Cynthia Nambo

Chapter three was very interesting for me. For our previous class (EDUG 513), I worked on single-sex schooling for my final project. The rationale for segregating the sexes had much to do with the Sadkers' work Shortchanging Girls, Shortchanging America. The researchers noted that girls were less likely to be successful in the historically male-dominated fields of mathematics and science. So they advocated the removal of girls to limit the perceived competition with their male classmates. (As a side note, now the pendulum has swung the other way and there is outcry that boys are disserviced in a predominately female environment of public schools).
While the explicit references to single-sex schooling ends on page 53, it subtly underscores the entire chapter. It begs the question, like the assumption in chapter two that minority teachers can better relate to minority children, can female teachers teach female students better? (I am anxious to hear Peter's response - Sorry Peter, but you are unfortunately outnumbered in this field!)
Cynthia seems a very strong and passionate teacher. I would love to observe her class. I have really become enthusiastic about project-based learning and I have been keeping notes on different ways to implement it in the classroom.
Michie mentions a term on page 68, coined by Judith Kleinfeld, "warm demanders." He states that "many of the effective Chicago teachers I know - particularly teachers of color" have this characteristic of possessing high expectations while demonstrating genuine caring. Like Cynthia Nambo, I struggled with the hugs and touching that my students exchanged. I actually had one African American girl tell me I was too uptight because I didn't "love on" my students. Once I realized their concept of personal space was much different than mine and their displays of affection were much more pronounced, I was able to alter my ways of giving feedback.
I wanted to hear how the "trial" play at the end of the chapter worked out. Cynthia sounds like she would be fun to work with and someone I'd like to collaborate with. I recognized a lot of my own style in her description of her philosophy. My husband is Mexican American and (like Freda Lin the Chapter 4 is called a "twinkie") has often been referred to as a coconut (you know, brown on the outside, white on the inside). I speak Spanish and so his mother laughs that the guera (Tex-Mex equivalent of a gringa) knows more of their language than her son. My students and their parents were frequently surprised early on in the school years (at the beginning of my teaching career, before I had a reputation) that I was a petite white girl. With a name like Anna Davila, I had to be Hispanic. And many of my Latinas liked to ask me questions about my in-laws and what it was like to be a white girl marrying into a Hispanic family. (My Hispanic boys were always bummed they couldn't get away with saying naughty things in Spanish in my classroom). I got a lot of street cred for having a black best friend and a Hispanic husband and when you're working with classrooms whose faces are predominately black and brown, it helped.
Anyone else find something interesting in Chapter 3?
~Anna