ASCD Poll: Teaching to Student Strengths

In the ASCD Poll, we asked you to select the best way to narrow the learning gap between girls and boys, with options such as "Give boys more personalized attention." and "Offer single-gender learning environments."

But is there a gap at all?

"Do We Really Have a 'Boy Crisis'?" describes a report released by Education Sector that concludes that students would be better served if educators focused their attention on larger problems, such as gaps between races and classes, or even the widening gap between younger and older students.

The report, The Evidence Suggests Otherwise: The Truth About Boys and Girls, does call for increased attention on the number of boys labeled as learning disabled or having ADHD, which has "exploded" over the last 30 years, with boys now two-thirds of students in special education. This call to action may be long overdue, given that the National Institute of Mental Health estimates that only between three and five percent of children have ADHD. From those numbers, it appears that there is either pandemic learning disability among boys in the United States, or there is pervasive misdiagnosis.

If the former is the case, has there been an investigation into the cause of the learning disability explosion among boys or into why girls don't seem affected? If the latter is the case, perhaps the cause lies in the medical community, which issues the diagnoses, not in schools.

Or, perhaps, as the report states, boys are doing fine and there's no need for worry. However, if you don't believe that, you will be interested in the four articles in EL this month that focus on teaching practices that account for learning styles usually associated with boys. All four address a common hurdle in boy world: literacy. You can preview two of these articles and ASCD members can log in to read all of them online.

What do you think? Is there a gap between boys and girls? If so, what difficulties have you confronted in your attempts to close the gap? What successes have you enjoyed? Share your experiences with other educators.

And, if you haven't taken the poll yet, please vote now.

Comments

[Dave Kommer]

The characterization of a gender gap is not at all helpful. However, the fact that we are discussing this at all is an indication that something may be amiss. In my opinion our schools and classrooms are gender hostile--that is they are toxic to both boys and girls.

First, we must all believe that boys and girls are different. You do not have to spend much time in a classroom to see it. We have solid scientific evidence now that boys and girls learn differently. They have specific physiological bran differences and their hormone chemistry adds to the difference. In addition, there are different socialization processes for each gender.

We need to realize that they are different and respond to the differences appropriately in our relating to them, our methodologies for teaching them and in our expactations. Those expectations need to be equally high, but separately reached.

However, we live in a bigender world and it is not helpful to have gender separate schools. We do need to learn how best to teach each gender in turn. The end result when used purposefully will be classrooms that support each gender, while informing each about the other.

[Linda Saleski]

It was not so long ago, or perhaps it was long ago, that I sat in math classes of predominantly male students. At that time people claimed there was a gender gap too (if I remember correctly). Was there a gender gap? I don't know. Is there a gender gap now, perhaps, but we all need to recall in this turbulent climate of education that teaching is all about process and all about relationship, it is all about the responsibility of teachers to provide ongoing, authentic assessment for each of their students, it is about creating a dialogue between teacher and student about what best exhibits learning. It is being passionately curious about how to reach each of our students. So I think that "gaps" are reduced or may even be eliminated when teachers purpose to establish a collaborative learning partnership where teachers and students value not only what they (students) learn, but how they learn.

[Dixie Allen]

After 26+ years in education, I fail to believe there is a gender gap. I believe as I was taught in Psychology 101 that boys and girls developed differently and that they excell in different areas. As some have suggested, boys due to their natural abilities and aptitude excell at football and girls typically do not -- however, I don't believe these differences are due to a gender gap -- but to individual abilities and desires to excell. I agree that we should teach and work with idividual students -- addressing their strengths and aiding in their areas of weakness. We must know that we want to foster individuals that will bring depth and different views to our culture and world - not clones who have the same skills, aptitudes and abilities.

[Ruth Rossi]

When I hear of a difference in learning styles between boys and girls, I am tempted to agree, given 18 years teaching behaviorally disabled students, and seeing the 15 to 1 discrepancy between the gender population in my program. However, observing heterogenous general education classrooms many times daily, and watching the interactions with and responses to their teachers and the assignments, I haven't seen so much of a difference between the sexes as I have seen a difference between the classroom climate. When the boys are together iin the back of the room, or the kids of color are in a corner by themselves, there is an obvious difference in the level of engagement and the interaction with the materials and the staff member. Girls are ignored if they are quiet, but so are boys. Both are ridiculed when they ask questions and appear to care about the work.
And then I think of my own three children, two girls and a boy, adults now, who struggled with the same poor classroom procedures and management strategies, but managed to succeed in spite of that. In high school, my son noted several times that the "boys in the back" would "get away with murder", but whenever he turned in his seat to make a comment to a classmate, he was singled out immediately. In groups, he was always grouped as the "smart one;" always given the bulk of the written work to produce for the group, and, because he was artistic and computer-savvy, he'd do the visual presentation, the editing, and often the oral presentation as well. Neeedless to say, he was a desired partner, but his experience mirrored his older sisters', and it made me see that the "gender gap" was more of a classroom management issue than something stemming from his gender. I explained to him at the time that the teachers were just human and felt they had a working knowledge of their students' personalities. He's been seen as a "good kid" and when he talked in class, it signaled to the teacher that the whole class was now getting off track, not just the rowdy group in the back. So he'd get nailed every time. He didn't feel so picked on, but he still resented it.
What I"ve learned is that the boys in the back feel that resentment too, even though the teachers may feel they are ignoring a lot before they yell, and those boys, gone to extreme, end up in my EBD class. Then I have to teach them, often for the first time, that their behaviors, ignored on the surface by these teachers, had been reported and are a big part of the reason they are now in a self-contained class to learn the academic and social skills they've shown they lack.
My job is to teach them until I can integrate them back into a general ed setting where they can be successful. That's when the classroom and teacher I choose for them becomes the critical factor in their success. If allowed to gravitate to the back of the room again, the same thing happens, of course. So the class has to be a totally different experience, supported academically and through home contacts.
You can get as deeply into the physiological, chemical, and social differences as the research goes, but without the right climate in the class, the study is merely academic on your part and student success is doomed.
I would like to see a study of identified behaviorally disabled girls (as opposed to the limitless research on my boys), that explores the impossible obstacles these girls must surmount to be successful with their peers and their learning in a general ed population. The social differences between the sexes during adolescence make it much more difficult for them to "fit in" with their female peers. It is hard for the "typical" female teacher to relate to an emotionally disabled female, since for the teacher, the rules of society have been made clear and, being female herself, she's learneed them well; it is even harder for a male teacher to relate to relate to that EBD female student, when he knows she isn't fitting in but can only empathize from a male point of view. A study of this kind could inform this debate between what is being experienced (nurture) and what is part of who they are (nature). But again, unless the climate changes, it will be academic and won't solve the problems students and teachers face daily.

[Older Azard]

Hi,
Can I have an excerpt of your August 31, 2006 report? I would really appreciate it. I am currently writing my Comp Assessment and I need to cite one of your satements in my paper.

Thanks!

Older Azard
Ph.D. Student at Seton Hall University

[Christy Sadler]

Older, the original report is available from Education Sector (www.educationsector.org). You would need to get in touch with them for a copy. Thanks for your interest!