sAdkER And sAdkER | HIddEn lEssons 574567lessons becoming secret mind games played against female children,
our daughters, and to morrow’s women.
After almost two decades of research grants and thousands of hours
of classroom observation, we remain amazed at the stubborn persis-
tence of these hidden sexist lessons. When we began our investigation
of gender bias, we looked first in the classrooms of one of Washington,
D.C.’s elite and expensive private schools. Uncertain of exactly what to
look for, we wrote nothing down; we just observed. The classroom was
a whirlwind of activity so fast paced we could easily miss the quick but
vital phrase or gesture, the insidious incident, the tiny inequity that held
a world of meaning. As we watched, we had to push ourselves beyond
the blind spots of socialization and gradually focus on the nature of the
interaction between teacher and student. On the second day we saw our
first example of sexism, a quick, jarring flash within the hectic pace of
the school day:
Two second-graders are kneeling beside a large box. They whisper excit-
edly to each other as they pull out wooden blocks, colored balls, counting
sticks. So absorbed are these two small children in examining and sorting
the materials, they are visibly startled by the teacher’s impatient voice as she
hovers over them. “Ann! Julia! Get your cottonpickin’ hands out of the math
box. Move over so the boys can get in there and do their work.”
Isolated here on the page of a book, this incident is not difficult to
interpret. It becomes even more disturbing if you think of it with the
teacher making a racial distinction. Picture Ann and Julia as African
American children moved away so white children can gain access
to the math materials. If Ann and Julia’s parents had observed this
exchange, they might justifiably wonder whether their tuition dollars
were well spent. But few parents actually watch teachers in action, and
fewer still have learned to interpret the meaning behind fast-paced
classroom events.
The incident unsettles, but it must be considered within the context
of numerous interactions this harried teacher had that day. While she
talked to the two girls, she was also keeping a wary eye on fourteen
other active children. Unless you actually shadowed the teacher, stood
right next to her as we did, you might not have seen or heard the event.
After all, it lasted only a few seconds.
It took us almost a year to develop an observation system that would
register the hundreds of daily classroom interactions, teasing out
the gen der bias embedded in them. Trained raters coded classrooms
in math, reading, English, and social studies. They observed students
from different racial and ethnic backgrounds. They saw lessons taught
by women and by men, by teachers of different races. In short, they ana-
lyzed America’s classrooms. By the end of the year we had thousands
of observation sheets, and after another year of statistical analysis, we03_GRE_5344_Ch3_055_079.indd 57 11/19/14 11:06 AM