First Weeks of School Hopes and Dreams Interactive Modeling
Learning students names at the beginning of a new school year is a key component in creating a positive community where students feel a sense of belonging and significance. Here are three ways you can get to know your new students names (and they can get to know yours) at the start of the year.
For the first few weeks of school, all children and adults wear name tags. During these early weeks, my students and I play name games that offer the children fun ways to memorize names, and we practice greeting each other by name.
Our heavy-duty plastic clip-on name tags—purchased inexpensively in bulk—last all year. When we stop wearing the tags every day, we keep them in a basket, ready for the student with the “hospitality” job to distribute when needed. For example, we’ll wear our tags when a new student joins us or when we have a guest teacher. Knowing everyone’s name helps newcomers feel a part of the community.
For years, I’ve welcomed my incoming students by sending each a letter at the end of their second grade year. I introduce myself and describing things they might look forward to doing in third grade. I include my photo so the children can picture me as they imagine the school year ahead.
But last summer I decided I wanted to picture the children in the same way, and also to learn all of their names before school started. I did this by looking through the children’s emergency cards, which include their photos. On the first day of school, I was able to greet each child by name as I stood smiling by the classroom door. I got many exuberant responses and several huge smiles. What a great way to start our first day together!
At our grade 3–6 school, all adults wear name tags for the first six weeks of the year. But at our first few weekly all-school meetings, the adults remove their name tags, and we offer the children a challenge: Can any student name the thirty or so adults in the auditorium—classroom teachers, paraprofessionals, the school nurse, and me?
We announce the challenge beforehand, and students from all grades sign up to give it a try. At the meeting, we draw a name with great fanfare. That child comes up to the microphone, and all the adults stand up. As the child calls their names, adults sit down. Typically, a child rattles through the first twenty names and then slows way down. Often, the ending is very suspenseful, and when a child names all thirty adults (or even comes close), the applause is thunderous.
Getting up in front of the whole school takes courage and gives contestants a sense of accomplishment. Hearing the names repeated helps all the children learn them, and the yearly challenge brings us together as a community.
You can learn more about creating a positive community at the beginning of the year in The First Six Weeks of School.
Caltha Crowe, MaryAnn Bernstein, and Chip Wood contributed to this article.