It’s Tuesday.
March 24th.
And you will not believe what one of my girls decided to tell me today.
On Tuesday.
March 24th.
As in . . . eight months into the school year. We get out June 4th. We barely have any time left to do anything except a) have half the class act depressed because they don’t want to go to second grade and b) have the other half act so excited for summer vacation that they’re kind of hurting my feelings.
This little girl decided to tell me this important piece of information today. I won’t say the date again but, let me tell you, it is way way way too late to receive this tidbit.
WAY WAY WAY TOO LATE.
I was at the back table stapling paper bag people to paper bags (I think I have plans to blog about paper bag people tomorrow, but I don’t really know now because of what this little girl told me and now I’m all discombobulated.).
Like I said, I was just stapling paper bag people to paper bags, minding my own business while my kids were working away and enjoying each other’s company, and this little girl came up and said to me, all nonchalantly . . .
Holy cow that would upset me. Are you going to change things in the room with her name on them?
Has SHE been spelling it correctly all this time?
It's surprising that her parent never said anything. But no-one seems upset over it, and better to correct it now than never… Take a deep breath and laugh a bit, then fix it 🙂 It's okay. Embarrassing, yes, but okay.
I had a student who had a very unusual name. Very. She told me her family just calls her Juanita. I thought, ok, not exactly the nickname I would have picked, but if it's what your family calls you, I'll go with it. I worked with Juanita all year to learn how to write her name. Letters were a struggle. We worked first on the letters in Juanita.
At the end of year celebration, mom asks why I taught her daughter to write Juanita as it's not her name. I told her the story and she said "we don't call her Juanita. She played you". Awesome. Teacher of the year right here
Now THAT'S funny!! 🙂
I am so glad I have HS kids who can spell their own names (usually) and if they want to be called beetlejuice I just go with it.
Juanita is kind of a hard name, Kudos to you for working with her that hard!
I JUST FELL OF MY CHAIR from laughing so hard!!! I so miss you my friend, I am glad I know you because I can see your expressions and hear your voice as if I was there!!! I think that it only means one thing…more chocolate…it is a stimulant!! xoxo
It's okay! Here's another story…a past teacher spelled a child's last name incorrectly, passed on the info to the next teacher who spelled the last name incorrectly, the third teacher spelled the name correctly, but had the little girl tell her that her last name did NOT have a c in it. So, she changed things in her room and went to inform the office of the error on the computer system only to find out that she did INDEED have a c in her last name…she has just learned to spell it incorrectly all through kdg and first grade…:( So, you're not so bad!
Thanks for the giggles!
Seems to me that the parents haven't been paying a lot of attention to the work and notes she has been bringing home for the PAST MONTHS. My daughters name is always spelled incorrectly, but we just correct the teacher as soon as we notice the problem and all is well … Their problem – not yours!
I pronounced a child's name wrong for a month. It was spelled Andrea but she said it like Ondrea. A staff member was talking to her at lunch and I said "Why don't you correct her and tell her how to say your name?" She replied, "She said it correctly…" I was the one all along saying her name wrong. She never corrected me! Ooops! It's all good. She skipped away as well. No hard feelings.
I can't stop laughing. But not at you of course! 😉
I can't believe her parents never corrected it or that she has never corrected you before???
This happened to me last year, but the parents did decide to remove an "a" in their son's name in the middle of the year. Maybe that happened with her too??? With all the security it takes to get into "the system" they might be able to update things like name changes in the middle of the year….like on March 23rd. 😉
DON'T FEEL BAD!!! You're AMAZING and I want to be in your class!!
I have had a terrible day too. Im so cranky and need a spring break. That said, this would upset me on any day. I'd be pissed that the parents didnt say anything about it. And they would hear about it!! Sorry this happened to you!
That happened to me with a Christofer. I even crossed it out on some home work and rewrote it with a "ph" and thought "who in your house does not know how to write your name?!" Fortunately, I checked our school system after a month into the school year, but NO ONE from his family said anything.
I can go one further. We have a student who came to us in October from Sudan. Her name is Jassica. NO LAST NAME! We have birth certificate, passport, everything..NO LAST NAME! (I am thinking like CHER…) BUT our system will NOT accept her without a last name. So…My school secretary & I give her a last name …Jassica. Her whole name is now Jassica Jassica. I really don't think that's what her family calls her, but I don't know. No one has EVER asked! 🙂 wendy 1stgradefireworks
It's okay Christen…..just take a trip to Starbucks to Starbucks with my hubby….same thing happens to him there! Love your posts!
Christy
Crayons and Whimsy
That was one of the best blog posts I have read this week…thank you for keeping it real!! ) LOVE IT!
I wanna know the name sooooo badly!
Oh yes- I have one this year I realized on Halloween I'd been calling the wrong name. The secretary introduced him as Alain like Elaine the ladies' name. I thought it was weird but he never corrected me. Finally one day I heard him introduce himself and he pronounced it ALLEN. I felt so bad. He just shrugged when I asked him why he never corrected me. My team now refers to him as Allen formerly known as Elaine.
Don't worry!! I had a student start midway through the year and he told me his name was Ivan. That's the name he wrote on his paper and in our school records it showed that his middle name was Ivan…so I went with it. Fast forward to parent conferences and I ask his parents to sign in next to his name. They silently crossed out "Ivan" and wrote "Eric"…his actual first name. They said he had always gone by Eric and so, with almost no time in the year, the whole class started calling him Eric. My kids were so confused!! To this day, I don't know what to call him when I see him around school!!
I had a similar situation last year. The office misspelled her name and I just copied what I saw on the roster. I was told at Parent Conference (in October) that I was spelling her name wrong :/ I couldn't figure out why they didn't tell me sooner. I was sending name practice home pretty much from the first day of school! lol…Thankfully Spring Break is coming up!
I teach at an ESOL school and always have tricky names. I can think of one in particular who told me after a summer tutoring, year in first grade with me, and another summer tutoring that I'd been saying his name wrong. I've had a girl named Dana (long a) tell me to call her Dana (short a) and her mom looked at me like I was crazy! I have a sweetie from Mexico this year and her name is Ana Paula. I live in Kansas, and we definitely lengthen our a's. I say it like Ann-a for Ana and Paula like Paula Abdul. Let's just say that is now how you say it in Spanish! When she was star student a couple weeks ago she said "When I first moved here I didn't like that everyone said my name wrong but I didn't speak English so I couldn't tell you. Now it has been a long time and I don't mind!"
I mispronounced a student's last name for an entire school year. Not only did I mispronounce it with him, but also his parents. It wasn't until the next school year when I was at his mother's funeral (she had cancer ?), that I heard someone pronounce it differently. I couldn't believe I'd said it wrong all that time. I guess with mom's illness, it wasn't a top priority of theirs. I felt awful. After that I learned to ask every single student from there on out if I was saying their name correctly. Good thing I did because I had a little girl with the name "lasagna" but it wasn't pronounced the way it looks at all.
:)…I Love It! Takes me back to Jr. High. I was the "victim". We had to go around with our report cards to each teacher to fill in. The whole year, my 7th grade Science teacher always wrote the wrong name on anything she gave me, & also called me by the wrong name. Of course, it didn't help that I was a very shy & quiet person and would never speak up to correct her. Almost 40 years have passed and I will never forget that teacher. Hopefully, your little sweetheart will not keep the memory that you were wrong with her name for 40 years…
I've done that! I had a girl who was named after a state with a lot of n's in it..I put too many or not enough. Her mom pointed it out. I once had a girl from Cambodia who laughed at me every single time I said her name. I tried to get her to teach me to say it properly but I was hopeless. I NEVER got it right. NEVER.
I went the whole year, my second year of teaching, mis-pronouncing a students last name. The mom helped out in the class all year and never said a thing, I sure wished she had! It wasn't until the next year that I learned the correct pronunciation.
bahahahah! You are hilarious! I've definitely spelled and pronounced names wrong in my years, but never for that long :/ Oh well, she didn't seem bothered 😉
sorry but I'm laughing, out loud when you tacked on the photo with Mother Bear bit, ha ha!
Laughing, and so grateful for the laugh because I needed it! (Nothing funny is happening at my school….boo.) But seriously, don't you have over 30 students? I don't know how you manage that many firsties. I probably wouldn't even spell my own name correctly!
Thanks for starting my day with a smile!!
I get it, totally get it. Teachers are doing way to much. Tonight we had parent teacher conferences. I totally forgot to put out chairs in the hallway. But still didn't think to offer the poor mom sitting on the FLOOR a chair until I got home. #teacherfail
I had the sweetest little girl and I called her 'Mary' that's how her name was spelled. She never told me (her brother did) that it was pronounced "Maury."
Forgive yourself… Modeling a sincere apology and being gracious are important life lessons for little people.
You crack me up! I totally get how you feel. I spelled one little girl's name the way it was spelled on the computer system, but she quickly informed me that it was wrong. I went ahead and spelled it the way she wanted me to, but it's still the same on all official records. She complains to me about it every time I give her a paper with her name spelled "wrong." I told her she needs to tell her parents to fix it in the office. I've had two conferences with the parents and meant to mention it both times. I forgot. Oh, well. She'll go on to 3rd grade and will still have the same issue. I figure it will eventually get worked out. Really, if it didn't bother them enough to mention it, I wouldn't worry about it.
That is craaaazy!!! One would think her parents would have written a note perhaps the first MONTH of the school year and spoken up for her if she didn't say anything herself?!?! crazy! 🙂
Oh, I just LOVE you Kristin! I have been so bad about visiting you. You ALWAYS make me laugh! If it makes you feel better, I had a student one year that for 3 days I thought he was a SHE!!! EVERYONE did!
Love you to pieces!
Heather
Heather's Heart
I also work in a school with a high ESL population. Sometimes the parents give the kids an "English" name just for school, but continue to call them their other name at home. When I taught Kindergarten, this was the child's first experience with school, with English, and with their English name so it would often take a few months for the child themselves to figure out what their name was, let alone how to spell it. And sometimes the parents didn't even know how to pronounce it properly. I had one little ESL girl who's English name was Peony. I thought it was such a pretty name, until her parents started calling her Pee-Oh-nie. It was so hard for me to mispronounce that word all year. That little girl will now have graduated from High School, and sometimes I wonder if she ever figured out how to pronounce her name properly.
Sandra
Sandra's Savvy Teaching Tips
I'm just now seeing this post, but I have a story too. When I was in 3rd grade we had a new student in our class that had a name that both the first and last name could be a first name (think Jackson Scott***not his real name). The teacher on the first day of school introduced him as Jackson. We all called him Jackson. I don't know how long into the year it was, but way too long, one of the boys at recess called him Scott and the teacher said, "We don't call people by their last names." I'll never forget Donald's response to the teacher. He said, "then why have you all year?". ALL YEAR WE (including the teacher) HAD BEEN CALLING HIM BY HIS LAST NAME.
Too funny! I found out after 5 months of school that I had been saying one of my school babies name wrong! To her and her parents! After 5 months I got a phone call and the situation was explained. I felt so bad! My kids switched to the correct name quickly! Thanks for laugh!
Hilarious! I had a teaching colleague that had a student called 'Tran'. For FOUR MONTHS we all thought Tran was a girl…..He was a boy!!!! This was only revealed to us when he had a haircut. (I hope you sleep better tonight!!!)