Hi !!!
I wanna tell u all about a lit korean culture with their teacher....

In Korea, the most commonly used word is '선생님' (seon-saeng-nim). When students see a teacher in the hallway, they would say, anyonghaseyo~ seonsangnim!

But recently, a lot of kids have been saying '쌤' (ssam) which is basically the same meaning as seon-sang-nim except this is much more informal.

Also, another very informal way to say teacher is '담탱' (dam-tang). It's usually not used in front of teachers because they usually find it rude and it is rather condescending. I used to say it with my friends a lot though.. about a teacher I hated.

College professors would be addressed as '교수님' (gyoh-soo-nim). Did you notice a common letter between '선생님' and '교수님'? The '님' signifies that the person is of a higher status- technically, the words that would come up in a Korean dictionary would be '선생' and '교수'. That's why students would always add the '님' at the end.

But you can definitely hear adults using such words without the '님'. For example, there might be a faculty meeting at a school- a teacher might address another teacher (Mr. Kim) as 김 선생, although this isn't always true. There's no doubt that 선생님 is a more polite way.

I hope that helped

Kian ^_^