AITA for referring to a group of my students as the “some of the best and brightest juniors” when I ran into them at Target with my wife?

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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/EarAlive8000 on 2023-10-07 05:54:28.

I’m a high school US History teacher and I teach one period of APUSH. I have 21 kids in that class and they honestly are some of the smartest kids in their grade. I require them to form study groups and meet outside of class every unit to study. One of these groups was studying at Target. There is a Starbucks at that Target and apparently they were studying there and decided to take a break by walking around Target.

I was also at Target with my wife and her sister at the time. One of them was being pushed around in a shopping cart and all of them were acting more like kindergartners than 16 year olds. They said hello to me in the aisle and I somewhat jokingly told my wife and sister in law that these are “some of the best and brightest juniors at our school”. I did not want to have an extended conversation with my students at Target so we left and I almost forgot about the whole interaction.

Later my sister in law brought it up again and said that I hurt my students’ feelings by making making sarcastic remarks about them. I don’t think they were hurt. I make fun of them sometimes and I only do it to the kids that can take a joke. I know these ones can. Besides, I didn’t say anything hurtful. I told my wife and SIL that they’re smart kids while they were doing some pretty stupid things. I don’t think I said anything wrong but my SIL is insisting that I’m hurting the kids’ self esteem. AITA? Is my old age making me insensitive and out of touch with the young’uns?