In the classroom this week we read the book Mamie Takes a Stand: A Chinese American Girl’s Fight for School Rights. We learned that the Tape family lived in Cow Hollow and wanted Mamie and her younger siblings to attend their local public school, but Mamie was turned away because of her Chinese ancestry. Her case against the principal of Spring Valley School went all the way to the California Supreme Court and her family eventually won, but in response SFUSD opened up a separate school called the Chinese Primary School so that Mamie and other Chinese and Chinese American children would not mix with the students at Spring Valley.
In the kitchen classroom we made lo mein with bok choy (a traditional Chinese vegetable named in the book we read) and lots of other delicious local vegetables. We learned that “lo” means to stir or toss and “mein” means noodles in Cantonese. Lo mein is a dish where the cooked noodles are tossed in a sauce as opposed to chow mein, where the noodles are fried. The second and third grade chefs enjoyed enjoyed practicing their chopstick skills once the table was set!
