Educating Boys

This week I read two great articles on educating boys (I'll provide the summary quotes for the other one next week). 

As an aside, about ten years ago I was helping teach an 8th grade English class. As part of that class every student had to write a research paper on a topic of interest to him/her. A boy I was working with wanted to research medieval torture techniques and tools. 

"Cool!" I said; his--along with my--interest was piqued. 

Unfortunately, when his actual teacher read the draft of his paper, she contacted the school counselor because she thought the boy's fascination with blood, guts, gore, and instruments of torture was indicative of a "sicked, warped" mind.

When I read his paper, which was well researched and well written, I said, "Cool!" 

(Of course, that teacher also didn't appreciate the movies of Adam Sandler or how much fun it is to read the Guinness Book of World Records; but then again, neither I nor the boy got the poetry of Sylvia Plath.)

Have a good weekend!

Joe

This week's article is entitled "What Schools Can do to Help Boys Succeed"

Being a boy can be a serious liability in today’s classroom. As a group, boys are noisy, rowdy, and hard to manage. Many are messy, disorganized and won’t sit still.

Young male rambunctiousness leads teachers to underestimate their intellectual and academic abilities.

Michael Thompson says, "Girl behavior is the gold standard in schools and boys are treated like defective girls."

Compared with girls, boys earn lower grades, win fewer honors, and are less likely to go to college.

Some say, Too bad for the boys—the ability to regulate one’s impulses, sit still, and pay attention are building blocks of success in school and in life. 

They further say, The classroom is no more rigged against boys than workplaces are rigged against lazy or unfocused workers.

But remember, unproductive workers are adults—not 5 and 6 year old children who depend on us to learn how to become adults. If boys are restive and unfocused, we must look for ways to help them do better.

Bring Back Recess: Since 1970s, schoolchildren have lost close to 50% of their unstructured outdoor playingtime. 40% of first graders today get less than 20 minutes of recess daily. By contrast, children in Japan get 10 minutes of play every hour.

Prolonged confinement in classrooms diminishes children’s concentration and leads to squirming and restlessness. And boys appear more to be more seriously affected by recess deprivation than girls.

Parents should be aware that classroom organization may be responsible for their sons’ inattention and fidgeting and that breaks may be a better remedy than Ritalin.

Turn Boys into Readers: "Not for me" is a common male reaction to reading, and it shows in test scores. In all age groups and across all ethnic lines boys score lower than girls on national reading tests.

Girls prefer fiction, magazines, blogs and poetry; boys like comics, nonfiction, and newspapers.

Every teacher should have an up-to-date knowledge of reading materials that will appeal to disengaged boys.

Every boy should have weekly support from a male reading role model.

www.guysread.com is a great resource for boys.

Work with the Young Male Imagination: Writing teachers need to consider their assignments from the point of view of boys.

Too many writing teachers take the ‘confessional poet’ as the classroom ideal: personal narratives full of emotion and self-disclosure are prized; stories describing video games, skateboard competitions, or a monster devouring a city are not.

Teachers have to come to terms with the young male spirit. If we want boys to flourish, we are going to have to encourage their distinctive reading, writing, drawing and even joke-telling propensities. Along with personal reflection journals, permit fantasy, horror, spoofs, humor, war, conflict, and, yes, even lurid sword fights.

If boys are constantly subject to disapproval for their interests and enthusiasms, they are likely to become disengaged and lag further behind. Our schools need to work with, not against, the kinetic imaginations of boys tomove them toward becoming educated young men.