Calling classes by names - why?

[Fossil]

DS's class has recently become 'Kingfishers', and all the other classes in the school have been named after different birds. Notice from looking at other school websites that this seems to be a trend. What is the reason for this?

at my DS's primary they have:

class 1
class 2
class 3
class 4

very simple and child-friendly it is too.

I love the fact that our school has names for classes, it's so dull and formal to have numbers only and shows no imagination either. I don't like hospitals with wards without names...it seems so cold and souless.

We had famous names in history eg: Wallace, Gordon, Calver and a couple of others that have escaped me entirely...

Ours are named after constellations (school has stars on logo and makes a big deal of star scheme).

So Indus, lyra, Pegasus, andromeda, Phoenix, Aquila, canis, hydra, Leo and so on.

I rather like it.

I think the naming of classes after birds, trees, flowers etc is a lovely idea - creative and fun.

It's dull old 1A, 2B, 3C etc at our school, more's the pity!

Trees - only 5 classes in the whole school so pretty easy to get the hang of and they are in alphabetical order. Ecologically speaking they have done a decent job of it as well - i.e. all native trees (well, argument about Beech but it has been here for a long time) and they do actually all grow in the area.

My Junior school was just the teacher's name I think. My secondary school had three houses, two classes to each house in each year so it was - year number/house/1 or 2. So you stayed in C1 but moved through 1C1, 2C1 etc. Does that even make sense?

Oh yes, the houses were famous people from our county - so D for Darwin - where all the sporty people mysteriously went, W for Webb - where all the musical ones were, and C for Clive - where the rest were. We usually won Drama things tho'.

In DS's school, Reception are all flowers, Y1 classes are birds and Y2 are jewels etc. It works fine. As a teacher, it makes no difference to me, but it's nicer to address the group as 'Pelicans' than to say 'OK, 3LM, time for lunch'

In our infant school we have colours and then the SN unit from where the children integrate into all the classes is called Rainbow. It symbolises quite well what's going on and the children get it.

DS1's (primary) school have animals, I think it's to do with a combination of some mixed year classes and some years having two classes per year. I only know that DS is a leopard and the other reception class are tigers but he seems to know exactly who's who!

It sounds quite sweet!

DS1's primary school had tree names for the classes. Very confusing Especially as I used to forget which "tree" he was in & end up guessing randomly - usually naming a class the school didn't have.

My DD's school recently had a new Head and a competition was set for all children to think of new year and house names. My daughter won with jewel names. Her inspiration ?...those fairy books by Daisy Meadows

I like numbers. You know where you are with numbers. And in a good way, not like when my brother's lower ability group was christened the Lemons (yes, the other group were Oranges, so I'm sure it was entirely blameless, but REALLY ).

However the groups for different subjects are named after things and people, so we get long spiels about 'I am on Newton table for every day, but for spelling I am on Diamonds and for reading I am on Elephants, and for maths I am on Purple; Ella is on Newton too but for spelling she is on Rubies and for reading she is on Giraffes ...'

My DC's infants school has class 1,2,3 and so on.
The Junior school has year group followed by initial of teachers surname eg Mrs Smith who teaches a yr 6 class would be 6S.
The middle schhol has year number plus initial of house group ie Cavaliers in yr 5 would be 5C then 6C,7C followed by 8C.
The Upper secondary has yr group and teachers initials eg yr9 with Mrs Joan Smith would be 9JS.
if there is more than one teacher with the same initials the they fiddle around and make it with 3 initials eg 9JSm or 9JAS if the middle name was Ann.
Hope all that makes sense.

I think all this would confuse the living daylights out of me! At dd's small school they have Foundation (reception, no nursery) and then Class 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Everybody in the school knows how the classes are structured, until class 4 the class number is also the year number then YR4 is class 4 with half of Y5 and then Yr 6 is in class 5 with the other half of Yr 5.
I think I would struggle is there was more then one class per year group what ever they called the classes but that is probably because I went to a small one form entry primary as is my dd's school!
At my secondary school each year had 5 forms, RC school so each was named after a saint, I was in Kirby so went 1k, 2k etc. Each year group had there own set of 5 form names and then they would cycle round, when I started six form the new year ones had my years for names (so there was a 1 kirby if that makes sense!)

Ours has the year followed by the teachers initial letter, or two letters if it's a job share, with the teacher who is in on Monday getting their letter first. To avoid implications about which teacher is "in charge".

I wish we had a system of also having a "year group" name, so each year having a colour, or jewel that followed them through the school. It gives a sense of continuity, so that you can see "the reds" progressing through the school, or fondly remember how boisterous the "greens" used to be.

At my old school the classes were numbered, sort of according to year group (1, 2, 3/4, 4/5, 6). It was easy, we all knew where we were and who was who.

Then I went on maternity leave and when I returned all the classes had been renamed after British poets. We had Blake, Longfellow, Wordsworth and Tennyson, and poor old Reception got lumbered with Milne because it was borderline relevant to them.

Pretentious, much?

I think they changed it when I wasn't there because they knew I'd have had a hissy fit about it

At my current school, we have minibeasts for Foundation Stage, and British wildlife for Year 1 and 2. Much more child friendly.

How odd. when i was in primary school the reading groups had names, but that was it.

Oh yes maighdlin, the reading groups have names too, DS1 is a leopard (class) and a rainbowfish (reading)

I think the only time I had a named anything was the reading group in the last year of my UK primary, in which I was a Strawberry. I understand the Raspberries were just as good as us, however. I don't recall what other fruit they had.

DD's school has two classes per year and just use the number and initial of teacher's surname.

Everybody instantly knows the age of each child by their class and helps with school teams as well.

No streaming yet (except within lessons) so DD being in 3S is no different to her being in the other class 3D

They did have birds names up until Kindergarden but from year 1 it's teachers.

Ours are Tube lines and stations, I rather like it

Dhead (D because he really does his best) tried to give our classes names at the beginning of the year (probably to stop those in split year groups from feeling superior or inferior depending on whether they were in with the year above or below). There was no rhyme or reason to them, no one could remember them and some children were in one in the morning and another in the afternoon. They lasted about 5 minutes, Dhead just gives out merit certificates by year and the rest of us use year group or registration class by the old numbers depending on context.