Why do some students get upset if a teacher no longer recognizes them?

I warn my students near graduation. I tell them, that when they come back to visit, the first thing they should tell me is their name. I teach 90-160 students yearly and I have only so much room in this old brain of mine 🙂

If you haven’t seen someone in a while, it’s always a good idea to introduce yourself.

“Hello, I’m John Smith, from your math class a couple of years ago, how have you been” would be an example.

Remember, you only had about 50 teachers throughout your whole school career; whereas, that teacher may have had 150+ students each year or more than 5000 students over their teaching career.

I know a teacher is expected to remember a student and I may recognize a face, but I can’t put the name with the face. Please help me out and tell me how I should know you – were you my server at a restraunt, did I have you as a student, did you live next door to me when I lived in the other town, etc? I have too many student names to learn every year along with all the other people I encounter to remember everyone. If you tell me who you are and how I know you, it jogs my memory and then I remember.

Because there’s that awkward moment when the student realizes that the teacher doesn’t remember them and it hurts them because obviously that teacher was important enough to them to remember…

However, the students should realize that if they’re 18, the kindergarten teacher isn’t likely to remember them, and if we’re talking highschool, and they graduated about 4-5 years ago, common sense should tell them that a teacher shouldn’t be expected to remember over 500 people. But, some students have a higher emotional attachment to teachers…so…

Unless the former student corners you with the dreaded “Do you remember who I am?” I would try to “fake it” to see if any clues to who they are come out in the conversation….if you get cornered with this a lot, maybe you need to tell the students at the end of the year that even though you care about each and every one of them, so many pass through your classroom on a yearly basis and that they have to realize that people can change dramatically from 18 to 22 (especially these days with cosmetic surgery LOL) that you should be entitled to some “clues” to their identity.

Unfortunately, I think it’s the students that were the biggest troublemakers that get remembered.

Simple. People always regard themselves as number 1. When a teacher can’t remember you, you think that you are too unforgettable to be forgotten. People never realize that a teacher can see aywhere from 30-180 students a year. Over the course of time, you will forget people.

Normal human nature, wouldn’t you be upset if you met a long time friend and they don’t even know you or say hi? Plus teacher and student in America has a stronger bond and share more like a friendship then a student-teacher kind.

Students expect their teachers to remember them like it was yesterday. I am a teacher and I remember approaching several of my old teachers when I began teaching in the same school with them. Yes, it hurt me that they didnt remember me but I realized that they have to memorize up to 30 different names in so many years. (I didnt see them in 20 years, so i understood).

because the student feels that the teacher has known them for a long time and should remember them

Maybe because they recognized the teacher and feels dumb that he/she didn’t recognize them back.

Because it gives them the feeling that they don’t matter. I call them emos.

They like the attention.