Alphabetizing

I alphabetize. My teaching assistants do not. I must be "old school," because I don't understand how you can grade 45 papers and record the grades (in an alphabetical file) without alphabetizing. I mean I understand how it can be done...it just doesn't make sense to me. I want all the papers in order before I record grades. Then I can go right down the class list as I enter grades.

I have a few simple strategies for alphabetizing. Usually I first sort the papers into 2 or 3 piles (A-M and N-Z for instance), depending on the class size, and then sort within the piles. For smaller classes I just continually sort and resort the pile in my hands, moving papers forward or backward according to the last name. I always have a few puzzles--the students with hyphenated names or double names. So, is Meyer-Himes filed under M or H? What about Meyer Himes as a last name? My computer generated classlist sometimes does things differently than I would.

I do have a little trouble with the end of the alphabet. I can't tell you, without getting a running start, whether V comes before or after W. I don't know why, but I also get X and Y confused. Seems to me that X should come after Y. I mean, both X and Z are so infrequently used, why not just stick them at the end together. I was discussing this problem with my son's 16 year old friend. He confessed to having troubles with the PQRST sequence. For some reason, we seem to do better up to M then things fall apart. Although another hard area could be the JKL region.

I remember spending a lot of time learning about alphabetical order in elementary school. We regularly did exercises putting words in order. I don't know if it was merely a way for the teacher to keep us busy, or if there was some real reason to learn that. After all, most of us were not going to be file clerks in the future. I suppose an argument could be made for dictionary usage.

Overall, I guess my desire for alphabetical piles of papers is one more example of my desire for order. I wish that desire for order would spill over into my thoughts about housekeeping.