what's in a name

before walking into a classroom at my previous school, you could guess what about 80% of the kids names were going to be. john, sally, ann, jimmy. basically all the typical western names. at my new school, the names are a bit more unique which i love but i can never get the spelling right. when my student told me her name was donna, i excitedly wrote it on the board, how could i mess this one up? after writing it, the students started hysterically laughing. "teacher! you spell it d-a-n-a." the whole class was a lesson in korean spelling of western names. lincoln was l-i-n-c-o-n, ellen was e-l-i-n. then there were the ones that i've never heard before. i had an alva, lyon, rani (pronounced ronnie), claude (pronounced cloud), lina and zinee. the names will be easy enough to remember but the spelling may take me awhile.