Failing at Fairness ... and Blogging!

It's been a while ... again! But I have a better excuse this time: For at least part of the time since my last post I've been "South of the Border" down Mexico-way visiting mi hermano in Guadalajara, where he's teaching English. As for the rest of the time, I don't have a lot to say about that.

I have, however, been able to continue reading and just finished "Failing at Fairness" by Myra and David Sadker, a husband and wife team of education researchers specializing in sexism in education. The book was interesting in a lot of ways but also seemed to be fairly out of date ... probably why they've updated it with a "sequel": "STILL Failing at Fairness." I'm curious to start SFAF, but some of my reflections on the original ...

The Sadkers explore sexism in schools from early childhood through graduate school and identify blatantly sexist practices, barriers, and attitudes at every step along the way. Many of these challenges (and the most interesting, to me) are those perpetuated by well-meaning educators and administrators who don't even know the impact of their actions.

I don't remember elementary school as crystal clearly as I wish I did, but many of the attitudes described regarding school boys' perceptions of girls and what it would be like to be a girl (that is to say, the "I'd rather die!! mentality" struck me as very true and reminiscent of my own childhood. Interestingly, girls are much more open and positive about the idea of what it would be like to be a boy (either for a little or long while), and some said they even wish they could make the change. (There is no real discussion of gender identities beyond heterosexual male and females in the original FAF ... perhaps SFAF?)

Another discussion that resonated with me was that of female protagonists in children's books (at the time of publication, vastly outnumbered by male protagonists) and the very limited role of women in textbooks of all kinds. When I was in high school I remember a new history textbook coming out that featured special text "boxes" or "sidebars" discussing the "important" role of women during each era in history and even remember thinking then that if the role was really so important, why wasn't it just included in the general text of the chapters?

The Sadkers also pointed out flaws in teacher education through the years (for instance, encouraging teachers to stock more books with male protagonists because "girls will read books about boys but boys won't read books about girls") and the various challenges faced by women attending college, graduate schools and professional schools (including a very interesting section on women in medical school in the early 80s -- around the time both my mother and aunt attended). They explore "controversial" ideas like single sex schools which -- though equivocal in their endorsement -- they seem to find more good in than bad.

The Sadkers also point to many things that teachers can do to stem the tide of sexism in their classroom. For instance:
-ensuring that books with strong female protagonists are prominent and in abundance
-making an effort to call on and interact with girls at least as often as boys
-interacting with girls in a way that values their achievements, actions and input
-discussing sexist texts, practices or other challenges openly with students
-exposing girls to traditionally masculine subject areas and careers, identifying role models, and encouraging exploration of these areas

... and many more. As a future kindergarten teacher, I'm very glad to have read this book. While talking to several people about it, I got the impression that many people believe this to be a problem of the past (another reason I'm very glad to read SFAF next!) or a problem relegated to communities of color and/or poverty, but it is clearly an important issue and one that I hope I can address in my own future classroom.

Birthday

Well if the weather today is any indication, my 27th year is likely to have it's ups and downs. Indeed, the weather has been positively schizophrenic today: mild and pleasant in the morning, showers at noontime, balmy and warm in the early afternoon, and then an apocalyptic (by Seattle standards anyway) thunder and hail storm just a short while ago. Things seem to be settling down now into a cooler than normal March evening.

Oops

Well, I knew it would happen sooner or later, but I've gone two weeks without posting. Some might say that's due to a lack of dedication to the blogging lifestyle and others might say, "Good for you! You got a life!" I wish I could attest to the veracity of the exclamatory statements of the latter group, but, alas, it probably has more to do with the former option.

That said, a couple of exciting things HAVE transpired over the last 12 days. In no particular order:

Rachel finished law school!!! Okay so there is SOME particular order. I can't adequately describe quite how glad I am that law school is OVER and also quite how impressed I am with my wife for completing it. She's a soldier.

We went to Portland! (Part I of Rachel's Guilt Over Missing Andy's Birthday Leads to a Prolonged Birthday Celebration ... which REALLY needs to be retitled) We had awesome Lebanese (not usually my favorite) food at Nicholas Restaurant, explored the Pearl District, saw the largest independent bookstore in Portland, drank a local brew at some bar tended by a pissy barmaid and scarfed a bacon maple bar (and waited half an hour to do it) at Voodoo Donuts.

We also hosted a Murder Mystery Party (Part II of RGOMABLPBC) in which my fictitious bride was murdered at our wedding reception, prompting an evening-long investigation that uncovered ugly truths and disturbing mysteries. It was a lot of fun and Rachel (a.k.a. Inspector Poirot) did a great job of both organizing the party and solving the crime.

Finally, March Madness has once again taken up more than it's fair share of my time over the last week or so. The Buckeyes just lost tonight, thus sinking my longshot bracket. It's been fun, but particularly since we'll be out of the country (Meheeko, here I come!) for the majority of the rest of the tournament, I'm not sure it's an entirely bad thing to lose some interest.

I'll be trying to get back in the swing of posting more about education and other things involving my future life as an educator. A friend has sent some links to some an interesting website and a book or two regarding early childhood education. My father-in-law also forwarded an article about experts condemning "proposed core standards" for young students, which will probably have to be addressed in an upcoming entry along with a question he has posed to me about the very nature of charter schools and their relationship to teachers unions. Heavy stuff.

Is there a Scottish Equivalent to St. Patrick's Day?

It's time for me to acknowledge that I've fallen off the wagon. I haven't picked up a book (any book, really) in about a week. When I'm through with this post, I'm going to give Paulo Freire one last college try, to hopefully alleviate some of the guilt I'm feeling.

My dad told me yesterday that I'm not as Irish as I thought I was -- and he tells me this four days before St. Patrick's Day! He and my mom have been exploring their genealogies online and have been debunking some of the lifelong ideas I had about who I am and where I came from. These ideas were always somewhat general and murky (Scotch Irish, kicked out of Scotland and then kicked out of Ireland and somehow wound up in Ohio), but they were an idea nevertheless, a part of my identity.

So it turns out that the McKee family comes direct from Scotland with no stopover in Ireland at all. The south of Scotland appears to be teeming with McKees (or McKies or MacKays ... or a bunch of other variations), dating back to the early 1700s when my great great great great great great great grandfather, David McKie, left the mother country and set up shop in the British colonies of America. David's son, John McKee, founded McKeesport, Pennsylvania (now kind of a depressed-looking place) in 1795. Dad's having trouble with his maternal line, though he's traced it back to Maryland, and the folks seem to be of English/Welsh descent.

Mom doesn't seem to have found as much in her research, though it looks like the Golemans are also from the British Isles (mostly English, she thinks) and were in Virginia for quite a while upon arriving in the new world.

I'm glad the folks are doing this -- partially because I do find it interesting and am gratified in a way to know where my ancestors came from, but also because it will be one less thing that I have to do when I'm getting old and wishing I knew more about who I am and where I came from. They also seem to be having a lot of fun with it, though, in typical McKee fashion, it took a TV show to spur this interest. They've been watching (and getting inspired by Henry Louis Gates' (he of the Obama Beer Garden Mediation) "Faces of America."

Final Thoughts ... for the Day

Okay, "Lost" was actually pretty good this week (It helped that it was focused on Ben Linus, one of the few characters to still have much individual interest for me). I wanted to say that, because I mentioned how unimpressed I have been with this season so far. Actually the last couple of episodes have been better ... although the religious overtones (which have previously usually stayed in the realm of undertones) need to get put back in check if it's not going to pull a total Matrix Revolution (remember the Keanu crucifix blast? yeah, you do.).

Also, I just checked macrumors.com, and they had a report about possible updated Macbook Pros being in stores tomorrow. They promptly backpedaled and debunked the rumors, but it seems like there is growing buzz in internetworld about an update very (hopefully VERY) soon!

Finally, Slate has a good advice column called "My Goodness: Advice on How to Make the World Better." Yesterday's topic was a question that I have debated with Rachel many times: Is it "wrong" (or bad) to send your kids to private school? The consensus seems to be that you need to do what's best for your individual kids, but it's certainly a complex issue and one that I'm sure we'll continue to struggle with. The state of public education in the U.S. is really abysmal and needs to be a priority for everyone.

Pacman

Catching up on Lost (so far not impressed with this ho hum final season), finally taking out the pile of recycling that was ivy-like in it's ascent up my living room wall, and now blogging about what has been taking up WAY too much of my thought and time today (and yesterday). I rediscovered the "fun" tab on my Google home page, which includes a Pacman app. I'm a fan of the arcade game (though mostly of the MS. Pacman), but today took the appreciation to a new level.

I was working out of our Tacoma office and (on a break, of course) played a game of Pacman when I started to think of how awesome I was at it. These thoughts merged with some paranoid theories about whether the different colored ghosts (or "Ghost Monsters") had different personalities/strengths/strategies and prompted me to do some Google searches. I not only found that there was a bizarre-sounding and short-lived Pacman cartoon in the 80s, but also (and somewhat more interestingly) a rather intense and impressive history of Pacman players.

I guess I had always thought I was a pretty amazing Pacman player myself and thought I must not be TOO far from "beating" the game. Little did I know that Pacman actually has over 250 levels (I've beaten maybe 10 or 11 in my best games) including a legendary "split-level" (a weird garbled mess of a level) that appears to be endless (or unbeatable). Since 1999, seven people have achieved the feat of a "perfect game" in Pacman, in which the top score is something over 3 million. (One of these guys was actually from Beavercreek, OH!) Anyway, dejected and ashamed, I now acknowledge that I am not a very strong Pacman contender, but it has inspired me to take my Pacman training more seriously.

Bring it.

Kindergarten

Well, it's official. I have a job for next year, and I will be teaching ... KINDERGARTEN! (Cue horror movie shrieks and ominous music.) It's a bit different than I was expecting (i.e. hadn't thought about sitting on carpet squares and finger-painting), but I'm already getting excited about the idea. Now, if only every other woman I tell about it will just stop saying "Aw, so cute!" or "Oh, how precious." We'll work on that.

I've decided that when I start teaching I am going to blog about it in a very scientific way while also respecting the privacy of the subjects (or students) involved. Rachel gave me a book for my birthday a few years ago called "A Primate's Memoir" by Robert M. Sapolsky, who refers to each of the members of the baboon troop by a name from the Bible. I think I'll do that with my kids, too, only maybe I'll use characters from Shakespeare or an HBO series. ("Today McNulty peed himself while I was helping Ophelia get rubber cement out of her hair." Something like that).

So it's been a little while since I posted and I wanted to make up for lost time by also posting a couple of links that I've been enjoying:

A good piece at the New York Times Magazine about "Building a Better Teacher."

An hilaaarious commercial for the hilaaaarious show "Modern Family." Some day I'll have to post specifically about the show, as it's really funny, but for now, enjoy the taste.

I've also been reading a new book, "Pedagogy of the Oppressed" by Paulo Freire. I'll have to comment further on it when I've been able to read a few paragraphs without either falling asleep or becoming somewhat overwhelmed. Gotta get back in the habit of reading academic works, I guess. Phew.