The Name Jar
Written and illustrated by: Yangsook Choi
Published by: Dragon Books, 2003
Pages: 40
Culture: Korean
In this story, we meet Unhei, a young Korean girl who just moved to the United States. She is worried that her new classmates will not like her. She is even more afraid that they won’t be able to say her very Korean name. Unhei refuses to tell her new peers her name until she decides on a new American name. Her new friends become intrigued and try to help her decide by placing names in a jar for her to choose from. But does Unhei really want to give up her Korean name? Or, with the help of her friends, will she stick with her roots and tell the class her Korean name?
The illustrations in the story are as soft and beautiful as the story. Choi uses an array for earth tones to paint the pictures in her story with. The illustrations have a cartoon-like feel, but it does not take away from the simplicity of the story. The pictures capture the anxiousness Unhei is feeling on her first day of class, to the relief of getting her name figured out for her new American life.
I would read this story to my class to teach them about living among difference cultural and ethnicities. It is very important for children to understand how to cope with people and ideas that are not the same as their own, especially in the classroom. I would also use this as the bases for a project. I would have to student choose a different cultural and let them research it and find common names in that cultural. The students will chose a name, learn how to pronounce it, and introduce themselves to us and tell us a little about ‘their culture’. Last, I would use this story as a writing exercise about their own name. Where did it come from? What does it mean? What does your name mean to you?
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