What's Your Name?

Yesterday's school was about an hour away.  It was constructed on the side of a mountain so the track field looks out over the expansive valley.  All of the students are aboriginal.  English classes start in third grade for children here, so typically we do not teach any grades below that level.  This school made a special request that we hold a class for the second graders.  Each of the eleven students in the class are barely taller than my knee, and even the most simple words we use in English are nothing to them.  There goes our lesson plan.  I stand in front of them and ask in Chinese "Do any of you have an English name?"  They reply back to me in their language, "No.".  "Do you want to have an English name?" I ask, still in Chinese... one little boy in the front slowly raises his hand, then another student, then another.  We go through the class to each child and give them each a piece of paper with their new name.  We help them say it once, then twice - and many times.  They bravely answer our question "What is your name?" with the sentence pattern we teach them in English "My name is ____.".  They are so proud of themselves and say their new name to themselves over and over under their breath.  Their Chinese name is still the one they use, but in the years to come, they will need an English name if they ever hope to break out of the simple life they've known.  To the people here an English name is almost like a symbol of hope for the future.