So I've been teaching at this charter school since January. I've seen the kids twice a week for 30 min each time for a few months now, and I am still struggling so much with remembering their names. The last teacher actually took class pictures and wrote their names over each kid for me, and I've studied that some, but even so....it's pretty pathetic.
At one point I told the fourth graders that if I called them the wrong name during class they'd get a tootsie roll. It didn't take long to go through a large bag. I've done rhythm activities in class with their names, I use a seating chart with their names on it, study their pictures, but they're just not sticking long-term. I feel so bad when I call them the wrong name...not to mention it makes disciplining efforts much less effective!
I don't remember this being an issue at all when I taught at Texas, and I had twice as many kids (500 versus 250) and only saw them 5 times a month. Maybe it's because I was fresh from college then. Maybe it's because I was younger? (Really....can memory difficulties begin at 30?!) OR, maybe it's because half of the male students at that school were named DeVonte, DeMonte, Demont, DeAndre, Demundre....or another variation. In this school we have ONE black kid. Maybe I should start using Hunter, Colby, or Zach as the default and I'll have better luck...
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It's true- your memory starts fading around age 27. I read it somewhere.
Oh no I'm in trouble then and I don't turn 30 until the 22! If it makes you feel any better I can't remember the names of the 70 kids I see each week let alone the class to get them from or the time I have them for therapy! If my memories going to start failing at 30 then I've only got 15 days left of sanity! And 10 of them are work days!
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