I'm currently two weeks into school, have 140ish students, and have already learned their names. I'm not here to brag... it took work. You might be thinking "Wow! She is so good with names!" but that can't be further from the truth. I am one of those people that if I meet you, shake your hand, and we introduce ourselves, I will likely have forgotten your name 2 minutes later. (Maybe because I'm not an active listener? We should ask my husband...) The point is learning names is not something that comes easy for me. It takes a lot of work. But it is important, so I make the extra effort. 

Have any of the following excuses crossed your brain?
"I'm just not good with names."
"I'm just not good with faces."
"But I have 150 names to learn!"
"I'll learn them eventually... I just wait for it to happen organically." 
"Many are too hard to pronounce."
If you are guilty of any of these, you aren't alone. But I promise you can learn them with a little extra effort and it makes a huge difference. 

Why learning names is so important
It is important for you to learn your students names as quickly as possible for multiple reasons:

• First, your name is your identity. Using "kiddo" or "hon" is not the same as calling a student by their name. Plus, calling a student "sweetie" may seem perfectly acceptable to you, but may offend a student. 
• Students will respect you more when they know you put in extra effort to learn their name quickly, AND pronounce it correctly. You are going to get students with names that are difficult to pronounce, but keep practicing. I always ask students to call me on it if I pronounce their name incorrectly. There is nothing worse than calling a student the wrong name for 2 months and finding out later you have been saying it wrong. 

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Tips to learn names quickly
I'm in my 11th year of teaching, and have found methods that help me learn student names relatively quick. I encourage you to skim the list and try a few that might work for you. 

1. Use a seating chart and name tents. On day 1, students come in with a seating chart. Seating charts not only help with classroom management, but also help me learn names. If you allow students to pick their own seats, they will shuffle seats on you and make it harder to put names with faces. I also have students make name tents on the first day and tell them they have to keep them visible the first week of school. 
2. Set a goal to learn their names by a certain date. I always have a goal to learn my students' names by the end of the first week. This doesn't always happen, but that's my goal. If you think it will take you 2 weeks or 3 weeks, make that your goal. Let the students know your goal, and offer some sort of reward if you don't meet it. For example, tell the class "If I don't know everyone's name by the end of the first week, then I'll bring in candy for the class." By telling the students your goal you are: a) holding yourself accountable, and b) giving yourself an incentive- If you learn their names, you save a few bucks. (Note: you don't have to do rewards that cost money. You could hand out no-homework passes or do a few minutes of free time at the end of class instead). 
3. Say their names as they enter class. I try my best to stand by the door as students enter class every day. On lab days when you are scrambling to get ready for the next class this can be difficult, but whenever possible I'm at the door. When students enter those first couple weeks I say "Good morning __(student name)__." If I don't remember their names, they always help me out.
4. Pass back papers yourself. If your students are like mine, you always have a handful of students eager to pass back papers, and generally I'm happy to get the help. But the first few weeks I always pass back papers myself. I'm not sure why, but this tip is probably the one that helps me the most. Putting written names (handwriting) with faces really helps me. Once I have mastered names, then the paper passing back goes to my antsy student helpers. 
5. Pictures. Our grade book and attendance program loads in student ID pictures. The first week during my prep hour and in the evening I really spend time staring at those photos. Generally the pictures are a year old (seniors have their junior pictures shown) so they don't always look exactly like their picture, but it still helps. 

I promise you if you learn your students' names quickly the beginning of the school year will go much smoother. They will perform better in your class. Lets stop the "if the teacher knows my name the first week that's a bad sign" narrative. I know you can do it! Do you have any other tips? Leave them in the comments! 

We're baaaaack! I've teamed up with a bunch of my science buddies to do another back to school giveaway! Back to school is a stressful time, and we would like to help! We are giving away FOUR $100 TeachersPayTeachers gift cards that you can use to save a lot of time and get some awesome resources for your classroom.

To enter, you need to hop from blog to blog and collect all of our secret words that form a sentence.
Once you have the sentence, go to any one of the Group Giveaway Rafflecopter boxes, on any one of our blog pages, and type in the secret sentence in the right order. We will pick four winners after it ends after midnight on Friday August the 17th. My Secret Word is #10: “IS”

A bunch of us are also hosting our own individual giveaways as well, so make sure you stop by and enter to win! All in all, there will be over $1000 worth of prizes given away this week!
For my individual giveaway, I’m giving away two of my popular Writing Prompt Bundles. You can see it here on TeachersPayTeachers. Enter my writing prompt giveaway below and make sure you hop to the next blog to pick up all the secret words!

If you are like me, you love finding free, engaging lesson plans you can implement right away in your classroom. I want to introduce you to FoodSpan- 17 free lessons from the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future that teach everything you need to know about the food system. 

Why teach food curriculum? 
Food is an integral part of our lives, yet the food system is hardly talked about in schools. Do your students ever take the time to think about where their food is coming from before they put it in their mouths? Do they consider the quality of life for animals within the system? Have they considered how marketing and advertising influences their food choices? Once you get your students thinking and talking about food, you will have them hooked. 
I know what you are thinking... you have no time to squeeze more curriculum into your tight schedule. I get it. But take a minute to think about where you could weave in some food curriculum into your units. Are you already teaching any of the following topics?

• Food chains and food webs
• Photosynthesis and cellular respiration
• Nutrition and food labels
• Sustainability / carbon footprint
• Global water crisis and food security
• Weather and climate change
• Pathogens and foodborne illness

​Food lesson plans can be easily woven into any of these units. One great thing about this curriculum is that you don't have to do every lesson for it to make sense. You can pick and choose what fits your curriculum. 

Overview of Units
This free curriculum is broken down into 3 units consisting of 17 lesson plans. The lessons include multiple options and are easy to modify to fit your grade level and classroom needs. Unit 1 covers an introduction to the food system, unit 2 explores farmers, factories, and food chains, and unit 3 explores the human component- why we eat what we eat, global hunger, and food policy. Unit two is my personal favorite- I enjoy teaching about the farm to table process and letting students explore the food journey. There is an optional food citizen action project at the end of the units, great if you are implementing any PBL into your classroom this year. 
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Pros of the Curriculum
There are multiple reasons I like this curriculum. First, not only are there multiple activity options within each lesson, but they also include great extension activities such as watching documentaries. It is truly flexible curriculum. Second, the lessons also incorporate writing components- which is something that I know my students really need practice with.  Lastly, there are points within the curriculum for students to share and discuss their ideas on social media. Our students live on social media already, so why not encourage them to share information they are learning about in the classroom?
 
Ready to dive in? Head to www.foodspanlearning.org and explore. I’d love to hear how you are weaving this into your current curriculum! Share in the comments, or use the hashtag #foodspan on social media! 
(This is a sponsored blog post)