Remembering Names

What do you do to remember student names? I haven't developed any habits associated with names, and I don't retain them. My classes do include a lot of me interacting with students, but none of it - as performed by me - produced names or gets names remembered. I know faces and classroom presence, but nobody's name ever sticks. What do you do?

(I did once try the labels on tables, where the students write their names on cards and keep them on their desks, but that stays alive for only as long as the teacher interacts with it and I didn't. What else is there?)

I'm horrible with student names too.  The only thing that really gets me to remember them is to take roll consistently for the first two weeks or so. Luckily I work in a high school, so roll taking is pretty much expected.  It also becomes much easier to remember names (unsurprisingly) once I've interacted with a kid one on one.

But I mean ... a couple of weeks ago, we had a parent meeting and this woman came up to me wanting to discuss her son. There was a male student next to her, and I kept referring to him by her son's name until she finally broke in and was like "That's not Ryan, by the way." I was mortified. But why was the male student standing with her!? To be fair, the two kids have a bit of a similar look to them, but this is freaking April, I should know all their names by heart by now.

I'm the pits when it comes to remembering student names, really awful. 
The thing that made a difference for me was when I applied this trick from Coach B of Whole Brain Teaching fame.

http://www.wholebrainteaching.com/

Taken from the WBT FB page:
To remember student names on the first day, ask the first child in the first row to say his/her name. Ask the class to repeat the name. Ask the second child his/her name. Ask the class to say the first two names and so on for about four names. Then, go back over them yourself ... when you forget a name, you say, "Now, class, who was this!" Someone will remember the name. Say, "that's right ... this is (such and so)." Every three of four names, go back for review, say each one ... and "quiz" the class on the names you've forgotten ... never admit you've forgotten any names. Do this slowly and by the end, you'll be able to say most of the names ... and the class won't know they are reminding you of the ones you've forgotten. Then, VERY IMPORTANT, take a picture of the whole class. At home, make two copies of the picture. Writing the names of the kids you remember on one copy and use the blank copy to quiz yourself. Go back in the second day and repeat the name learning routine. Be sure everyone sits in the same place.

The names are a real problem for me too. If I only taught speaking I'd never remember them, apart from the ones with the Big Personalities be they good or bad.

I'm a bit lucky as I teach writing to the same students so each week I return their note books to them after they've been corrected, the weekly drifting about the room handing back their books helps me attach the names to faces, or the ones with faces that aren't memorable I remember by where they sit. But it's a slow process and it takes me almost all year  At least I can refer to their name in the last 2 or 3 weeks.
R

^ yeah, it occurred to me today I have that option too. Every week the students hand in something and every following week I hand it back. In the past I'd just divided the pile in two and handed it to a pair of persons nearby. Today I tried the drift around. I have acquired "Jack", "Ivy", "Helen", "Faker".

The gold standard though would be that Whole Brain thing.

I too am awful with names.  At the beginning of the year or term, I use interaction with students during lessons as a method of learning names.  Usually only a handful of students will raise a hand or volunteer and those are the ones I learn first.  Next, I identify students that either have the deer in the headlight look or are just simply mouth breathers and will require extra help.  The others in the middle come slowly through in class observation and informal assessment.

At the start of every class I play the game of " who can he not remember today!"  I accompany each name forgot with some fooling around like " You must be boring since I have forgotten you!", though depending on what lines you come up with you may need to be careful with the "overly sensitive" students  Eventually I do remember all the names. It used to be that I would take pictures of the students holding a name card and have them on my computer. But I found it to be unnecessary since I started the "who have I forgot today!" game.

I made a seating plan.  Basically a diagram of the classroom seats with the students name at each desk.  Worked really well until I got a couple of classes where the students would move every class. 

I also took attendance and part of the class grade was participation.  If they weren't there they lost points.  I also would put a check mark beside their names whenever they answered a question. 

Taking role and marking class participation works well for me. I may not know their names offhand all the time, but once in the groove I can call out specific students during class. Great when you have a whackload of them.

I'm lucky, all my students are named "You"

Hei Yu

An Yu

Na Qu, Yu.

Special activity for the first night of class:

Does everyone have an English name?  (assign names to those who don't)

Now I've got a special way to help everyone remember everyone else's English name forever.  Would you all like that? (act enthusiastic until they all agree - then break students into groups of 2 or 3).

I'm now handing each of you a "temporary" tattoo kit.  I want each student's name to be tattooed on his/her forehead.  Don't worry, it only stings a little bit.  It won't last more than 1 to 2 megahours. (1 million hours is a little over 114 years and temporary is a vaguely defined term )

One thing I have done in the past was to put students into groups of 4 or 5, and have 1 person in each group write down the names of the 4/5 students on a single sheet of paper. I used to do this every class. I do a lot of groupwork,  so it became routine for them. As I made my way around the class, I made a point of talking to each group several times, and each time checking names against faces. End of class, I would collect all the name sheets and that was my attendance report for that class. Usually I knew 75% or more of my students by mid-term.

That said, I figured this year I would skip the practice and just take a role. It's midterm and I only know a handful of student in each class. Next semester, I'm going back to group name lists.

I make a map of the classroom and get them all to write their names on it every lesson and use this to elicit feedback

I'm back at uni and only teaching each class once a week though, so no way am I going to remember anyone except the really bright ones, the interesting looking ones or the awful ones

Good technique, if you are faced with a decent sized class and don't know anyone's name, just ask for 'Cassie', 'Amy' or 'Lisa'. There is always one of them

For roll call, I will do a poll, ask a question, preferably not a "yes" or "no" question, such as, "how old should a girl be before she gets married," or, "what is your favorite pet animal?," or some other question related to the topic of the class, such as, "which of these three festivals in the textbook would you like to go to?"  That way, every kid in class is speaking English at least once during class, and I am interacting and reacting with the kids as I call their names. I work at at a vocational institute with college-age kids.

Bonus, I also get a humbling demonstration of who has actually been listening to me, because some kids are caught by surprise every time and the answer is "huh"? When that happens, I continue with the roll call and return to the kid who wasn't prepared and ask them again at the end.

This year my classes only have about 16 to 20 kids per class.