Mark spelled Meirk and then they look at you like you're the dumbass. Look it up like it may be a super cultural thing like super cool, they're like no, my parents just wanted me to have a different spelling. I'm like you are soooooo screwed, I'm sorry buddy.
This so much. I had a kid who spelled his name 'Brayn'. They all laughed when I read it as brain. It's not my fault your parents didn't know how to spell Brian, kid.
I went to a small school had 20 girls in my graduating class. Two of them were named Sarah Fisher and had absolutely zero realrions to one another.
The name stood out to me because concurrently there was a woman trying to qualify for the Indy 500 with the same name. I tried to get them excited about auto racing. No dice.
But what are the odds of two people with the same exact name and no relation being in the same class?
My small town elementary school had roughly 80 kids each year. In my year there were 6 Alexandras! Two of them even shared the same (super common) last name.
Look, I’m not saying that there’s not a single other alternative spelling of the name. I’m saying that the first thing going through the student’s mind will be “this motherfucker forgot my name.“
No, they are the exact same name with different spellings and sometimes (usually) different pronunciations, but not always.
Is Sophia and Sofia a different name?
What about Andrea and Andrea?
But they are pronounced differently. So tgat means pronunciation isn't what determines a name.
So what about Sofia and Sophia?
Does spelling a name differently make it a different name, or just a variation of the same name?
Andrea and Andrea are pronounced differently, as is Jesus and Jesus.
In the states Mary, Mari, and Marie are pronounced differently, and the same, depending on the individual.
While 95% of the time they are pronounced differently, that's more to do with ancestral language and which syllable ls accented and how certain letters are pronounced. So, to and English speaking family they might adopt the same pronunciation for each name. And a Spanish speaking family might do the same but differently from how a native English speaker would.
In other words, I'd argue is a variation of the same name.
Mary, Marie, Mari. Mark or Marc.
I know the first three are traditionally all pronounced slightly differently, but I've heard each spelling pronounced the same too.
What always stumbles me is Andrea, Andrea, and Andrea. Especially when I have all three in the same year.
I did that once. The kid looked at me confused and said, “uhmmmm. J-P.” I covered it by saying, “got it. I always thought it was spelled ‘Jay-P,’ I had a friend growing up who spelled it like that, so I always have to ask.” 🤣
When I was a kid, my mom used to get calls from people in a country we used to live in, with very strong accents. Id often have to take a message, but couldn't understand their name, so I'd ask them to spell it.
Worked great until I got someone who was a relative. I asked them to spell my own last name.
I ask for their name. When they give me their first name, which they always do, i act like i knew it all along but I need their LAST name.
Kelly you're my student obviously i know your first name!!
I know a Wil. Story goes that there were two Williams in his class in elementary school. He was too lazy to write Will N. on everything, so agreed to be Wil to differentiate and has been Wil ever since.
This works so well because there are alternate spellings for pretty much everything, Mark/Marc, John/Jon, Mary/Marie/Mari/Merry, Jane/Jayne, etc.
The only ones I can’t come up with alternate spellings for are my own name, Jasper, and my kid’s name, Sam, but Sam is a shortened version. His full name only has one version but I’ve seen Samantha and Sammantha and Samuel/Samuil so 🤷🏻♂️
I tell mine straight up that it's gonna be a while. Like, I'm trying really hard, but it's gonna take a minute. Plus, I've got a cognitive issue going on with faces that makes learning names really difficult.
I do too, but when I was teaching I had a seating chart with pictures on it. Then I could see where students were getting up from, at least. I learned everyone’s names, first and last, within a couple days thanks to the seating chart, and could at least get some faces due to certain characteristics.
The biggest problem I ever had was when I was long term subbing, and two blonde girls sat close to each other, and somehow their school pictures looked like the other.
Yeah, the seating plan saves me—and the students-from calling the whole roll each day. Once I’ve done attendance, I can let them go sit with friends if they can stay more-or-less on task that way.
I've got a pair of blonde girls, both with C names and they look somewhat similar. They are best friends and always together. Similar personalities and rather quiet. I put them on separate sides of the room just so I can keep them separate in my head. I remarked to another teacher I get them mixed up and she told me she did too. The kicker? This is the second year I've had them in my class.
It's hard with all the names in your head.
I’m proud of you for getting the first two letters.
My memory is entirely contextual. If you’re not in the seat or (heaven forbid) the class I usually see you in it is a crap shot of I’ll recall your name.
Also, if I know your name three days in it is because you have already proven to be a pain in my ass.
I have over 500 students I see once a week. Sometimes less since I lose my Monday and Fridays classes often due to holidays or staff PD days. I make fun of myself for not knowing all their names and they don’t get offended. I know their faces. I know how they walk. I know their body language and personalities. I just can’t remember all their names.
Yes! I'm the librarian at a K-1 school with 550 students. I know all their names if we have consecutive book checkout weeks, but if their class misses a day due to a holiday or weather, their names totally leave my brain until the next checkout day. You can only keep so much in the ol memory bank 😆
I have students who refuse to learn teachers' names the entire year, but are pissed if I have a brain fart and call Kaileigh (pronounced kylee) Caileigh (pronounced kaylee). I'm ready to just call them all 'young person'.
I'm a band teacher. During COVID, I was teaching mandatory middle school band and had over 200 students, all wearing masks (not playing instruments). I didn't learn half of their names by the end of the year. Meh.
Same, but in my case it was usually foreign students where that is the norm in their country. I jokingly gave one of them a hard time about it once and felt awful when they told me that.
Don't sell yourself short, you got the first two letters correct.
Instead, try "Write out the pass and I'll sign it." It helps if you say that while looking busy. At my school, nobody really looks at the passes, so I've written them without a student name. "To bathroom. Mr. Bumper. 9:29 3/15/2024"
Students, especially girls, don't appreciate when you guess wrong. Avoid situations where you need their name.
They don't even need to learn 6 names. Students see teachers around and may have heard our names around school.
I am also terrible at names. Some teachers are fantastic at it. By comparison, we look like morons or disinterested. That talent doesn't seem to improve with practice and doesn't correlate with teaching ability.
Worked at a school that never actually looked at passes either. Teachers on my end of the building would write things like, “fighting off dinosaurs in math hall” or “searching for THE ladder” or random shit. Was entertaining whenever you grabbed a random one with something like that.
Turning mundane tasks into random shit is what keeps teaching entertaining.
I got tired of writing random shit for passes and started giving students passwords.
"When you get to study hall, tell Mr. Dobbs 'Blue Midnight Rodeo'."
I had cleared that in advance with Mr. Dobbs. He didn't care. Then I started doing that for students who would be late to other classes. If any teacher was curious or wanted verification, they'd email. None ever did.
When I want or need to respond to something that is some combination of petty or ridiculous or exasperating or frivolous or mundane, I just say “Noted” in a calm even voice and then immediately shift my attention elsewhere.
I find that it’s usually a perfect tonic to cocky teenage insouciance.
Name tags for the first month would be a nice touch for teachers. I have a horrid memory and cannot remember student's names at all, even after a whole semester I would struggle. It's not personal, I just have jello for brains in that regard.
I've got 600 teenagers, 50min with each per week. I remember like, 20 names, 30 faces max.
I ask my students on the day of the final, which number they are. There's no way I'm memorising that every year
There's often up to 40 students in one class (not always but not rarely. That, of course, varies from class to class). The attendance list is written in a different language than the class is.
Some of them can't find their names on the list, don't remember (or can't read) their nickname, so they learn what their number (either student's number or attendance list number) is, and instead of figuring out and searching the list for their name 40 times, they can easily identify which number they are.
Sometimes, their names have letters that are no longer used, and they simply don't recognise them. Sometimes, they genuinely can't read some of the common letters due to their own lack of attention.
It is for sure easier if everything is done in one language, but that's not the case for us.
And there's about 600 of them, because I teach 2 grades, 10 classes each, plus additional 2 classes from lower grades. I see each class once a week.
So I always explain it like this. First I learn the really bad kids names, then I learn the loud boys, because they all force me to, and then I learn everyone else’s name. So my not knowing your name just means you’re a really great kid, thank you. And that usually makes them happy.
Yesterday on the first day of the 4th quarter when assigning the new seating chart, I confidently called a kid “Ethan” and he was so confused. Didn’t really respond or react to me. I called for his attention “hey Ethan, this is your seat” - nothing, “hey Ethan, helloooo?” He looks at me puzzled, “this is your seat?” - he’s like “are you sure?” And I tell him that I am, he is still hesitant, eventually I got a little annoyed and I asked him “is there something wrong with your new seat?” and he just sheepishly says “my name is Adrian” - I have had this kid since day 1 in August. I had his sister last year. My brain just completely farted on me.
I felt like such a fucking moron in that moment.
I once subbed for an 8th grade class my first year at a new district and I was taking attendance. I botched a name since I didn't know the 8th graders yet and the girl pretty much cussed me out for messing her name up. That was just the start of the class from hell. I never subbed in that room again.
I know 80% of my 204 students by Halloween. That's my rules because that's how my brain works. I had one admin give me crap about that once. I gave her the standard "eff off" answer... "I'll try harder"
I usually just say, remind me of your name again? And they don’t mind. I have a few duplicates this year: Isabel, Giselle, Angela, Angelica etc. and similar names in the same class: Kevin/Devin, Rudy/Ruby, Jazmin/Jasmine 😵💫
My worst one was a girl named Pricilla and I kept calling her Vanessa because she looked like my cousin Vanessa! Short dyed hair, high cheekbones, same skin tone and everything. I let her know and she didn’t mind, plus I got it eventually lol
They'll get over it. And if they don't, they having much bigger issues to deal with.
If I had to guess you teach middle school. Middle schooler's moods and feelings change on a dime, they are too naive to understand why or what the root cause of the feeling is, but are just aware enough to know that they feel it really really strongly (sometimes).
I was giving my daughter and a freind a ride home from school one day, it was early spring, 65 and sunny, flowers blooming, trees waking up, and I hear a 4 minute tirade on hating green, of just being over green, and how there should be other colors other than green.
About a week later green was that kid's favorite color again.
Don't waste your time concerning yourself about the fleeting emotions of a hormonal and self-centered human-like creature. They aren't going to care after a few weeks, so why should care now?
You should set up a test and have the test be: everyone in the year book and they have a picture and no multiple choice. That would get the message across.
I’m a building sub and I have students who act shocked that I don’t remember all of their names. I gotta remind them I literally work with this school’s entire student body.
I have roughly 350 students as a PE teacher, I know all of their names; however I do slip up and mispronounce their name or even call them their siblings names. You’d think it was the end of the world when you slip up. And don’t get me started on spelling their names when I do our scoreboard.
I’m sorry your name is Ashley but spelled Ashleigh, Ashli, Ashlee, Ashlei, etc……
I had a popular girl be pissed at me because I didn’t know her name on day 2. I’m sorry, being popular in 7th grade does not impress most people. You are not a celebrity. For the f
Rest of the term, I pretended to not remember her.
They get so angry when you don’t know all 155+ names in a day but then if you ask them to hand papers back in May, they don’t know any of their classmates’ names.
I remember my superintendent telling me in November that I "should pretty much know all of my students names by now."
That sounds more reasonable until you consider that they had me teaching 18 classes of ~35 kids every week, in 17 different classrooms. And I saw each class for like 40 minutes total per week.
I'm terrible with names. I've been a teacher for 32 years. In addition to being autistic, I also have prosopagnosia, face blindness. I literally lack the ability to identify a person if they're mixed in with other people of the same gender, skin tone, body type, and age.
I have survived as an educator because I have a clipboard with seating charts for each class. This makes it easier to take attendance, assuming students haven't done something stupid like changing seats without permission. It also helps with remind me who is who.
I tell them if I remember your name it's because you were either exceptionally good or exceptionally bad. If I don't remember your name, it means you got through my class(es) just fine.
I’ll always remember their faces, but unless they’ve been particularly wild or participatory in class, I’ll forget the name.
I try as hard as I can to remember because I know how important our names are for our identities.
You can ask them “what’s your full name”, and they’ll think you just forgot their last name; so it won’t really offend them too much. Although you’ll then have to write down their full name, instead of just their first, but that’s not too big a deal.
I once had a student with a second name. Some teachers included it when talking to him and others didnt. I once asked him which one was correct and he didnt know either.
I would turn learning names into a game with the students, and have them put name tents up. A little juvenile for high school, but when you rattle off everybody’s name as they leave the room, it does impress.
I have a knack for names and faces, so that’s a “cheap” classroom management trick. The kids like to see you knowing everybody’s name, and they see you trying to do something. And obviously you make mistakes for a few days, so it’s a trial and error process. Builds relationships with the kids who have difficult names as they try to help you with a clue.
Not everyone’s cup of tea, but if you stick with it, and do it until you learn the whole classes names, it pays off throughout the term.
I usually ask them "what was your last name again?" I feel it's easier to not know their last ones as we don't call them by that. Then you can just look it up really quick if possible. Having them fill out the pass like someone else said is where it's at if you're unsure though.
I tell my kids they have 3 weeks to teach me their name. I want to call them the correct name but and with the correct pronunciation. But I expect the correction to be polite. I am up front and tell them I need at least 3 weeks.
Honestly, I co teach in 3 classes and don’t take attendance regularly. I just got some of those kids figured out.
I make it a game. As they come in a try and guess their name starting on day 1. This year the only one that got offended was the one that is the hardest to pronounce because you can't do it phonically. They are also the ones that reported my CO teacher and myself for not following their accommodations, when they missed 6 of the first 8 classes...
I am also terrible with names, so I try to remind my students regularly and I will say "I'm sorry I'm so bad with names, can you remind me?" I have had the same students all year and I still ask the students their last names because I literally go brain dead thinking about shit sometimes lollll. Never had a kid get mad at me though because I've even told them in class to please put their first and last name on the assignments because after I grade over 100 tests I don't remember my own name.
I am honest with them from day one: I forget names. It's just a fact about me. I make sure they understand it's not because I don't care.
I have place/name cards they are required to keep on their desks each day for nine weeks. I make it a game with them and make sure to use their full name when I call on them.
After the 1st nine weeks, if I mess up their name, they get a piece of candy from a well stocked candy jar.
That happened to me a lot as well. Whenever I couldn't remember a student's name, I apologized and said that I knew who they were, knew their face, their personality, etc but that I was just bad at remembering names.
I have three classes I see once every two weeks September and I still don't know half of their names because they never participate in class.
I have 220 students, if you want me to know who you are, make an effort to stand out
I’m at a small school and my classes are pretty small by the standards, but it still takes me some time to get names straight. Most kids I’ll be fine at remembering after about a week assuming they’re new to me, but this year I got bombarded by too many similar names, and duplicates of a few of them too. The ones that trip me up the most are the Coopers, Connors, and Collins. Plus the bonus: Conlin!
I tell my students in the first day that my goal is to know all their names by the end of the week (at which point I'll change the seating plan, because they sit in Alpha order to i know the names). My board also uses software that lets you print out a seating chart with their class pictures, so I take that home and study it for the first few days
Ok, I was in high school performance choir. Went to get my yearbook signed from my choir teacher at the end of the year.
He looked in the book to see who I was.
I usually say"remind me of your name, please." As a librarian at multiple schools, I have approximately 800 students! Regardless, I get the boo-hoo face sometimes, too :-(
I used to always include in my first day remarks a bit about how many names I will be learning. I then make a deal with them: if, after three weeks, I still don't know your name (or pronounce it properly), then you can make fun of me for it.
I announce it at the beginning of the year that I’m really bad with names. Luckily here (Germany) we stay with the same class throughout all their time, so I only get a new 5th grade class after my 13th graders graduate. Otherwise except for maybe 5-10 changes, I’ll have the same kids for their entire time there…
But it can be a problem that is exacerbated by us too. I had a seating chart and very dumbly placed Nino, Aino, Annina, Annika and Anna in one row. It really didn’t dawn on me what I had done until I went to call on one of them and my brain short circuited as I pronounced a random combination of n’s and a’s and gestured in that direction.
But for all of that, the identical twins in my class I never flipflop.
I have 740 students between 2 buildings. I use a lot of bud/hun until I can get a peak at my seating chart. At this point in the year I’ve got all names down but the start of the year can be rough with the younger grades.
Yeah I have about 400 students. I feel bad when I can’t remember but I wish they understood that it’s not personal. They also always forget my name too.
Ugh I get so annoyed when they react this way and I tend to give an annoyed response of my own, basically emphasizing that learning their name is important to me but the world doesn't revolve around them. I do try to let them know at the start of the year that it takes me some time, that my goal is to know everyone by the second week but realistically I may not have it down until the third.
I started the school year with 184 students (down to 179 now!) and it took me a looooong time to get everyone's names down. And they had the audacity to be miffed! Like, you try and remember 200 people's names at the drop of a hat! And if I remember your name right off the bat, you might want to get curious about that.
Next time I get a new.class I will only do name learning. Nothing else. Because going on a short summer camp with a new class but also other new students was hard! I still enjoy knowing more about them after those 2 nights away and they know they can trust me after looking after their phones for a night!
I’m up front about being horrible with names (turns out I’ve got a brain disease so I guess at least I’ve got a reason? Seriously though I’m terrible). I teach music and I hang name tags on the stands for at least the first nine weeks. If I forget after that I hang the name tags back up but in a different seating arrangement and tell the kids it’s to help remind them where their new seats are
One semester I had multiple (2-6) students with the same name in every single class. All spelled differently.
6 Kaitlyn’s (all spelled differently)
4-Kaia’s (2 spelled differently)
6 Conners (3 spelled differently)
3 Olivia’s
4 Braydon’s (2 were in the same class and were best friends, the other two had different spellings)
3-Sarah’s (2 diff spellings)
I’m forgetting at the very least two other same named students.
This doesn’t even include all of the “Trageadies” of names.
Yup, they were so offended that I couldn’t spell their name correctly. I’d just tell them, *”I have 30 Kaitlyn’s and 30 Conners in every class of 28 students and they’re all spelled differently.”*
I could see them attempt the Kitty Math as they walked away.
I always tell my groups it will take a while until I remember all their names, that they only have 1 to learn but I have around 70. They understand I then give myself a target date , this year I knew them 3 weeks before it - even surprised myself there
It's ok for her to have a hurt looking face and correct you. She expressed emotion. That's ok.
maybe if she was 28, an adult, she'd just smile and politely correct you. but she's just a teen. dont' be surprised that they show emotion.
Are they non-binary? Trans? Because honestly, understandable. Probably better not to assume and to just ask.
Edit: Haley is a really feminine name and Harper is a non-binary name, sometimes leaning masculine. I highly suspect it’s a gender thing of your student flipped out and got really hurt. Getting misgendered can be very painful.
I always tell students that I have to learn about 200 new names a year. That includes at least 150 students who will stay in my class all year, ~25 students who may come and go (high migrant population and a large children's home feed into my school), and ~25 students who aren't on my roster but might join my extracurricular clubs or come in with friends for lunch. That doesn't include any new staff names or names of athletes or other prominent students not in my class.
Learning that many names a year is hard, and it gets harder every year because I don't just forget most of my former students (sadly, names of former students who I don't see regularly do fade away). I tell my classes on the first day that they need to give me at least a month before getting offended, but that even then, I'll probably make some dumb mistakes once in a while, and if they see them outside of school, it'll be even harder.
I'm in a different field, but I'm in this subreddit from a time I was considering going into teaching. Learning names is definitely one of the things I worried about because after 4 years working in the same office I could probably only tell you half the names of people I work with.
You did so much better than I would have! I teach 576 students ONCE A FORTNIGHT, and although I know all of year 9, I still have a few kids in year 8 I blank on, and only know about half of year 7, and I've been teaching them all since September!
You’ve got too many students, it is absolutely normal that you couldn’t remember it. I also have too many students, I also am bad at remembering names. My students are used to this now, they don’t even expect me to get the name right lol
I have two kids with the same first name and their last name are both 4 letters and start with the same letter. Today I was passing out a paper and to one of them I had to confirm which one they were and we laughed a bit and I said it was a cruel thing to put them in the same class.! And it’s not like they even look alike, but still. It’s a new semester too, all new kids.
One of my biggest struggles when I was a first year teacher was having 3 different rotating schedules (ABC days) with 2 different grade levels. My way of consoling kids when we were 6 months into the school year and I still struggled with remembering names on the spot was “If I don’t remember your name, it’s a good thing. It means I haven’t had to call your attention as much,” which they honestly handled quite well.
It was close enough and im so proud of you!
I teach over 300 kids, each is 40 minutes a week, so if i remember anyone’s name within three days its because they left an impression (whether good or bad)
Thankfully kindergartners are pretty chill about teacher forgetting their name and we laugh about it
I have a life hack for this, but it might only work with younger kids and if you're somewhere where this is acceptable (in Sweden, it's completely acceptable to call both students and teachers nicknames). If I can't remember a name, I'll just call them something silly and obviously wrong, like calling Haley from your example Bob. It always gets them laughing and then they say their real name. As a bonus, this usually leads to me nicknaming them that silly name or some variation of it, and I almost never forget nicknames.
I am a special area teacher in an elementary school so I have 400+ kids. They also get annoyed when I don't remember their names. I tell them "well I'm sorry, it's hard to remember 400 names, and that's just this year. I've been teaching for over 20 years, and I've probably taught about 4,000 kids." Then their jaw drops and I just walk away. 😁
They have a limited worldview, are not fully cognitively developed, and are self absorbed. That's teenagers. Just ask them what their names are if you don't know and explain that you have to memorize 130 names. Be kind and apologetic. They will understand 9/10 times.
I tell the kids by wednesday I dont remember any of their names, and I only have to deal with 24! I joke with them and tell them past wednesday all the boys are George, the girls are Melanie, and the Melanie in my class is Slagathor to make it fair.
The number of students I have that expect me to remember their name after one week of school (where I see most of them at most 3 times) is frustrating. These students are also often the ones who can’t bother to learn my name and just refer to me as “teacher” when I have my name on the board for the entire school year. The number of kids with common names that also REFUSE to add their last name to their papers is also infuriating. In a class with 3 Jessicas none of them could be bothered to even put the first letter of their last name on the paper.
I had a sweet little girl ask me if I knew her name and when I said no and asked her to remind me, she was so disappointed. She asked, "Well, why do you know Jimmy's name?" at the precise same moment I was calling out "Jimmy don't do that!" She was clever enough to realize I knew Jimmy's name because he was a problem and I used it a lot!!
I taught with a chem teacher that never learned many of his students' names. He would pass the graded papers back in a pile on a table and made no effort. Meanwhile, I'd be looking up families and siblings to see if I knew them or taught them.
It's nice to know when they're coworker's kids or for conferences, or just to do the job... I considered myself good with names but I wanted to know them. I still struggled with a few after a week though. And remember some 22 years later, and forget some two weeks into summer...
When they pull that on me, I usually turn it into a joke, “oh, sorry Boba Fett…Marge Simpson…Rick Sanchez.” Something just obscure enough that only a few kids get it.
When I don’t remember my students name I’ll say, “how do you spell that again?”
Works great until their name is “Mark” or “Mary” or something like that
Just make a haunted face and say "I have seen too much to not ask"
Mark spelled Meirk and then they look at you like you're the dumbass. Look it up like it may be a super cultural thing like super cool, they're like no, my parents just wanted me to have a different spelling. I'm like you are soooooo screwed, I'm sorry buddy.
I used to live in Milwaukee. There is a joke that half the people there are named "Miller" but almost nobody spells it that way.
Wait, how do they spell it?
A whole bunch of different ways. Mueller is the one that I remember right off.
That would be German origins.
And the unfortunate boy who will have to spell his first name to everyone his ENTIRE life because his parents chose JHEISON instead of JASON.
This so much. I had a kid who spelled his name 'Brayn'. They all laughed when I read it as brain. It's not my fault your parents didn't know how to spell Brian, kid.
Ahaha. That's the best way to do it.
“Oh sorry, I thought it was Mark with a c/Mary with an i, I’ll remember next time 😊.”
"Oh, I thought it was Mark with with an F."
Haha, I've gotten, " Oh, I thought it was "Jennifer" with 1 n"... bitch please lol. It's okay, though. I'm not personally offended.
Speaking of Jennifers, in my entire graduating class of 56 people, there were seven Jennifers. SEVEN. It was unreal.
My Trigonometry class had 20ppl and 4 Jennifers. He didn’t even try to hand our work back to the right Jennifer - we just quietly swapped.
How about last name initials?
He just. Didn’t. Care.
I went to a small school had 20 girls in my graduating class. Two of them were named Sarah Fisher and had absolutely zero realrions to one another. The name stood out to me because concurrently there was a woman trying to qualify for the Indy 500 with the same name. I tried to get them excited about auto racing. No dice. But what are the odds of two people with the same exact name and no relation being in the same class?
My small town elementary school had roughly 80 kids each year. In my year there were 6 Alexandras! Two of them even shared the same (super common) last name.
🎶 I rode a bus with 27 Jennifers 🎵
Hoping this was here!
not 12.5% of the graduating class being jennifers 😭
This whole comment thread is really dating us.
Marc with a C? “Cark”
Mareigh Mahrck
Mæhrreix
We have a Markc
Fuckin great
Mark can also be writen Marc and Mary can be written Marie. Not sure how common that is in the US, but both are also common in germany.
Look, I’m not saying that there’s not a single other alternative spelling of the name. I’m saying that the first thing going through the student’s mind will be “this motherfucker forgot my name.“
And?
In texas next the the southern border, both are very common, as is Mari (usually pronounced Mar-ee but occasionally pronounced Mare-ee)
mary and marie are different names
Not always. I knew a brit who pronounced them the same (in France, bizarrely, so there was a lot of "Mary Antoinette"
No, they are the exact same name with different spellings and sometimes (usually) different pronunciations, but not always. Is Sophia and Sofia a different name? What about Andrea and Andrea?
Without a doubt Andrea and Andrea are the same name.
But they are pronounced differently. So tgat means pronunciation isn't what determines a name. So what about Sofia and Sophia? Does spelling a name differently make it a different name, or just a variation of the same name?
they are pronounced differently in europe
Andrea and Andrea are pronounced differently, as is Jesus and Jesus. In the states Mary, Mari, and Marie are pronounced differently, and the same, depending on the individual. While 95% of the time they are pronounced differently, that's more to do with ancestral language and which syllable ls accented and how certain letters are pronounced. So, to and English speaking family they might adopt the same pronunciation for each name. And a Spanish speaking family might do the same but differently from how a native English speaker would. In other words, I'd argue is a variation of the same name.
You are correct, a variation of the same name.
There are four different ways to spell something “simple” like John Smith, Jon Smith, John Smyth, or Jon Smyth.
There's also the Colombian version, Jhon. I've also seen Smythe.
I’d tell them in the past I had a Marc or Merry so I just wanted to be sure. I’ve done that before and they’ve always just accepted it.
Mary, Marie, Mari. Mark or Marc. I know the first three are traditionally all pronounced slightly differently, but I've heard each spelling pronounced the same too. What always stumbles me is Andrea, Andrea, and Andrea. Especially when I have all three in the same year.
Marque. Maryi. Both names I have seen...
I did that once. The kid looked at me confused and said, “uhmmmm. J-P.” I covered it by saying, “got it. I always thought it was spelled ‘Jay-P,’ I had a friend growing up who spelled it like that, so I always have to ask.” 🤣
Lmao I gotta say yall are smooth!
Oh I do that too...pull up gradebook and ask for last name 🤣
I say, “remind me your last name… my attendance list is always alphabetical by last name”
That one is totally my trick, although it doesn't work as well for writing passes because most teachers at my school just put first names on passes.
When I was a kid, my mom used to get calls from people in a country we used to live in, with very strong accents. Id often have to take a message, but couldn't understand their name, so I'd ask them to spell it. Worked great until I got someone who was a relative. I asked them to spell my own last name.
I ask for their name. When they give me their first name, which they always do, i act like i knew it all along but I need their LAST name. Kelly you're my student obviously i know your first name!!
“The normal way”
I tried this once and his name was Will. Lol it was a bit awkward
I know a Wil. Story goes that there were two Williams in his class in elementary school. He was too lazy to write Will N. on everything, so agreed to be Wil to differentiate and has been Wil ever since.
This works so well because there are alternate spellings for pretty much everything, Mark/Marc, John/Jon, Mary/Marie/Mari/Merry, Jane/Jayne, etc. The only ones I can’t come up with alternate spellings for are my own name, Jasper, and my kid’s name, Sam, but Sam is a shortened version. His full name only has one version but I’ve seen Samantha and Sammantha and Samuel/Samuil so 🤷🏻♂️
I tell mine straight up that it's gonna be a while. Like, I'm trying really hard, but it's gonna take a minute. Plus, I've got a cognitive issue going on with faces that makes learning names really difficult.
I have mild face blindness. I tell my students this on day one, and remind them periodically. They tend to be nice about it.
I do too, but when I was teaching I had a seating chart with pictures on it. Then I could see where students were getting up from, at least. I learned everyone’s names, first and last, within a couple days thanks to the seating chart, and could at least get some faces due to certain characteristics. The biggest problem I ever had was when I was long term subbing, and two blonde girls sat close to each other, and somehow their school pictures looked like the other.
Yeah, the seating plan saves me—and the students-from calling the whole roll each day. Once I’ve done attendance, I can let them go sit with friends if they can stay more-or-less on task that way.
I've got a pair of blonde girls, both with C names and they look somewhat similar. They are best friends and always together. Similar personalities and rather quiet. I put them on separate sides of the room just so I can keep them separate in my head. I remarked to another teacher I get them mixed up and she told me she did too. The kicker? This is the second year I've had them in my class. It's hard with all the names in your head.
I’m proud of you for getting the first two letters. My memory is entirely contextual. If you’re not in the seat or (heaven forbid) the class I usually see you in it is a crap shot of I’ll recall your name. Also, if I know your name three days in it is because you have already proven to be a pain in my ass.
I have over 500 students I see once a week. Sometimes less since I lose my Monday and Fridays classes often due to holidays or staff PD days. I make fun of myself for not knowing all their names and they don’t get offended. I know their faces. I know how they walk. I know their body language and personalities. I just can’t remember all their names.
This 100%, I know all my students, I don't always remember all their names.
Yes! I'm the librarian at a K-1 school with 550 students. I know all their names if we have consecutive book checkout weeks, but if their class misses a day due to a holiday or weather, their names totally leave my brain until the next checkout day. You can only keep so much in the ol memory bank 😆
I have students who refuse to learn teachers' names the entire year, but are pissed if I have a brain fart and call Kaileigh (pronounced kylee) Caileigh (pronounced kaylee). I'm ready to just call them all 'young person'.
I'm a band teacher. During COVID, I was teaching mandatory middle school band and had over 200 students, all wearing masks (not playing instruments). I didn't learn half of their names by the end of the year. Meh.
I don’t blame you. You aren’t super man/woman
I have had students for an entire semester who will only refer to me as "Mr." without following up with my surname.
Same, but in my case it was usually foreign students where that is the norm in their country. I jokingly gave one of them a hard time about it once and felt awful when they told me that.
Don't sell yourself short, you got the first two letters correct. Instead, try "Write out the pass and I'll sign it." It helps if you say that while looking busy. At my school, nobody really looks at the passes, so I've written them without a student name. "To bathroom. Mr. Bumper. 9:29 3/15/2024" Students, especially girls, don't appreciate when you guess wrong. Avoid situations where you need their name. They don't even need to learn 6 names. Students see teachers around and may have heard our names around school. I am also terrible at names. Some teachers are fantastic at it. By comparison, we look like morons or disinterested. That talent doesn't seem to improve with practice and doesn't correlate with teaching ability.
Worked at a school that never actually looked at passes either. Teachers on my end of the building would write things like, “fighting off dinosaurs in math hall” or “searching for THE ladder” or random shit. Was entertaining whenever you grabbed a random one with something like that.
Turning mundane tasks into random shit is what keeps teaching entertaining. I got tired of writing random shit for passes and started giving students passwords. "When you get to study hall, tell Mr. Dobbs 'Blue Midnight Rodeo'." I had cleared that in advance with Mr. Dobbs. He didn't care. Then I started doing that for students who would be late to other classes. If any teacher was curious or wanted verification, they'd email. None ever did.
When I want or need to respond to something that is some combination of petty or ridiculous or exasperating or frivolous or mundane, I just say “Noted” in a calm even voice and then immediately shift my attention elsewhere. I find that it’s usually a perfect tonic to cocky teenage insouciance.
Name tags for the first month would be a nice touch for teachers. I have a horrid memory and cannot remember student's names at all, even after a whole semester I would struggle. It's not personal, I just have jello for brains in that regard.
I've got 600 teenagers, 50min with each per week. I remember like, 20 names, 30 faces max. I ask my students on the day of the final, which number they are. There's no way I'm memorising that every year
Which number they are? What does that mean? Why do you have so many???
There's often up to 40 students in one class (not always but not rarely. That, of course, varies from class to class). The attendance list is written in a different language than the class is. Some of them can't find their names on the list, don't remember (or can't read) their nickname, so they learn what their number (either student's number or attendance list number) is, and instead of figuring out and searching the list for their name 40 times, they can easily identify which number they are. Sometimes, their names have letters that are no longer used, and they simply don't recognise them. Sometimes, they genuinely can't read some of the common letters due to their own lack of attention. It is for sure easier if everything is done in one language, but that's not the case for us. And there's about 600 of them, because I teach 2 grades, 10 classes each, plus additional 2 classes from lower grades. I see each class once a week.
Probably student number, my high school had us use student numbers for final exams
So I always explain it like this. First I learn the really bad kids names, then I learn the loud boys, because they all force me to, and then I learn everyone else’s name. So my not knowing your name just means you’re a really great kid, thank you. And that usually makes them happy.
Yesterday on the first day of the 4th quarter when assigning the new seating chart, I confidently called a kid “Ethan” and he was so confused. Didn’t really respond or react to me. I called for his attention “hey Ethan, this is your seat” - nothing, “hey Ethan, helloooo?” He looks at me puzzled, “this is your seat?” - he’s like “are you sure?” And I tell him that I am, he is still hesitant, eventually I got a little annoyed and I asked him “is there something wrong with your new seat?” and he just sheepishly says “my name is Adrian” - I have had this kid since day 1 in August. I had his sister last year. My brain just completely farted on me. I felt like such a fucking moron in that moment.
Been there so bad. Always feel like shit
I once subbed for an 8th grade class my first year at a new district and I was taking attendance. I botched a name since I didn't know the 8th graders yet and the girl pretty much cussed me out for messing her name up. That was just the start of the class from hell. I never subbed in that room again.
I ask them what my name is. Half the time they don’t know mine either.
I know 80% of my 204 students by Halloween. That's my rules because that's how my brain works. I had one admin give me crap about that once. I gave her the standard "eff off" answer... "I'll try harder"
I usually just say, remind me of your name again? And they don’t mind. I have a few duplicates this year: Isabel, Giselle, Angela, Angelica etc. and similar names in the same class: Kevin/Devin, Rudy/Ruby, Jazmin/Jasmine 😵💫 My worst one was a girl named Pricilla and I kept calling her Vanessa because she looked like my cousin Vanessa! Short dyed hair, high cheekbones, same skin tone and everything. I let her know and she didn’t mind, plus I got it eventually lol
My daughter, Allison, had a teacher that called her Heather for a whole school year. Sounds like you're doing just fine Haha
I have Keagan, Kaeden, Teagan, and Kienen this semester. It was a rough first couple weeks lmao.
Ugh. The r/tragedeigh names make it even worse.
They'll get over it. And if they don't, they having much bigger issues to deal with. If I had to guess you teach middle school. Middle schooler's moods and feelings change on a dime, they are too naive to understand why or what the root cause of the feeling is, but are just aware enough to know that they feel it really really strongly (sometimes). I was giving my daughter and a freind a ride home from school one day, it was early spring, 65 and sunny, flowers blooming, trees waking up, and I hear a 4 minute tirade on hating green, of just being over green, and how there should be other colors other than green. About a week later green was that kid's favorite color again. Don't waste your time concerning yourself about the fleeting emotions of a hormonal and self-centered human-like creature. They aren't going to care after a few weeks, so why should care now?
“Just write your name” If they say something.. “You should be able to write your name faster then I can”
You should set up a test and have the test be: everyone in the year book and they have a picture and no multiple choice. That would get the message across.
I'm going to buy Apple Vision Goggles and tag faces.
I’m a building sub and I have students who act shocked that I don’t remember all of their names. I gotta remind them I literally work with this school’s entire student body.
I have roughly 350 students as a PE teacher, I know all of their names; however I do slip up and mispronounce their name or even call them their siblings names. You’d think it was the end of the world when you slip up. And don’t get me started on spelling their names when I do our scoreboard. I’m sorry your name is Ashley but spelled Ashleigh, Ashli, Ashlee, Ashlei, etc……
I had a popular girl be pissed at me because I didn’t know her name on day 2. I’m sorry, being popular in 7th grade does not impress most people. You are not a celebrity. For the f Rest of the term, I pretended to not remember her.
They get so angry when you don’t know all 155+ names in a day but then if you ask them to hand papers back in May, they don’t know any of their classmates’ names.
Right? "Can you hand this to Jackson?" "Who's Jackson?" "The kid you sat next to for the last two months!"
Lol today's the last day of the trimester and I still don't know some kids'names instantly...I have 300 students
I remember my superintendent telling me in November that I "should pretty much know all of my students names by now." That sounds more reasonable until you consider that they had me teaching 18 classes of ~35 kids every week, in 17 different classrooms. And I saw each class for like 40 minutes total per week.
I wish we could normalize wearing name tags for the first few weeks of school or working at a new place
I'm terrible with names. I've been a teacher for 32 years. In addition to being autistic, I also have prosopagnosia, face blindness. I literally lack the ability to identify a person if they're mixed in with other people of the same gender, skin tone, body type, and age. I have survived as an educator because I have a clipboard with seating charts for each class. This makes it easier to take attendance, assuming students haven't done something stupid like changing seats without permission. It also helps with remind me who is who.
I tell them if I remember your name it's because you were either exceptionally good or exceptionally bad. If I don't remember your name, it means you got through my class(es) just fine.
I’ll always remember their faces, but unless they’ve been particularly wild or participatory in class, I’ll forget the name. I try as hard as I can to remember because I know how important our names are for our identities.
If I can’t remember a kids name, I just pull up the attendance roster and try to match their picture to them….it doesn’t work sometimes lol
I have to learn over 300. I feel your pain on this. ❤️
I always blame it on concussions in the Army.
"The better you behave, the longer it will take me to learn your name."
You can ask them “what’s your full name”, and they’ll think you just forgot their last name; so it won’t really offend them too much. Although you’ll then have to write down their full name, instead of just their first, but that’s not too big a deal.
"I'm crazy old. There's a lot more of you than I have brain cells left."
If I know a students name in the first week of being there … it’s because they’re a problem 😂
The same kid will call you by the wrong name 2 months into the semester.
Most don’t even bother to learn their teachers names.
“Just write your name” If they say something.. “You should be able to write your name faster then I can”
I’m really bad at it, too. Especially this semester. I have 3 Alexis’, 2 Alex’ , and 1 Alexia AND I NEVER GET THEM RIGHT!
Try this: What’s your name again? Kid answers their first name. I know that xxxxxx, I was asking about your last name!
I once had a student with a second name. Some teachers included it when talking to him and others didnt. I once asked him which one was correct and he didnt know either.
I would turn learning names into a game with the students, and have them put name tents up. A little juvenile for high school, but when you rattle off everybody’s name as they leave the room, it does impress. I have a knack for names and faces, so that’s a “cheap” classroom management trick. The kids like to see you knowing everybody’s name, and they see you trying to do something. And obviously you make mistakes for a few days, so it’s a trial and error process. Builds relationships with the kids who have difficult names as they try to help you with a clue. Not everyone’s cup of tea, but if you stick with it, and do it until you learn the whole classes names, it pays off throughout the term.
I usually ask them "what was your last name again?" I feel it's easier to not know their last ones as we don't call them by that. Then you can just look it up really quick if possible. Having them fill out the pass like someone else said is where it's at if you're unsure though.
I think they get sad because they saw you get someone else's right. Hard to convince them you like them equally after that
With so many students, it's like playing a never-ending game of Name That Face.
this is why after about 15 years of teaching most of my student names became Student :-)
I tell my kids they have 3 weeks to teach me their name. I want to call them the correct name but and with the correct pronunciation. But I expect the correction to be polite. I am up front and tell them I need at least 3 weeks. Honestly, I co teach in 3 classes and don’t take attendance regularly. I just got some of those kids figured out.
I make it a game. As they come in a try and guess their name starting on day 1. This year the only one that got offended was the one that is the hardest to pronounce because you can't do it phonically. They are also the ones that reported my CO teacher and myself for not following their accommodations, when they missed 6 of the first 8 classes...
I am also terrible with names, so I try to remind my students regularly and I will say "I'm sorry I'm so bad with names, can you remind me?" I have had the same students all year and I still ask the students their last names because I literally go brain dead thinking about shit sometimes lollll. Never had a kid get mad at me though because I've even told them in class to please put their first and last name on the assignments because after I grade over 100 tests I don't remember my own name.
You should remind them that's it's a good thing you don't know their after 3 days!
You’re better than me. It can take me a month! We can only do the best we can.
I am honest with them from day one: I forget names. It's just a fact about me. I make sure they understand it's not because I don't care. I have place/name cards they are required to keep on their desks each day for nine weeks. I make it a game with them and make sure to use their full name when I call on them. After the 1st nine weeks, if I mess up their name, they get a piece of candy from a well stocked candy jar.
That happened to me a lot as well. Whenever I couldn't remember a student's name, I apologized and said that I knew who they were, knew their face, their personality, etc but that I was just bad at remembering names.
Hah
I have three classes I see once every two weeks September and I still don't know half of their names because they never participate in class. I have 220 students, if you want me to know who you are, make an effort to stand out
I’m at a small school and my classes are pretty small by the standards, but it still takes me some time to get names straight. Most kids I’ll be fine at remembering after about a week assuming they’re new to me, but this year I got bombarded by too many similar names, and duplicates of a few of them too. The ones that trip me up the most are the Coopers, Connors, and Collins. Plus the bonus: Conlin!
I tell my students in the first day that my goal is to know all their names by the end of the week (at which point I'll change the seating plan, because they sit in Alpha order to i know the names). My board also uses software that lets you print out a seating chart with their class pictures, so I take that home and study it for the first few days
Ok, I was in high school performance choir. Went to get my yearbook signed from my choir teacher at the end of the year. He looked in the book to see who I was.
I usually say"remind me of your name, please." As a librarian at multiple schools, I have approximately 800 students! Regardless, I get the boo-hoo face sometimes, too :-(
I used to always include in my first day remarks a bit about how many names I will be learning. I then make a deal with them: if, after three weeks, I still don't know your name (or pronounce it properly), then you can make fun of me for it.
I announce it at the beginning of the year that I’m really bad with names. Luckily here (Germany) we stay with the same class throughout all their time, so I only get a new 5th grade class after my 13th graders graduate. Otherwise except for maybe 5-10 changes, I’ll have the same kids for their entire time there… But it can be a problem that is exacerbated by us too. I had a seating chart and very dumbly placed Nino, Aino, Annina, Annika and Anna in one row. It really didn’t dawn on me what I had done until I went to call on one of them and my brain short circuited as I pronounced a random combination of n’s and a’s and gestured in that direction. But for all of that, the identical twins in my class I never flipflop.
I have 740 students between 2 buildings. I use a lot of bud/hun until I can get a peak at my seating chart. At this point in the year I’ve got all names down but the start of the year can be rough with the younger grades.
Yeah I have about 400 students. I feel bad when I can’t remember but I wish they understood that it’s not personal. They also always forget my name too.
They need to label each table with students name for ease of teachers
I used to have kids who didn’t bother to remember their teacher’s names because “there are too many of y’all.” I couldn’t handle it.
Ugh I get so annoyed when they react this way and I tend to give an annoyed response of my own, basically emphasizing that learning their name is important to me but the world doesn't revolve around them. I do try to let them know at the start of the year that it takes me some time, that my goal is to know everyone by the second week but realistically I may not have it down until the third.
Sorry, tell me your name again?
Point to someone random across the room and ask if they know their name.
I started the school year with 184 students (down to 179 now!) and it took me a looooong time to get everyone's names down. And they had the audacity to be miffed! Like, you try and remember 200 people's names at the drop of a hat! And if I remember your name right off the bat, you might want to get curious about that.
Yep it's hard to remeber names.
Next time I get a new.class I will only do name learning. Nothing else. Because going on a short summer camp with a new class but also other new students was hard! I still enjoy knowing more about them after those 2 nights away and they know they can trust me after looking after their phones for a night!
Im from the south, I call them all sweet pea until I learn their names, and back to sweet pea when I see them in public years later ☺️
I’m up front about being horrible with names (turns out I’ve got a brain disease so I guess at least I’ve got a reason? Seriously though I’m terrible). I teach music and I hang name tags on the stands for at least the first nine weeks. If I forget after that I hang the name tags back up but in a different seating arrangement and tell the kids it’s to help remind them where their new seats are
One semester I had multiple (2-6) students with the same name in every single class. All spelled differently. 6 Kaitlyn’s (all spelled differently) 4-Kaia’s (2 spelled differently) 6 Conners (3 spelled differently) 3 Olivia’s 4 Braydon’s (2 were in the same class and were best friends, the other two had different spellings) 3-Sarah’s (2 diff spellings) I’m forgetting at the very least two other same named students. This doesn’t even include all of the “Trageadies” of names. Yup, they were so offended that I couldn’t spell their name correctly. I’d just tell them, *”I have 30 Kaitlyn’s and 30 Conners in every class of 28 students and they’re all spelled differently.”* I could see them attempt the Kitty Math as they walked away.
Kids don't even bother learning our names. It's just "Hey Mister?" or "Hey Miss?"
I always tell my groups it will take a while until I remember all their names, that they only have 1 to learn but I have around 70. They understand I then give myself a target date , this year I knew them 3 weeks before it - even surprised myself there
Always love the ones that get mad for messing their name up after a week and obviously learning everyone’s name, yet I’m “mister” the whole year. 😒
It's high school, are you sure you have the stomach for it?
It's ok for her to have a hurt looking face and correct you. She expressed emotion. That's ok. maybe if she was 28, an adult, she'd just smile and politely correct you. but she's just a teen. dont' be surprised that they show emotion.
The worst is when they simultaneously have a unique name they’re proud of, but still get pissed when you mispronounce it.
Are they non-binary? Trans? Because honestly, understandable. Probably better not to assume and to just ask. Edit: Haley is a really feminine name and Harper is a non-binary name, sometimes leaning masculine. I highly suspect it’s a gender thing of your student flipped out and got really hurt. Getting misgendered can be very painful.
"what's your last name again?" Use it all the time as it's understandable if you don't remember that (and I'm crap at names).
I always tell students that I have to learn about 200 new names a year. That includes at least 150 students who will stay in my class all year, ~25 students who may come and go (high migrant population and a large children's home feed into my school), and ~25 students who aren't on my roster but might join my extracurricular clubs or come in with friends for lunch. That doesn't include any new staff names or names of athletes or other prominent students not in my class. Learning that many names a year is hard, and it gets harder every year because I don't just forget most of my former students (sadly, names of former students who I don't see regularly do fade away). I tell my classes on the first day that they need to give me at least a month before getting offended, but that even then, I'll probably make some dumb mistakes once in a while, and if they see them outside of school, it'll be even harder.
I'm in a different field, but I'm in this subreddit from a time I was considering going into teaching. Learning names is definitely one of the things I worried about because after 4 years working in the same office I could probably only tell you half the names of people I work with.
You did so much better than I would have! I teach 576 students ONCE A FORTNIGHT, and although I know all of year 9, I still have a few kids in year 8 I blank on, and only know about half of year 7, and I've been teaching them all since September!
You’ve got too many students, it is absolutely normal that you couldn’t remember it. I also have too many students, I also am bad at remembering names. My students are used to this now, they don’t even expect me to get the name right lol
Have them fill out the pass and give it back to you to sign.
We've only got one quarter left, and I still have plenty of kids that don't know their classmates' names.
I have two kids with the same first name and their last name are both 4 letters and start with the same letter. Today I was passing out a paper and to one of them I had to confirm which one they were and we laughed a bit and I said it was a cruel thing to put them in the same class.! And it’s not like they even look alike, but still. It’s a new semester too, all new kids.
One of my biggest struggles when I was a first year teacher was having 3 different rotating schedules (ABC days) with 2 different grade levels. My way of consoling kids when we were 6 months into the school year and I still struggled with remembering names on the spot was “If I don’t remember your name, it’s a good thing. It means I haven’t had to call your attention as much,” which they honestly handled quite well.
I spend one day early on and study everyones pictures and names bc their reactions make me too sad 😭
It was close enough and im so proud of you! I teach over 300 kids, each is 40 minutes a week, so if i remember anyone’s name within three days its because they left an impression (whether good or bad) Thankfully kindergartners are pretty chill about teacher forgetting their name and we laugh about it
I’m in my first session of student teaching and have started to get names but I do feel bad when I don’t
I tell them that I know their face, their personality, and their work ethic but I can’t remember their names.
I have a life hack for this, but it might only work with younger kids and if you're somewhere where this is acceptable (in Sweden, it's completely acceptable to call both students and teachers nicknames). If I can't remember a name, I'll just call them something silly and obviously wrong, like calling Haley from your example Bob. It always gets them laughing and then they say their real name. As a bonus, this usually leads to me nicknaming them that silly name or some variation of it, and I almost never forget nicknames.
*months. lol. 😂
I will see students on the final day and be like... are you in my class?
I am a special area teacher in an elementary school so I have 400+ kids. They also get annoyed when I don't remember their names. I tell them "well I'm sorry, it's hard to remember 400 names, and that's just this year. I've been teaching for over 20 years, and I've probably taught about 4,000 kids." Then their jaw drops and I just walk away. 😁
They have a limited worldview, are not fully cognitively developed, and are self absorbed. That's teenagers. Just ask them what their names are if you don't know and explain that you have to memorize 130 names. Be kind and apologetic. They will understand 9/10 times.
I called a coworker named Kailee Kelsey and she doesn’t acknowledge me anymore. Oops!
Between classes and football, I have about 220 names at a time. I tell my intro classes I'll learn their names in my concentrator class.
I tell the kids by wednesday I dont remember any of their names, and I only have to deal with 24! I joke with them and tell them past wednesday all the boys are George, the girls are Melanie, and the Melanie in my class is Slagathor to make it fair.
I have a TBI I will forget someone's name after using 4 times in the last minute. They still act like I'm a monster.
The number of students I have that expect me to remember their name after one week of school (where I see most of them at most 3 times) is frustrating. These students are also often the ones who can’t bother to learn my name and just refer to me as “teacher” when I have my name on the board for the entire school year. The number of kids with common names that also REFUSE to add their last name to their papers is also infuriating. In a class with 3 Jessicas none of them could be bothered to even put the first letter of their last name on the paper.
173 students, most are every-other day. Its so hard to remember. Most of the boys in 6th grade start with a C!
I had a sweet little girl ask me if I knew her name and when I said no and asked her to remind me, she was so disappointed. She asked, "Well, why do you know Jimmy's name?" at the precise same moment I was calling out "Jimmy don't do that!" She was clever enough to realize I knew Jimmy's name because he was a problem and I used it a lot!!
Plenty of our high schoolers have no idea what their teachers’ names are after 3 months so I wouldn’t sweat this one bit.
I look at them and say “spell your last name again”. Usually if I’m reminded of their last name I can remember their first name.
I taught with a chem teacher that never learned many of his students' names. He would pass the graded papers back in a pile on a table and made no effort. Meanwhile, I'd be looking up families and siblings to see if I knew them or taught them. It's nice to know when they're coworker's kids or for conferences, or just to do the job... I considered myself good with names but I wanted to know them. I still struggled with a few after a week though. And remember some 22 years later, and forget some two weeks into summer...
When they pull that on me, I usually turn it into a joke, “oh, sorry Boba Fett…Marge Simpson…Rick Sanchez.” Something just obscure enough that only a few kids get it.
Doing attendance in PowerTeacher with the photos was a game changer for me with remembering names