time, he made us write a chronicle about a manned Venus mission, and I was like:

"Oh man, I'm gonna get you this time."

So I started doing research on the Apollo fly-by proposal, and wrote a badass three-page chronicle using the most complicated technoblabble I could find, and terminology. Tons of terminology.

Do you know what he did? Nothing. He didn't even take my notebook, again. I tried telling my principal, and I discovered I wasn't the only one. Lots of parents had been calling them because of the same exact reasons. He still works there, but we have a new teacher this year.

- My religion teacher. Oh, my religion teacher... Where do I start?

He's one of those guys who believe abortion is against god's will and euthanasia is the devil's work. Most people where I live are catholic, so my teacher thought it would be a good idea to do one of those "draw Jesus being good with people" things. Even though he's a very nice guy, he's the worst religion teacher I've ever had. I've always been opposed to the idea that religion should be taught in schools, so that kinda makes it worse. We've always had some of those "Atheist vs. Religious" unintentional debates, which are kinda fun. We get to talk to each other and talk about the topic in hand instead of avoiding it, and as an atheist, I feel like I should be the image of a good atheist for my classmates. Question what doesn't seem right, ask why it is so, but don't be offensive.

But everything changed when he started a class with one of those work guides that basically explained why atheism was bad and how 'we' should cure it. It was the most offensive and childish thing he had ever done to us. One of my close friends stared at me as I read through the first page, and when I got to the end, almost half of my classmates were sharing evasive stares at me. They knew I was pissed and I knew it too. So I patiently got up and asked my teacher what did that thing mean. I bet he could see I was getting red, because he immediately started explaining himself, and saying that guide was intended for those who believed in that thing.

What followed was the most intense, frightening, and mature moment I have ever had in my school years. I proceeded to let out an internal scream in the form of gentle but penetrating words, telling him how childish and offensive that little piece of paper was. I asked him how he would feel if I started handing out papers that said we should cure christians, and continued rambling on him for about five minutes. All that time I was standing up and looking through his black eyes and into his soul, while my classmates were sitting down and quietly staring at both of us in shock. I finished my ramble with something like "I expected much more of somebody like you when I first saw you. Guess I was wrong". Then we stood there staring at each other for about 15 seconds, and then my buddies slowly started clapping. My teacher sat down first, and then I returned to my work group and sat down. They knew the class was over as soon as I stood up and started arguing with my teacher, so they had already packed their stuff. It was then when I realized what I had done. Blood was running through my veins, my pupils were so dilated I could almost see through the walls, and I could have crushed a concrete brick with a single hand if I had wanted to. I was like a war machine, ready for battle, but that wasn't gonna work against a detention. My teacher just sat at his desk, scribbling on a piece of paper, and you could almost see he was about to cry. I completely demoralized him and felt kinda sorry about it.

Nevertheless, the next class he explained everybody why atheism wasn't bad and 'God still loves atheists', and then made us work on other religions too, until the end of the year. This year he was the first teacher I spotted in my first day, and he kindly guided me to my classroom. I guess that moment was like a learning experience to both of us, and it was just a way to say "stop it!" when he reached too far.

Man, I wrote a lot.

But please read it. pleeeeeaaaase!

[rpayne88]

My 10th grade English teacher. Her class is the only class I have ever failed. Why did I fail, you may ask? She would not give me the work I missed. You see, in 10th grade, I had been diagnosed with Celiac Disease for all of about 5 months. With Celiac, consumption of foods containing gluten, such as wheat, barley, rye, and oats, causes food poisoning like symptoms. And there is a lot of "hidden" gluten in most foods. Long story short, I missed a few days. Despite a doctor's note stating I had Celiac and a note from my parents, she refused to give me any work (initially at least.) She claimed that she had lectured the class and had not assigned of collected any thing. Fast forward two weeks, and the class gets progress reports. I looked down at my paper and saw missing assignments making up the majority of the page. These assignments were given the days I were absent. I then talked to her again, and she straight up accused me of trying to blame my poor grades on her. I then take the issue up with my parents. Unfortunately, my mom is a teacher in the same school district, but not the same school. My mom has had more than one parent blame her for their child's poor grades. It is usually a case of the child not doing his homework. As a result, my mom then followed my teacher's lead and accused me of trying to "pass the buck" onto my teacher. As a result, I failed the class with a 53%. It figures that I went to summer school and passed the class with the second highest grade, 105% (we had an extra credit assignment, and I did it.)

So, my English teacher was nothing short of an a--hole. I wish that students had the capability to fire their teachers for s--- like this.

[Starwhip]

I don't recall the facts exactly, but it went like this:

I was moved from my third-grade classroom, into a classroom with much older kids (but also kids my age). The teacher didn't seem to like me, saying I was too sensitive and that I should be bumped down a grade. Well, I was moved back to my old class, where I did great, and then she seemed to hate me even more.

So yeah, great times.

[kBob]

Had a few, my two favorites were:

The US history teacher (in 1979) who kept ranting about how the "pinko communists" were about to take over the world. I learned pretty much nothing in that class...it did let me escape high school a year early though so I didn't mind. I wonder what the big threat he worries about now is?

A Nevada state history teacher (a required course, I kid you not) who was smoking in class, I asked him, politely, not too explaining it gave me asthma...I was lucky to get a "B" in that class. This was in Reno where I think smokers are still a majority even today .

[Kerbart]

Oh, easy. University Professor who wanted to make a point about students being less engaged and willing to come up for themselves than when he was a student.

So he started teaching bad on purpose, to prove that nobody would complain about it. Only problem was that there was an immense line after every class, with students asking to please, please, please improve the way you're teaching because this is horrible, why don't you, etc, etc. As a good scientist the man simply decided to ignore the "data" that was not in line with his theory.

Half a year later we found out why the teaching was so bad: in the university paper he was describing how "class after class, he was teaching worse and worse, and not a single complaint was to be heard." I learned a lot that semester. Just not about Discrete Mechanics.

[Brethern]

My primary school principal banned everyone from going to the bathroom(we were 6&7)for 3 months because somebody forgot to flush.A couple of kids wet themselves in the middle of class,wasn't until a girl did it that she stopped it.She also ignored any kind of bullying so you had to basically beat the hell outta them so they would stop.

I had a primary school principal that tried that once, except she banned only the boys from using their bathroom. Fortunately the teachers had enough common sense to ignore it and let us go.

Ban lasted for about two days before she was fired.

Strangely enough she was sent to prison shortly after that for perfectly timed reasons.

[pxi]

So I've another story for you, somewhat close to the subject at hand, but not exactly, so please excuse this slightly tangental post. Hopefully you'll get a laugh out of it.

After doing my GCSE exams in the north, I moved back to Dublin and did the Leaving Cert. Generally I enjoyed the comprehensive school I went to a lot more than the Grammar School I posted about previously - it was mixed-gender to begin with, and where the former school had a somewhat insane 'you will learn' ethos, the new school was, to put it mildly, a lot more relaxed in that sense. This wasn't so great from my academic point-of-view - it turns out I can be quite lazy if allowed - but meh, 20/20 hindsight and all that.

The other major thing that differentiated the two schools was rules. Former school had rules that were probably as old as education itself. Set in stone and unchanging. The obvious things you expect. New school had an evolving, convoluted set of rules that made little or no sense. Every couple of weeks there seemed to be another notice posted on the bulletin-board with a few bullet-points listing new minor infractions and modifications to existing rules.

Let me give you a sense of the crazyness of some of these rules. I've been to quite a few schools in my life, but never before had I encountered a school that assigned a direction of travel to the doors in the buildings. That's right, one door to go into the building, and another that you can leave through. And the permitted direction of travel varied depending on the time of day. And they actually used the prefects to enforce this.

Being late required you to fill in an A5-size form stating when you got there, why you were late, and what you could have done in order not to be late. I can't be sure, but somewhere along my path in life I developed a hatred for unneccesary bureaucracy. I suspect it was sometime about this point.

So what to do?

Moar rules.

For some reason the school seemed to think that using a photocopy of the schools letterhead, printed using blue toner was the key to giving announcements that official look. Blue toner eh? Now that's hard to fake, right? Took me a day to find a photocopier that did that. School letterhead? Even easier to find.

It took a bit of digging around, (I still have most every file I ever created since I moved from Amiga to PC) but I found the notices I made when I got home this evening:

FOR THE ATTENTION OF ALL STUDENTS:

The following school rule changes have been introduced:

1. Students may only use the doors which are clearly marked for passage in or out of the school buildings. Exit by any unmarked door, or any other exit such as a window is prohibited. Use of these exits is allowed only in an emergency, and the management must be informed at least three weeks in advance by the completion of Form Number 415; Special Arrangement For The Use Of Unsanctioned Exits.
   
2. A maximum of one wrist-watch may be worn on each arm. Students who wish to wear additional watches, (for religious or historic reasons only) must fill out Form 1134; Additional Watch Allowance, and submit it in triplicate to the Front Office.
   
3. All abscence notes must be submitted in triplicate to the Front Office at least three weeks before the planned abscence dates.
   
4. All students who change their abscence notes must notify the Front Office by completing Form 1472; Abscence Note Change, and submitting it at least three weeks before the change of plans.
   
5. All abscences must be approved by the Vice-Principal, and may be changed if they conflict with the abscence of students of higher rank and/or longer tenure.
   
6. The school may announce such cancellations at any time, providing the student is given fourty-eight hours, or two working days notice, whichever is the longer, as the case may be. (Students crossing the International Date Line, see Form 2317.)
   
7. The arranging of rabbits by their numerical order is prohibited, except under the direct supervision of the Principal. Students wishing to participate in this activity must fill out Form 213; Provision For Numerical Rabbit Arranging, and Form 126; Arrangement For The Utilization Of Management Time And/Or Resources.
   

These few simple rules should prevent a great deal of needless friction and frustration if all students cooperate.

A few weeks later, I posted another notice with with the same letterhead on the noticeboard just below the first. This said:

FOR THE ATTENTION OF ALL STUDENTS:

ADDITION TO PREVIOUS COMMUNICATION

Following the recent ammendments made to the school rules, some disruptive elements in the institution have taken it upon themselves to abuse the new measures. There have been many cases where students have requested forms which have either not been returned, or returned with misleading information entered.

Since we are providing the forms (which are quite costly) free of charge, and because a lot of manpower is required to process the forms, we cannot allow this activity to continue. We have therefore decided that the following ammendments will be added:

1. Students who find that they require a form, must apply in writing, giving their name, class and year, stating the form (or forms) required, and the reasons for the form request. The form (or forms) requested may then be collected on presentation of this letter to the Front Desk.
   
2. Students who request a form from the Front Office, must return the completed form, along with samples of hair, skin, blood, or urine, as requested in the document within five working days. Students who are unable to do this must complete and return Form 2541; Request For Extension To Facilitate Form Completion, no less than two working days before the original form was due to be completed and returned. If the form cannot be completed and returned to the Front Office due to the loss of the form, the student must also complete Form 2321; Notification Of Loss Of Form, and return it to the Front Office within the time frame stated above.
   
3. Students who request a form, and find that they have no use for it, must return the form to the Front Office untouched, along with Form 2634; Notification Of Unused Form. Students who have filled in a form incorrectly must complete Form 3125; Notification Of Incorrect Application.
   

Hopefully these new measures will serve as a deterrent to those wishing to hinder the smooth running of the school. We hope that you will cooperate with these new rules.

It still gives me a chuckle when I read these. I remember the notices stayed on the bulletin-board for months, which says a lot about how often a member of staff looked at the board.

Edited February 10, 2014 by pxi
WYSIWYG mode is less WYG then I would like.

[DonLorenzo]

It's a while ago, but when I was 15 or so years old I had a terrible French teacher. Now I wasn't a model student in her class, and I wasn't very interested in the subject and because of that I used to get rather bad grades. At one point I decided 'this French stuff can't be that hard, let's go and learn it'. So I actually open my books (I think I had to unwrap them mid-year) and start soldiering through the assignments. At some point there's this or that that I can't figure out so I walk up to the teacher and ask her to explain something to me. Now whatever it was that I'm asking clarification about I'm sure had been covered before, and wasn't too complex and I should have had the opportunity to learn it many a time over already, but still her response was IMO inexcusable. It went like this:

'So, you're asking about this now? I'm not going to answer or help you out, get some good grades first and then we'll talk'

Then and there I decided that French was going to be the subject that I was going to fail (we were allowed one). I think I even threw out the book on my way back to the bench but that may be myself enhancing the memory

[DonLorenzo]

It's a while ago, but when I was 15 or so years old I had a terrible French teacher. Now I wasn't a model student in her class, and I wasn't very interested in the subject and because of that I used to get rather bad grades. At one point I decided 'this French stuff can't be that hard, let's go and learn it'. So I actually open my books (I think I had to unwrap them mid-year) and start soldiering through the assignments. At some point there's this or that that I can't figure out so I walk up to the teacher and ask her to explain something to me. Now whatever it was that I'm asking clarification about I'm sure had been covered before, and wasn't too complex and I should have had the opportunity to learn it many a time over already, but still her response was IMO inexcusable. It went like this:

'So, you're asking about this now? I'm not going to answer or help you out, get some good grades first and then we'll talk'

Then and there I decided that French was going to be the subject that I was going to fail (we were allowed one). I think I even threw out the book on my way back to the bench but that may be myself enhancing the memory

[viccie211]

I had a German teacher last year who already had a reputation for coming late. She was new at our school the year before however she worked at another school in a different part of the country(the Netherlands are small so that can be done) and she still lived there. She worked at that other school for a long time and took a year off, after that her old school wouldn't take her back. So she came here. She came very late after a couple of weeks for the first time and I didn't like it so I went to our team manager(a teacher who is also some sort of manager for other teachers and students) because I was very bad in German and I didn't want her being late affecting my finals. She obviously didn't like that so that.

On top of coming late 2-5 minutes every class she also was not the best teacher, she mostly talked about herself being miserable and ****. However when she was evaluated(like every teacher at our school) she was very very angry because she had 38 years of experience and "So I know how to teach". That was her opinion I think very different about that. The "Fun" part about that 38 years of experience is that she mentioned it about every lesson and at the end of the year it became forty. So in the three quarters of a year that was our last she gained two years of experience.

This year she was fired because she didn't accept her timetable so she just denied teaching, that meant she got suspended and eventually fired.

[rasheed]

From today, the HM (Head mistress (Principal) ) has set a rule so that if you come late,you are guided through the gate, you are taking to the main room and is put to write lines. FOUR WHOLE FLIPPING PAGES OF LINES SAYING "I must be early for school". So by the time im finished, im 15-20 minutes late for class. Im really pi**ed off. BTW the time is 8:30 am and i came 8:55 am and so i got punished. Oh and there's an assembly from 8:30 am to 9:00 am. And i live in Guyana so we don't have the same school structure/Building.

[Spartwo]

>Snip<

So?,We get detention for that.Every monday there is a 20 person long line waiting to get a note.You wait so long that it's been another 10 minutes before you get in,And this is being 2 or 3 minutes late in a school which's clock runs 6 minutes fast!

[Duxwing]

This one is easy! My 12th grade International Relations teacher. He spends almost all class teaching about current internal affairs, mentioning international relations only when he wants to decry US foreign policy. He is a narcissist with paranoid delusions and extreme Marxist views that he spends almost all class teaching, feeding his fragile ego by defeating ridiculous conservative ideas ("conditioning") and implicitly therefrom concluding his system's truth. When anyone disagrees, he subtly insults and shames them into silence, insinuating that by disagreeing with him they agree not only with the "conditioned" position but are "conditioned" (i.e., insane) and believe every other "conditioned" idea. Many kids terrifyingly agree with him, restating his arguments when challenged.

His arguments and passions so battered me that I quit his class. A few other kids noticed, too, and I hope to gather them and tell my Social Studies Department Head.

-Duxwing

[TheCanadianVendingMachine]

I had a science teacher in elementry that made my life worse than it was back then.

[Extemporary]

I see several people talking about how unpleasant their religion classes were. Why were you still in that school system instead of the public one? Parental pressure? Or was that the public one somehow, and if so, what country would do that?

Anyway, my worst teacher. Up until grade seven, I was quite fond of French classes. I enjoyed, and still enjoy, learning other languages (French is tragically the only one I've been able to study in school). However, partway through the year, the French teacher just didn't come into class. We all sat there, gradually getting more and more chaotic, until the bell rang and we left. The next day, the teacher once again failed to show up. On the third day, a teacher I didn't recognise came into the classroom looking very serious. It turned out the French teacher had been arrested for sexually assaulting a student from another class. I never met the student, so I don't know how she dealt with it. Nobody else in the school was qualified to teach French, so the class was cancelled for the rest of the year. The "replacement" for grade eight wasn't really able to teach French either, so we all had a lot of difficulty when we started high school.

The high school's teacher, while fortunately not a criminal, was only somewhat better than the other teachers in this thread. She spent three weeks teaching us how to use Powerpoint, without using a word of French. She didn't know how to use Powerpoint. She taught nothing, instead making us do the same project over and over. As in, the same topic and the same criteria in the same format. At least four times. There was only one project not to follow this: an essay about teenagers. She only accepted topics complaining that our generation was far worse than hers. I had her class the next year, and dropped it the first day.

So, yeah. A paedophile teacher got French class cancelled for a year and a half. The next real teacher was awful. French has been ruined for me.

And, of course, I've had the standard Marxist social studies* teachers who cater to the stoners. I was once legitimately praised for being able to read from the Charter of Rights ("That's third-year law school [crap]!"). Of course, everyone's had one or two teachers like that; they were nothing on my French teachers.

*The main thing they taught me was not to dignify the fields with the term "science."

[Skyler4856]

It went like this.

"The Earth is flat" She said

You can imagine how the rest of the year went..

[xrayfishx]

Back in 1st and 2nd grade I was bullied. It was a school that, at the time, had about 50 students so it was clear to everyone that I was bullied, since the guy who made it happen was such a little Hitler that he even got the 6th graders against me. Every single teacher there just pretended it wasn't happening. Because of that, even after the bullies went to a different school for 3rd class, I was left so emotionally unstable that every time I got a bad grade or sth I got pissed off and started throwing stuff across the classroom etc. The teachers just ignored me when that happened. No one asked why. Then, in 5th, I started getting Russian classes. That teacher also gave me a few other subjects. She didn't just ignore me. No. She punished me, made fun of me, made sure that everyone would know about it, basically did everything she could to make it worse. About then the school started hiring some teachers that would do more than just shoot the breeze about problems so I was sent to the school psychiatrist. That didn't make it any better, though. Then, after 6th grade, when that school finally ended, I went to a bigger school (1400+ students) with some serious mental problems. Didn't help that even though 2 of my former classmates came to the same school, they were put in a different class so I was now alone, too. A few years later I met that teacher again and she acted as if we had always gotten along nicely. It was almost as hard not to punch her that day as it is to avoid badwords in this text.

[TheDarkStar]

I don't really have good memories of my sixth grade social studies class. The normal schedule for the day was:

1. Walk in.

2. Read the assignment on the board (usually copying vocabulary).

3. Spend the entire hour and probably some home time working on it.

4. Leave with the teacher sometimes never saying a word.

It's not that she was mean or anything, but it just wasn't a good way to teach. I can't recall very much that was covered, mainly because of how mindless it was. It also gave me a dislike of any kind of history class that took a long time to get over.

It gets worse in other years, though. I lived in Germany in third and fourth grade. While I was there, I did not have a nice class. They basically took every opportunity they could to mistreat me (although I now suspect it was related to their even stranger parents) and liked to exclude me or make fun of me. When I talked to the teacher about it, she ended up saying how the best way to get over it was to "get a big group of friends" - which, of course, I didn't have. After that, I don't think my teacher ever did anything else about it. Nothing ever happened to anyone who mistreated me, and the only reason they stopped was because I moved away. Part it continuing for so long was due to there being little bullying awareness in the German school system, but I think some actual action would have helped a bit.

[Ryn]

Ahh, Miss Kent. I will never forget her.

A math teacher that avoided math like the plague. we'd come into class and be told to "draw or something" while she bought things on ebay, Unfortunately this was at a rather sensitive time (6th till 9th grade) which threw me way behind on my maths, As it did her entire class. complaints were made but she was not 'let go' until the year I moved on to highschool. I had to learn basic algebra in my sophomore year.... I guess things turned out alright but still, I would have been much better off with someone else.

She was also the only teacher ever to write me up, And that was because I said she should be fired directly to her.