Brain Space: How Much Do You Have Left?
I often wonder how much brain space is taken up by students’ names and faces. As teachers we may have between 100 and 150 students a year. That doesn’t include students from extracurricular activities and tutoring. Take that rough number and multiply it by the years you’ve been teaching. Not only do you remember names and faces, but you remember personalities, student work, colleges they’ve gone to, their parents, and some funny things they’ve done in class. We deal with more people on a personal level than any other job. College professors may have more students, but they can hardly get to know a lecture hall full of students. Politicians cannot get to know their constituents as well as a teacher can.
I try to memorize and use student names as fast and as much as possible. This ensures that their names are stored in my long-term memory. I’m usually pretty good at remembering names of students years later if I bump into them outside of school. However, I’ve had the experience of running into a student and not remembering his name until after we departed.
Napoleon is famous for knowing the names of all the officers in his regiments. That’s a remarkable leadership strategy. Yet, seasoned teachers still know more names than Napoleon did.
• What strategies do you use to remember student names, even after they’ve left your class?
• Does remembering names bolster your memory or take up too much space?
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I find the easiest way to remember student names is to pass back assignments. It requires me to put a name to a face quickly.
Thanks for the comment Art, I find the same thing to be true. Handing back assignments helps me learn names too. By the way, we’ll have a post about handing back papers next week.