Serious question about education

KrisK_lvin · 2015-05-30T09:14:47+00:00

I'm a relatively new math teacher at an alternative high school …

I'm from Europe so I'm unclear what you mean by an 'alternative high school' - is it alternative in the Montessori / Ken Robinson / Sugata Mitra sense where children (all of them) are encouraged to pursue what interests them and that there is a focus on independent and autonomous learning? Or do you mean 'alternative' in the sense of special needs i.e. you're dealing with dyspraxic children and/or children with emotional difficulties etc.?

how has public education (in general) become more feminized? […] What I'm asking specifically, is what did education used to look like? How has it changed?

The tone of these questions sounds a little skeptical, as if you're implying that you haven't yet seen or noticed anything out of the ordinary in the school you work in. Perhaps where you are - an alternative school - that is the case.

Either way, while it's long I can recommend you listening to this podcast from just the other day, which features Jonathan Taylor, a former tutor at Texas A&M University who is just beginning a research project in this area. The podcast addresses the questions you ask in some depth. Mainly the discussion focusses on changes in school culture and organisation as opposed to the teaching of specific subjects.

A very big issue in schools and the treatment of boys to me is exemplified by the Just Like a Child initiative from Zero Tolerance. This document argues essentially that it is inevitable that boys will grow up to commit violence against women as men unless Feminist-inspired education reforms can divert them from that course. It states such things as:

Children learn from the world around them. Gender stereotypes perpetuate inequality and reinforce difference between men and women, rather than individuals being people first and equals […] At the extreme, gender inequality is linked to domestic abuse and other forms of gender-based violence which are internationally recognised as being overwhelmingly committed by men against women.

The document cites the following example of this policy in action, from The Scotsman:

Helen Donaldson, acting head teacher of Trinity Primary in Edinburgh, comments on the school’s work to promote gender equality:

‘...pupils have taken part in a range of activities, such as designing a gender-neutral toy and talking about stereotypes. One of the aims of this work is to try to break down gender barriers, so we also make sure that children are not separated into boy/girl groups for sports, lining up in the playground or for competitions. The response from children so far has been excellent and the message of respecting others and understanding differences is definitely getting through.’

Notice how boys and girls are not divided by gender for the sporting activity - I'm only speculating here, but this likely results in all manner of bother. Imagine a boy who loves football, who lives for football who spends hours every night kicking a ball against a lamppost and sleeps in a bedroom festooned with Arsenal FC posters and memorabilia. Sports at school should be the moment for him to shine, which would boost his self-esteem and so on.

But now imagine that he's playing in a mixed team and he goes in for a hard tackle to win the ball from a girl - the likely result is that he will be penalised for being 'too rough, too aggressive, too dominant, too … etc.' - Basically, for being a boy who loves football.

It astonishes me how local councils have allowed this kind of thing to become part of education policy. I can only imagine it is through a mixture of cravenness - opposing Feminists tends to create a shitstorm - and political advantage - doing what Feminists want can win you brownie points from the progressive media.

That is all about early years education of course, and I appreciate you are at high school where the culture will be different - but perhaps not that different.

Maybe you can take the time to tell us about your experiences?

onyonn · 2015-05-30T06:48:53+00:00

The typical example is that boys -- who are, in this argument, naturally more restless and boisterous -- are penalized for exhibiting boyish behavior, while girls, being more likely to 'sit still', 'listen attentively', etc, don't receive this kind of discouragement for their natural demeanor.

I think only some of this comes from a sexist view that girls are 'better'. For example, lobotomies became common not because it was better for the patient, but because it made patient management easier. Likewise, I think teachers (predominately female) probably find girls 'easier to manage', which reinforces this.

I'm no expert in education, but I think boys overall are naturally more interested in hands-on activities and real-life applications than girls. I think an environment that integrates this perspective might help keep things more balanced overall, and keep boys interested.

Unfortunately hands-on activities like this might (and this is pure speculation) alienate some girls to the material to some degree as well.

Look up the Bronx Aerospace high school for some insight into this side of things.

ImNotIntoPokemon · 2015-05-30T15:11:49+00:00

You've already gotten a lot of good comments, but I think one obvious one was missed: a great majority of teachers are women. Boys have fewer male role models. Schools are a dangerous environment for men who want to teach.

augustfell · 2015-05-30T06:39:03+00:00

Great question. I believe the /MR suggested reading, "The War Against Boys," by Christina Hoff Sommers, addresses this question.

Unfortunately it's not on Audible, so I haven't read it. But you've just inspired me to read the Kindle version some time in the near future.

Post again if you come up with any interesting classroom ideas!

mikesteane · 2015-05-30T10:52:23+00:00

Every teacher (and parent) should read John Taylor Gatto's "An Underground History of American Education" in which he argues that compulsory schooling was deliberately developed in order to impede learning and has been maintained to do exactly that since it was introduced during the industrial revolution. It is the only theory which fits the facts.

Connelly90 · 2015-05-30T11:25:00+00:00

I'm a teacher in Scotland, and the education system we have over here has just undergone a major upheaval.

The new system takes the "whole child" approach and seeks to develop the learner as a valuable member of society and a generally happy individual, instead of just getting them qualifications and into a job.

This can only be a good thing in my opinion, since it encourages educators to see learners as individuals rather than a collective whole, be that as a class or a year group etc.

The way I see things becoming "feminised" is through the actions of teachers themselves.

The number of times I've witnessed a female teacher bringing blatant anti-male bias into their classroom is staggering, and it's really harming the kid's education.

To these people; the assumption is, that if a boy is falling behind or struggling with the materials of a class, it's because he's male and "boys don't do well at school". Then the frustration which arises from lack of support turns into disruption which then is also blamed on the fact he is male, because "boys are

I can walk down the corridor every day and I'll hear a woman screaming "the boys in this class are [something negative]!" and that kind of labeling can stick with you for the rest of your life.

I guess the main thing that has changed is that this kind of bias is now acceptable, and the people who bring it to school with them are untouchable.

Marcruise · 2015-05-30T12:32:11+00:00

I've got a particular narrative on this based on my own experience. It's wildly speculative, so don't take it too seriously. Anyway, here goes:

I would say it goes hand-in-hand with a testing culture where teachers are judged on their students' results. We don't let children fail, and that is an extremely important part of learning. It's an invaluable meta-cognitive skill to learn from failure.

Boys, much more than girls, want to do things in their own way. They don't like being told when to work, and how to work (and there's much more of this focus on process rather than outcomes now). They want clear, objective guidelines as to what's expected of them, and to be left to their own devices to some extent in terms of how they go about it. And here it's invaluable to learn that, whilst they think they're shit-hot, they're actually not, and they do need to do some fucking work! But if they're being constantly chivvied along by a teacher who knows that they'll be blamed for their student's failure, they never get this learning experience.

Thus, you get a whole load of lazy boys bumping along the bottom, never really learning that you have to work if you want to get anywhere. They know that they don't have to bother, because someone else will do the bothering for them and it will be OK in the end.

Girls, by contrast, are much more likely to go along with the teacher's emphasis on process. They'll work more consistently across the year, but typically won't excel in anything because their motivation is external (living up to people's expectations of them).

Obviously, these are generalisations. There are girls who tend to rebel, and there are boys who will work solidly across a year. It's probably not a large gender difference, this difference in motivation style, but it's enough, I feel, to potentially explain why girls do better in a testing culture even though it's traditionally been thought that boys do better in examinations over coursework.

MasterZapple · 2015-05-30T10:59:38+00:00

I think this is a good overview about the main key areas by Jonathan Taylor at the Male Students in Peril Conference in KSU.

_pluto_ · 2015-05-30T12:33:22+00:00

Watch Human Resources

http://metanoia-films.org/human-resources/

Explains the history of schooling. It's not pretty.

thrway_1000 · 2015-05-30T18:21:10+00:00

Well as an older guy I can think of some ways things changed over my school years.

Punishments were a big thing. You didn't do things right you'd be bending over a desk to get a paddle across the back-side.

Competition was big, so grades were public. All the students knew who was doing good and who were doing bad. There were rewards for moving up and getting better grades. Plus, you also knew who to talk to for help if you were doing poorly.

Fun. When I was younger they were big on engaging and making the work more interesting and relevant to you. Later, it become rote and busywork. Curiosity and wanting to learn more was encouraged, while later it became do this, this and this, and the teachers really didn't want extraneous questions. It became work in the system as apposed to an exploration of knowledge.

Samurai007_ · 2015-05-30T06:50:47+00:00

A few big differences off the top of my head:

1) Recess: In elementary school, we used to get a 10 minute recess every hour, a long lunch time in which we'd play kickball or dodgeball after eating, and one of our 50 minute blocks was PE in which we'd run, do calisthenics, and then play an organized sport with picked teams. All this activity throughout the day gave boys (and girls) time to burn off restless energy so we'd be able to concentrate more during class.

2) Grades were based upon concrete things like doing the homework, attendance, and tests. How a teacher felt about you wasn't supposed to really matter. If you did the homework, showed up to class, and got the right answers on the tests (many of which were multiple choice and thus not very subjective), that determined your grade in the class. Apparently nowadays a teacher's subjective opinion matters as much or more than the work, and that's how female teachers are boosting girls grades and lowering boys. (I suppose there isn't as much of that in math class though). Bad behavior was a reason to call a parent-teacher conference, not lower the kid's grades usually.

Ransom_Stoddard · 2015-05-30T11:16:35+00:00

http://www.deliberatedumbingdown.com/MomsPDFs/DDDoA.sml.pdf

Title	Serious question about education
Author	UtahStateAgnostics
Upvotes	29
Comments	23
Date	May 30, 2015 6:26 AM UTC (11 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/37tffy/serious_question_about_education/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/serious-question-about-education.978950 https://theredarchive.com/post/978950

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