What's in a name? Or a pronoun? Or an identity?

Summer of 2016 was a big one for Shawn. He spent time with his friends, went to sleep away camp, and came out as trans*.

By the time the school year rolled around, he was using masculine pronouns (he/him) and the name Shawn with his family and close friends. That didn't account, though, for the 1000+ students, teachers, and staff members at the middle school who still thought of him as "Sarah," though... and that's where he was when he walked into my class on the first day of school. 

Quiet kids (well, during class time, at least), Shawn and his friend Mary introduced themselves to me on the first day, correcting the class roster that I held in my hands. "Sarah" was not here, but Shawn was (he/him). "Mary" didn't use the feminine pronouns I would expect from the name on the roster, but is non-binary and uses gender neutral pronouns (they/them). 

No problem. 

And when I say "no problem," I really do mean "no problem"-- not for me, and not for the 28 students in the class with Mary and Shawn. They switched to the new name and the new pronouns easily enough, correcting themselves and each other if they made a mistake. It was, honestly, pretty smooth. No one said anything transphobic or homophobic (at least, not that Shawn, Mary, or I ever heard), and class simply progressed. We immersed ourselves in social studies. 

Several weeks later, all of Shawn's teachers had a meeting with his parents to talk about how school was going for him. At the meeting, they mentioned that he would like to start going by Shawn and using he/him pronouns in his classes. Sure, everyone said, of course. That would be no problem. 

Wait.

"Start"?

"So... he hasn't been going by Shawn in your class?" I asked Veronica, my teaching partner. Our LA/SS kids are blocked, which means each group of kids stays together for Language Arts (Veronica) and Social Studies (me). 

"No..." she looked at me, puzzled. 

"And he hasn't been using he/him pronouns?"

"No. Wait. She--I mean, he-- has been in your class?"

We realized that our entire group of kids-- everyone except Shawn and Mary-- had been switching back and forth between the names Sarah and Shawn, between using she/her pronouns and he/him pronouns. Every day, they called him Shawn in 2nd period, and called "her" Sarah in 6th. 

We stared at each other. 

Several weeks ago, Morgan (previously "Mary") and I were reflecting on this.

"We just couldn't understand it," they said. "Why would anyone think that he would use a different name and pronoun just because he was one classroom over? How does that make any sense?" They kind of laughed. "It was just weird, you know?"

I shrugged. "Yeah, I don't know. But it does kind of seem to sum up the kids and the culture at our school, don't you think?"

"Yeah," they said, nodding. "Not mean, just really confused." 

And, you know? It's kind of weird, but we can work with that.