I am a substitute teacher and I sub at several different schools from kindergarten to high school. I always feel bad when I say a name wrong (like when I take attendance in a class for the first time) and I’m not sure how to pronounce someone’s name. I always say “I’m sorry if I say this wrong…” or “is this how you say it?” and most people are fine and just give me the correct way to say it. Today a teenage girl seemed so annoyed that I mispronounced her name (which made me annoyed b/c it’s not my fault and I just met her for the first time). Her name was [name]Kassia[/name] pron [name]Kass[/name]-ee-ah and I said -K-asia, oops.
My Q is, do you ever get your name mispronounced and does it bother you? Does your child’s name ever get mispronounced and do you wish you would have picked a name that was less confusing to say? Thoughts?
I know as a teacher, being around so many kids, I think it is so important to choose names that are easy to spell and pronounce, that are recognizable but not super common. And I also don’t get why some kids are given 4 middle names? Is that a cultural thing?
I have never had any issue with the pronunciation of any of my names (first, middle, I’ve had two last names, and I’m going onto a third that is pretty straightforward). But my sister [name]Mariah[/name] (like [name]Carey[/name]) gets [name]Maria[/name] all the time. And my poor mother. Her name is spelled [name]Jeanne[/name]. It is pronounced like [name]Jean[/name]-nee. But she gets Jee-anne and even [name]Janine[/name] all the time. So when she introduces herself most times she just says her name is [name]Jean[/name].
Oh yes I always get called something other than [name]Kaylie[/name]. Especially with substitute teachers (please don’t take offense to that ). I have been called [name]Kayla[/name], [name]Kyla[/name], [name]Kyle[/name], [name]Kylie[/name], [name]Karey[/name], [name]Kalle[/name], [name]Hailey[/name], [name]Bailey[/name], etc. My last name is always mispronounced too, but I don’t really mind because last names are harder to pronounce than first names are most of the time. I don’t have any children so I’m not much help there.
My sister is a substitute teacher and recently she has been teaching at a school which has alot of students with arabic names.
She takes the same approach as you and either asks them how to pronounce their name or apologizes for pronouncing their name wrong.
My name is [name]Miriam[/name] and I have been called every variant of [name]Mary[/name] (most commonly get called [name]Maria[/name], [name]Mary[/name] & [name]Marion[/name]). Most people know how to pronounce my name correctly- especially if they see it written down but majority of the time when I introduce myself they think my name is something different. It does bug me a bit but if I am talking to someone who I don’t really know I often don’t bother correcting them. I don’t have any children but I know some kids who get really annoyed when you mispronounce their name and others who don’t really care.
My last name is a different matter, it NEVER gets pronounced correctly because its so uncommon. I’ve gotten really good at saying ‘its _______ - like ______ with a _’
My name is [name]Johnna[/name]. It’s unfathomable how many [name]Joanna[/name], [name]Johanna[/name], [name]Juana[/name], [name]Jonah[/name] (yes) I’ve been called. I’ve had like 3 people pronounce it right on the first try. It’s annoying as hell.
This is why I prefer names that aren’t easily mispronounced. The only issue I ever had was teachers getting lazy and saying [name]Diane[/name] instead of [name]Diana[/name]…
It doesn’t bother me when people mispronounce my name as long as they are willing to listen to me and try to say it right. I don’t expect people to be mind readers. I had a lot of teachers who refused to even try, or who would fuss at me or try to embarrass me for having a “weird” name. I do not have a difficult name. I learned early on to say, “It’s just like [name]Karen[/name], but with a T instead of a K.” Sometimes, with very elderly people, it would be obvious to me that they just couldn’t hear me and I would just accept that they were going to call me [name]Karen[/name].
I feel the same about my son’s name- I only get annoyed if people refuse to even try to say his name properly. And I make allowances for people who clearly can’t hear what I am saying.
My name has 2 pronunciations and I really don’t care which one people along the lines of substitute teachers use…like if someone at Starbucks or a bank teller uses the one I don’t go by, why bother correcting them! I even went by my “wrong” pronunciation at a job for several years! To me, it’s the same name, I corrected people for a bit & let it go when no one caught on!
As for my daughter, I am upset with myself that I didn’t realize her name had multiple pronunciations so I get a bit upset when someone uses the “wrong” one!
I go by [name]Katy[/name]-- K-A-T-Y…although so many people imagine that there’s an invisible “H” in there and call me [name]Kathy[/name]. It definitely bothers me but I would never be rude to someone because of it.
My name is [name]Edie[/name] and when I was in school I would get “[name]Eddie[/name]” a lot from teachers or people I didn’t know very well and it did really bother me. Additionlly, trying to introduce myself at loud parties or other events can be frustrating as I always become [name]Katie[/name], [name]Phoebe[/name], or some other ee ending name. At places like Starbucks or Panera where they ask for a name I usually just go by something like “[name]Sarah[/name]” as it’s way easier to pronounce! When I slip up and give my real name I don’t care when they call me “[name]Eddie[/name]” but I’m also pleasantly surprised when someone I just met can pronounce (or more impressively SPELL) my name right on the first try!
Yeah, I does- quite a lot, but as [name]Lyra[/name] as a first name, it’s kind of understandable, so I try to just let them. In Denmark it’s said [name]LY[/name]-Raah (yeah…), which annoys me pretty much when people say it like that. And People once thought it was [name]Laila[/name] or [name]Laura[/name] I said! o.o but even so, my middle name - [name]Elizabeth[/name] is still mispronounced (don’t ask me how!) and of course, people want it with a S instead of Z.
I don’t have children, but I have nieces, which is lucky enough to have more common names. ^^
No one mispronounces my name if it’s written down but if I’m introducing myself I have to say ‘[name]Ren[/name], like the bird, but without the w’. Otherwise I get this face O_o
People don’t mispronunce our first names but no-one ever gets our last name right! I really don’t understand why. It’s very simple but people always get it wrong.
We intentionally avoid hard to pronounce names for our children because having a surname people can’t get right is annoying enough!
My name is always pronounced properly(and last name too). But my daughter’s name sometimes causes confusion, he he…OK with [name]Cornelia[/name](we got [name]Cordelia[/name] or [name]Caroline[/name] a few times) but it’s surprising to see almost no-one can pronounce her middle name, [name]Hermione[/name]. Her-mee-one, er-my-own or even her-mi-o-nuh. Luckily she won’t have to be introduced by it:)
I’m a substitute as well, so I know exactly what you’re talking about! I take the same approach as you, or show the name to another kid and ask them how it’s pronounced. I feel really bad when I say someone’s name wrong, but with so many “creative” spellings of names these days, it’s impossible to know how to pronounce every name. It really bugs me a lot when a kid gets an attitude because their name was mispronounced. I get that it’s annoying to constantly have to correct people, but if every substitute you’ve ever had has butchered it, it’s an issue with your name, not the teachers!
I get what kathrynsarah is talking about, too. I’m also [name]Kathryn[/name] who goes by [name]Katy[/name]. I would get [name]Kathy[/name] a lot in school, or [name]Kathleen[/name] instead of [name]Kathryn[/name] for some reason. But, there is a right way and a wrong way to correct someone. I never found it to be that annoying.
I named my daughter [name]Maura[/name] knowing that there a 2 different ways people pronounce it (like [name]Mara[/name] or like [name]Mora[/name] - I use the latter pronunciation because where I live the name [name]Laura[/name] is pronounced like [name]Lora[/name], so that’s what makes the most sense to me). I do not care AT ALL if people say it differently than the way I do. In this case, I think it has more to do with the person’s accent anyway. The only time it did bother was right after she was born and my MOM mispronounced it repeatedly. Like for days. I felt bad correcting her, so I just kept purposefully saying the baby’s name a lot around her hoping she would get the drift, but she didn’t. A week later, she came to me and was like, “Your dad thinks I’m saying her name wrong. It’s [name]Mara[/name], right? He thinks it’s [name]Mora[/name], like it rhymes with [name]Laura[/name].” LOL! Yes, Mom. It rhymes with [name]Laura[/name].
Luckily there’s only one way to say [name]Sophie[/name] really, so I don’t get a lot of bother with it, except the occasional [name]Sophia[/name] - uh, no, there’s an ‘e’ on the end not an ‘a’. [name]Sophie[/name]'s the more common variant in the UK though so I don’t really get [name]Sophia[/name] an awful lot but it has happened. Though I’ve also been misheard for [name]Sapphire[/name] (yeah, I can understand that) and [name]Katie[/name] (not so much). My sister gets her name mispronounced a lot though, people tend to use a short ‘a’ rather than a long one.
My first name was never a problem (except when I sat next to a [name]Shauna[/name] in elementary school and they would just mix up our names). My last name and now my married name always get mispronounced. Doesn’t really bother me though.
My name is classic and biblical but people STILL manage to butcher the pronunciation and spelling! I really don’t mind if it’s the first few times I’ve met someone, but when (like with my form tutor) they still can’t get it right after 5 years of seeing me almost every single day- that’s when it irritates me
). I have been called [name]Kayla[/name], [name]Kyla[/name], [name]Kyle[/name], [name]Kylie[/name], [name]Karey[/name], [name]Kalle[/name], [name]Hailey[/name], [name]Bailey[/name], etc. My last name is always mispronounced too, but I don’t really mind because last names are harder to pronounce than first names are most of the time. I don’t have any children so I’m not much help there.