Friday, September 08, 2006
Help! Black Girl Alone At Midnight!
In September Navah started her new White school. She came from a mostly Black/Latino school with a progressive curriculum where half the parents wore Assata and Che t-shirts and the other half simply believed in the groundbreaking idea that even kids in the 'hood deserved music, art, and not to attend a school that prepares them for a trade (read institutions called School of Medical Technology that train future home attendants of the world).
On her second week of pre-k at her old school, she pronounced her puffy 'fro to be a "brown cloud" and her skin"the color of chocolate chip cookies." This was after a previous year of begging for blonde Barbies.
On every birthday at her old school, parents came and told their child's birth story. The Pre-Kindergarten teacher would ask, "Now was little Sundiata pushed out of your vagina, or did he have to be cut out of your belly?" And the four-year-olds would stare up at you in wonder, chin in hand, waiting for an answer.
The problem was Navah didn't learn to read. Or add. Or make a heading at the top of a notebook page. And we started worrying she would become a statistic disguised in a Che t-shirt.
The lack of structure at the old school gave my child the chance to drift. And, like her mama, given the chance to float, she will do so -- and high. The philosophy of the school was that children should focus on what they love. That seemed to be fashion for Navah. But half way through a drawing of a fabulous cheetah print gown, she would forget what she was doing and wander off to the block area leaving the garment chopped off at the waist. I pictured her glamorous model strutting down a Milan runway with half a dress and a naked c00chee.
I started off by being annoyed and angry at Navah. "Concentrate," I would yell during reading practice. "If you look more closely at the words, you can make out the sound!" But that was making her cry and my stomach churn so bad I needed to scratch myself inside. The school refused to offer her reading help -- it was too conventional, and they claimed she didn't need it. You see, Navah seemed rather high functioning compared to other kids in the school. That wasn't that difficult considering one of her best friends was a starving vegan child who spent most of each day obssessing on how to find chocolate to taste and her other friend came to school weekly with stories of how his dad was in jail for some random misdemeanor.
In the middle of the first grade I got her evaluated, and the psychologist started off with "She is a very sweet girl."
Mmmm Mmmm, I thought, there's a problem. Apparently my very sweet girl was in fact, below in her reading and writing skills, verbal skills, reasoning skills --- skills and more skills. Direct instruction was the prescription from the shrink. It was too early to tell, but they predicted possible learning disabilities lurking in my little genius' head.
I visited schools. Some were so white, I could count every chip in the cookie. But worse, in one, kids sat at desks, staring at the chalkboard, while the teacher shouted directions to draw a perfect letter "J". "Hat on top, SWOOP, at the bottom," she said, mimicking the trunk of an elephant. In the back of the classroom, I saw a little me. She was fat. The paisleys on her little shirt were stretched so far from her belly bulge they resembled splatters. She had stray crumbs on one cheek, and her mind was some place good. Not with the J at all. Maybe she was dreaming of her own cheetah gown. But if I had asked her the teacher's name at that point she would have stared at me, mouth agape, without an answer. That one got crossed off the list.
Finally I found another progressive school on the White side of town. The curriculum seemed fabulous. During the visit, my friend and I began ticking off the number of kids of color in each classroom. There were very few, and what kids of color were there seemed to come from alternoland -- adopted Asian kids, biracial Black kids, kids who were a quarter Burmese, products of Peace Corps love connections. But mostly they were White kids with hippy parents who we later learned lived in fabulous Upper West Side apartments thanks to their trustfunds. Most importantly, the school promised Reading Recovery, occupational therapy for backward writing, etc. We decided to give it a try.
On the first day of school Navah came home looking a little disoriented. We ate dinner alone together in the dim living room at the coffee table. I waited for her to talk. I didn't want to barrage her with questions. We talked about why Raven Simone seems to favor froofie feathers around most of her jacket collars. We talked about why my bike was so tall. And then we were quiet. Finally she looked at me and said,
"Ma, do you know what it is like to be the only black girl in a classroom?"
"Uh, no," I said with a shy smile on my white face.
"It's like being all alone at midnight. And everbody forgot about you."
She just looked at me, waiting for a reason. Why had I dragged her away from her friends and their games of dozens and her lovely afterschool where all the kids sit on each other's laps and take Hip Hop dance and African Drum for electives?
I asked her why she felt alone. She said that nobody liked Cheetah Girls. She said nobody was cute. Nobody was fun. Nobody knew how to do Chicken Noodle Soup. And then she said nobody wanted to be her friend. That was as simply as she could put it.
Should she be able to read and compete in her future, or should she be self affirmed and emotionally nurtured? Are they mutually exclusive? We won't move her before June, but we are still seeking answers.
On her second week of pre-k at her old school, she pronounced her puffy 'fro to be a "brown cloud" and her skin"the color of chocolate chip cookies." This was after a previous year of begging for blonde Barbies.
On every birthday at her old school, parents came and told their child's birth story. The Pre-Kindergarten teacher would ask, "Now was little Sundiata pushed out of your vagina, or did he have to be cut out of your belly?" And the four-year-olds would stare up at you in wonder, chin in hand, waiting for an answer.
The problem was Navah didn't learn to read. Or add. Or make a heading at the top of a notebook page. And we started worrying she would become a statistic disguised in a Che t-shirt.
The lack of structure at the old school gave my child the chance to drift. And, like her mama, given the chance to float, she will do so -- and high. The philosophy of the school was that children should focus on what they love. That seemed to be fashion for Navah. But half way through a drawing of a fabulous cheetah print gown, she would forget what she was doing and wander off to the block area leaving the garment chopped off at the waist. I pictured her glamorous model strutting down a Milan runway with half a dress and a naked c00chee.
I started off by being annoyed and angry at Navah. "Concentrate," I would yell during reading practice. "If you look more closely at the words, you can make out the sound!" But that was making her cry and my stomach churn so bad I needed to scratch myself inside. The school refused to offer her reading help -- it was too conventional, and they claimed she didn't need it. You see, Navah seemed rather high functioning compared to other kids in the school. That wasn't that difficult considering one of her best friends was a starving vegan child who spent most of each day obssessing on how to find chocolate to taste and her other friend came to school weekly with stories of how his dad was in jail for some random misdemeanor.
In the middle of the first grade I got her evaluated, and the psychologist started off with "She is a very sweet girl."
Mmmm Mmmm, I thought, there's a problem. Apparently my very sweet girl was in fact, below in her reading and writing skills, verbal skills, reasoning skills --- skills and more skills. Direct instruction was the prescription from the shrink. It was too early to tell, but they predicted possible learning disabilities lurking in my little genius' head.
I visited schools. Some were so white, I could count every chip in the cookie. But worse, in one, kids sat at desks, staring at the chalkboard, while the teacher shouted directions to draw a perfect letter "J". "Hat on top, SWOOP, at the bottom," she said, mimicking the trunk of an elephant. In the back of the classroom, I saw a little me. She was fat. The paisleys on her little shirt were stretched so far from her belly bulge they resembled splatters. She had stray crumbs on one cheek, and her mind was some place good. Not with the J at all. Maybe she was dreaming of her own cheetah gown. But if I had asked her the teacher's name at that point she would have stared at me, mouth agape, without an answer. That one got crossed off the list.
Finally I found another progressive school on the White side of town. The curriculum seemed fabulous. During the visit, my friend and I began ticking off the number of kids of color in each classroom. There were very few, and what kids of color were there seemed to come from alternoland -- adopted Asian kids, biracial Black kids, kids who were a quarter Burmese, products of Peace Corps love connections. But mostly they were White kids with hippy parents who we later learned lived in fabulous Upper West Side apartments thanks to their trustfunds. Most importantly, the school promised Reading Recovery, occupational therapy for backward writing, etc. We decided to give it a try.
On the first day of school Navah came home looking a little disoriented. We ate dinner alone together in the dim living room at the coffee table. I waited for her to talk. I didn't want to barrage her with questions. We talked about why Raven Simone seems to favor froofie feathers around most of her jacket collars. We talked about why my bike was so tall. And then we were quiet. Finally she looked at me and said,
"Ma, do you know what it is like to be the only black girl in a classroom?"
"Uh, no," I said with a shy smile on my white face.
"It's like being all alone at midnight. And everbody forgot about you."
She just looked at me, waiting for a reason. Why had I dragged her away from her friends and their games of dozens and her lovely afterschool where all the kids sit on each other's laps and take Hip Hop dance and African Drum for electives?
I asked her why she felt alone. She said that nobody liked Cheetah Girls. She said nobody was cute. Nobody was fun. Nobody knew how to do Chicken Noodle Soup. And then she said nobody wanted to be her friend. That was as simply as she could put it.
Should she be able to read and compete in her future, or should she be self affirmed and emotionally nurtured? Are they mutually exclusive? We won't move her before June, but we are still seeking answers.
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