Is it not courteous to challenge a teacher's criticism?

Question

I had to write a short response to the 1964 satire of the cold war, "Dr Stangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb".

My history teacher has somewhat of a grudge against me, however after passing the written response through my parents, a teacher and a historically genius lawyer, I had reason to believe it was a good response.

It came back with comments which questioned my use of words which were, indeed, accurate, and a way-out criticism of the piece over all.

I wrote an email questioning my teacher's comments, not in a "rude" or "uncourteous" way, but received an email back telling me it was "neither helpful nor courteous".

Answer 1

Sometimes teachers just don't like being challenged by their students - they feel it's an affront to their authority. Personally, I think challenges are only uncourteous when they're rude or made in front of a class, but my feelings don't change the teacher's feelings.

If you made sure to be very polite in your email and mentioned all the people that had looked over your paper, then I'm afraid you've done all you can do.

Answer 2

If the teacher already doesn't like you and you s***w with him, he's gunna mess with you more.

Answer 3

Talk to him. In person.  Email leaves a lot to the imagination, and interpretation.  While you're talking, you may get to understand his point of view better, and vice versa.  It'll be much quicker than writing a carefully worded email as well.

Answer 4

have you learned a lesson from this little episode in your education?

in school you don't only develop your knowledge base, you know?