Names our Mothers called us
I am really really bad with names. Do you think it could be related to the fact that my name is unusual?
Not in the 'misspelled hence unusual' or 'throw in some silent letters' way, but in the honest 'unusual but defensible'/related to your ancestry way. Is it only people with honestly unusual names who are 'blessed' with this particular arrogance, or is it also pedantic teachers who suffer professional exposure to the names that people land their children with.
Think about it. In most occupations names can be learned and then filed for future use, but in teaching every year you have to learn another 30X5 = 150 names and the faces that they belong to. I am so happy when I have the same student turn up the next year or so later. But it doesn't happen often enough. And kids start high school and expect you to have learned their names by osmosis as I'm sure primary school teachers do with only one class each year.
I have also found that sometimes I learn a name for someone and tie it to them and then the next week thay have turned into another person, as is the wont of teenagers. I have to confess that I get types mixed up. There is a stream of blonde girls who, although unique, could be any of them called Rachel or Samantha or Courtney or Alex or Emma or Jamie or Natasha or Emily or Sarah or Anna. Sometimes they are not even blonde, but they resemble each other in some 'bright young thing' manner. And if they sit next to each other, well, they deserve to be mistaken for each other.
It's not the spelling. I can remember things like Jaymie or Raechel or even, God help the poor boy, Micheal, but tying them to faces can be problematic. Then there are double ups or triple ups. I have a class with three Lukes and I still haven't worked out the surnames. Two Emilys in another class, both well-behaved, intelligent young women. Two Alexs - one boy, one girl and two Jesses - both boys, but that doesn't seem to help.
It's halfway through the school year here, and it seems to just get worse. Maybe it has to do with turning 50.
Not in the 'misspelled hence unusual' or 'throw in some silent letters' way, but in the honest 'unusual but defensible'/related to your ancestry way. Is it only people with honestly unusual names who are 'blessed' with this particular arrogance, or is it also pedantic teachers who suffer professional exposure to the names that people land their children with.
Think about it. In most occupations names can be learned and then filed for future use, but in teaching every year you have to learn another 30X5 = 150 names and the faces that they belong to. I am so happy when I have the same student turn up the next year or so later. But it doesn't happen often enough. And kids start high school and expect you to have learned their names by osmosis as I'm sure primary school teachers do with only one class each year.
I have also found that sometimes I learn a name for someone and tie it to them and then the next week thay have turned into another person, as is the wont of teenagers. I have to confess that I get types mixed up. There is a stream of blonde girls who, although unique, could be any of them called Rachel or Samantha or Courtney or Alex or Emma or Jamie or Natasha or Emily or Sarah or Anna. Sometimes they are not even blonde, but they resemble each other in some 'bright young thing' manner. And if they sit next to each other, well, they deserve to be mistaken for each other.
It's not the spelling. I can remember things like Jaymie or Raechel or even, God help the poor boy, Micheal, but tying them to faces can be problematic. Then there are double ups or triple ups. I have a class with three Lukes and I still haven't worked out the surnames. Two Emilys in another class, both well-behaved, intelligent young women. Two Alexs - one boy, one girl and two Jesses - both boys, but that doesn't seem to help.
It's halfway through the school year here, and it seems to just get worse. Maybe it has to do with turning 50.
posted by Ennis @ 6:44 am
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