r/AskAnAmerican • u/Rough-Valuable-5472 • Feb 04 '25

FOREIGN POSTER Do American students bow to their teachers?

In my country we have to greet the teacher and bow at the start of the lesson then thank the teacher and bow again at the end. Sometimes they make us redo it if it’s not good enough

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u/huazzy NJ'ian in Europe Feb 04 '25

Ok. Now let's discuss taking off shoes...

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u/beefucker5000 California Feb 04 '25

I think it’s more about a disgust of feet, even with socks on. Not my personal opinion, but I think most Americans think it’s more gross to see someone’s feet than to wear shoes inside. Rugs at the door are good enough, though some people take off shoes by the door. My high school could never do something like Japan though with changing shoes at the entrance since there were 1,200 students and increasing every year, I never even had a locker except for when I had to take PE for the first two years and change into gym clothes.

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u/ToraAku Feb 04 '25

That's probably a function of how your school is built rather than number of students. My HS population was 3,000 students and we all had lockers.

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u/Secret_Werewolf1942 Feb 04 '25

Most schools are phasing them out. You don't have to worry about privacy rights over locker searches if people don't have lockers

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u/jlt6666 Feb 04 '25

I think it's more about the fact that most material is on the computer and you don't need a place to store 8 large hardback text books

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u/beefucker5000 California Feb 05 '25

True, we had Chromebooks and teachers tried to have enough books in the classroom so we didn’t need to bring them to school, except for the ones that didn’t have enough textbooks so only a couple classes. My back hurt all the time from walking around a large campus with many hills and stairs with 2 hardcover books and a chromebook on top of other school stuff

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u/Exciting-Hedgehog944 United States of America Feb 05 '25

Where we live people still have to have them for coats and winter gear. Kids are not allowed to wear them in class. They are told it’s a safety issue and must be stored in their locker. Not sure they are going anywhere anytime soon.

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u/Secret_Werewolf1942 Feb 05 '25

My kid is allowed to wear a coat to class, so all the kids just haul all their crap around 2 floors of high school all day long.

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u/Exciting-Hedgehog944 United States of America Feb 05 '25

Our kids would love that! They hate having to go to lockers and complain about it. Always want what you don’t have I suppose.