The Eyes Have It

Almost every time I go to the grocery store I meet a former student stacking peppers in produce, slicing cheese behind the deli counter, or cashing me out at the register. The eyes I always remember, but everything else can change by the time one of my former seventh graders gets about halfway through high school. And if they are college students working on summer break, the changes are even more extreme.

The eyes catch me, a flash of recognition comes first by the young man or woman before me. This is followed by a smile and a hearty greeting. The student will usually say one of two things: "Hi, Mrs. Cowperthwaite!" or "You were my teacher! Remember me?" Once in a while they will say, "You were my favorite teacher!" or "I'm still writing!" both of which are lovely to hear.

It's the "Remember me?" that makes me want to melt into my shoes and hide because yes, yes, I do remember you. The eyes!  I know you...I know you...I just don't remember your name.

The name! If I am at Hannaford Supermarket, it is on the employee tag. Dare I slide my eyes down to read it? I do. I must. Everyone wants to hear their name. Everyone wants to be remembered.

I do the eye slide.

"Angelica! How are you doing?" 

"Carlton, it's good to see you! What year are you in now?"

They see the eye slide. Please forgive me. Once the name comes, I can usually remember a small personal detail and chat a bit and I hope that makes forgetting their name more forgivable. 

Why is it the name seems to go first?  Very rarely, I will remember a student's name after two years and retaining that name is usually for a good reason. That student either did something stellar (like got an award for work on cold fusion in science club or something) or their behavior was so unusual in seventh grade that everything about them, every interaction with them, is imprinted somewhere in my brain, probably whatever part retains the fight-or-flight response or the part where you file the warning of not to get too close to a hot stove. There have been a lot of hot stoves over the years.

Some names go quicker than others. If a Caitlyn, Kaitlyn, Kate, Katey, Cate, Caitlin Kaitlin, or Kayteeee comes my way, I have lost her name by August of the current year. Same goes for Aidan, Aiden, Ayden, Adin, or Aden. Sorry boys.

By now I have had close to twelve hundred students come through my classroom so of course that memory pipeline in my mind is full and spitting out rosters of earlier classes like a Play Doh press. Most teachers I work with say they have the same problem. But what to do about it? One veteran teacher, who has since retired, told me to be blunt about it. She told her students that if they ever see her after they had moved on from their year with her, that they should start out by saying their name when they greet her. I also observed this teacher meet a former student and she simply said, "Please remind me of your name, sweetheart."  My aunt, who had five children and had begun calling at least one of them by the dog's name daily, kept it even simpler than that. She renamed them (and the dog) all Dewdrop. Then her nieces and nephews all became Dewdrop. When grandchildren came, they were all Dewdrop.

I don't think I'm there yet with Sweetheart and Dewdrop, though. I may need another decade in the classroom trenches to pull that one off.  For now I'll have to rely on the eyes and the name tags.