Learning their names.

I didn’t really know where to post this…

I am curious to see if children with longer names have a harder time learning their name compared to children with shorter names. This is the main reason I tend to stay away from long names. That being said and I don’t mean to cause offence but would children with longer names be better with letters earlier than children with shorter names.

So to the Questions:
[name_f]Do[/name_f] your children have a short or long name?
Did your child/children encounter any difficulties in writing or learning their name?
If so what did he/she have trouble with?

[name_f]TIA[/name_f]

Hmmmm, interesting. I don’t think it makes any difference to be honest. I have a five year old (just turned 5, at school next week). She has a long name and has had no problem at kindergarten (from 3-5 years free play type preschool setup here in NZ) learning to write her name. I did suggest she started with her nickname lulu when she started because of the long name thing but they said no, she will be better off learning the proper first name first. I have no idea if she will be better with letters and numbers yet but I doubt it makes any difference, some kids are really into learning straight away and some take time to get into it.

When they are learning to write their name (at first) there is not really any concept of the letters being distinctive, it’s more of a game of memory. They are just practising the letters over and over without a huge amount of thought as to what the letters sound like and mean when they are put together.

I wouldn’t let name length put you off at all, I would guess it makes no difference at all.

My kids are a bit young for me to weigh in, my eldest is two, and only recognises about five letters. She knows her name starts with I and that her sister’s name starts with S. :stuck_out_tongue:

But that’s beside the point. I think that the period of time in their lives where they are learning their name is so small - a drop in the ocean of their days - that you shouldn’t let an extra few weeks to learn their name stop you giving them a longer one if you love the name more.

I grew up with a four syllable name and don’t recall ever having an issue trying to write it.

I think this ENTIRELY depends upon the child.

Some children will learn their names easily, whether they are long or short.

Some children will struggle to read/write/spell their names…perhaps a longer name might take these children more time to learn, yes.

I know I could write my name by the age of 3, fairly early, and my name is 9 letters.

My daughter is 23 months and has been saying a 2 syllable version of her name ([name_f]Lilly[/name_f]) for 5-6 months now. She’s just starting to say her full, three syllable name + last name. She can also write an (albeit sloppy) letter L. Many of her peers struggle to correctly hold a pen and do not say many words, including their 1-2 syllable names, which is perfectly normal. She can also say the names of every child (20) in her class, including a [name_m]Benjamin[/name_m], with a few pronounciation mistakes.

I don’t know if she will be an early/advanced writer, the way she is a speaker, but I don’t think a longer or shorter name will make a big difference. I may have learned to write my name sooner had it been [name_f]Ella[/name_f] or [name_u]Jean[/name_u], but I still learned quite early. If I named my daughter Scholastica, yes, it might take her a few weeks more to learn than were she named [name_u]Sam[/name_u], but I don’t think it would affect her in the long run or disadvantage her, or be more difficult for her than for shorter named children.

In other ways I am quite focused on thinking about how a name might cause hassle in somebody’s life, but to be honest I wouldn’t even think about this. All developmentally typical children will learn to say, read and write their names. I think a lot of, if not most, children will learn their names before they are physically able to pronounce them properly, just like other words - that comes with time. For example, my boyfriend’s nephew is named Tómas (not a long or complicated name by any standards). He knew that was his name from an early age but he would call himself Mas. Then he started calling himself Ómas. Then eventually he added the final t on the beginning. You can see the same process taking place with many other words, where little children at first do not say the whole word or substitute sounds. Unless there is some genuine issue, e.g. the child requires speech therapy and doesn’t get it, they all get there in the end, no matter if it takes some children a little longer to master all the sounds. Length of name would be less relevant there than what particular sounds the name includes, but I still don’t think it really matters if they are pronouncing their name perfectly a little earlier or a little later.

As for writing, once a child is old enough to be becoming literate in earnest, they will have to learn a lot of different words, some of them long, and English isn’t an easy language for spelling. If they are basically capable of learning to read and write, they will learn to write their name. If they are naturally quick at picking up literacy skills they will learn it faster, if they naturally find it a bit harder they will learn it slower. I strongly suspect the name itself makes a minimal difference if any. I don’t think it makes sense to focus on just one word in the process of learning to speak/read/write, because they are learning a whole language (at least one), not just their names. There is zero reason to theorise that a child with a ‘difficult’ name would have any sort of headstart on literacy over a child with an ‘easy’ name. Besides, these are skills that different children will master at different rates anyway. It’s not a race.

I wanted to add that I have her my grandmother ([name_f]Elizabeth[/name_f]) say she wishes she had a shorter name because it was difficult to learn to spell.

However, my grandmother grew up in an illiterate family, likely never held or even saw a pencil used until she was 5 or 6, and I can almost guarantee she never saw her name written down before she needed to learn to write it at 6 or so. I think that for children who learn to have a common modern level of expected literacy, and are exposed to writing from a preschool or prekindergarten age, it’s not going to make as big of a difference.