Gender and Teaching

Frances A. Maher

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2001
• ISBN:
  9781135677541
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Pedagogía
• Subtopic: Educación general

Gender and Teaching provides a vivid, focused, and interactive overview of important gender issues in education today. This is aocomphshed through conversations among experts, practitioners, and readers that are informed by representative case studies and by a range of theoretical approaches to the issues. Gender and Teaching is the third volume in Reflective Teaching and the Social Conditions of Schooling: A Series for Prospective and Practicing Teachers, edited by Daniel P. Liston and Kenneth M. Zeichner. It follows the same format as previous volumes in the senes. Part I includes four cases dealing with related aspects of gendered experiences In schools (non-sexist elementary school curricula; gender and race implications of special education assignment practices; homophobia in high schools and classrooms; and teaching as a woman's profession), followed by reactions from preservice and practicing teachers, administrators, and professors. Part II is an elaboration of four "public argurnents"—conservative, liberal, women-centered, and radical-multicultural-—pertaining to the issues raised in Part I. These arguments exemplify dusters of orientations, organized around general values rather than hard and fast principles. Part lii presents the authors' own interpretations of the issues raised throughout the book, and provides activities and topics for reflection and an annotated bibliography of additional resources.

I
CASE STUDIES AND REACTIONS

INTRODUCTION TO CASE 1

The first of our four cases concerns many of the issues facing teachers who wish to create coeducational classroom environments that are equally safe, hospitable, and challenging for both boys and girls. It illustrates the relations between gender socialization, which goes way beyond the classroom, and classroom dynamics, which both reflect and influence gender socialization patterns. Children learn gender role identity and expectations at early ages. Not only do school-age children become aware of gender stereotypes and engage in gendered activities, but they also start to adopt personality characteristics that show the ways they have identified with their understandings of “masculinity” and “femininity.” Children use gender differences as a way to organize their social worlds. Because children teach each other to behave according to cultural expectations, same-sex peers also exert a profound influence on how gender is learned. Gender role formation also intersects with race, class, and culture issues, as different attitudes about sex role expectations often have cultural roots and cultural connections.

A related issue is the role of the teacher in combating or reinforcing gendered behaviors in the classroom. What aspects of the teacher’s own background and his or her construction of gender come into play? What should teachers do, and why? Although it is safe to assume that all teachers wish to treat their pupils fairly and equitably, the research on curricula and classroom pedagogies, from kindergarten all the way through graduate school, has shown overwhelmingly that girls at every age and from every background do not receive an education equal to that of their male peers. Teachers pay more attention, both positive and negative, to boys. Textbooks, storybooks, and most reading materials feature almost exclusively male activities and heroes. Girls typically get better grades than boys in elementary school, and boys are more likely to be diagnosed as learning disabled and end up in special education settings (see Case 2). However, boys often do better in the higher grades, are more frequently found in advanced-placement classes in high schools, particularly in math and science, and do much better on the Scholastic Aptitude Test.

Furthermore, practices that are central to many school cultures reinforce gender-biased educational experiences. Much is made of gender differences among schoolchildren, from lining up pupils by sex for lunch and recess, to dividing up playground space and activities by gender, to assigning classroom tasks in terms of gender stereotypes. Thus, boys lift and carry heavy boxes, and girls do secretarial errands for the teacher. Finally, girls and boys themselves, through the influences of family, peer, and media cultures, often treat each other with avoidance and hostility. Boys in particular often refuse contact with girls and actively resist assignments and activities they associate with femininity. Studies have shown that when teachers try to call on girls equally, or include more curriculum materials about girls and women, boys will rebel (Sadker & Sadker, 1994; Spender, 1983).

Given these circumstances, teachers who want to enhance gender equity have a difficult set of challenges, including the selection of curriculum materials, the handling of class discussions and the difficulties of intervening in classroom peer group life. This case explores these issues through the specific dilemmas of a second-grade teacher who wants to increase the gender awareness of her class as well as help her pupils get along better with each other.

CASE 1: “SEXISM AND THE CLASSROOM”

Nina Rodriguez steps back from the two large colorful posters of Dolores Huerta, the United Farm Workers Union organizer, and Sally Ride, the nation’s first female astronaut, that she has just hung over her desk. She stands for a moment smiling to herself, proud of the way that she has organized and decorated her second-grade classroom. She is especially pleased that the children also seem to like the room. Being late September it is still too early to say for sure, but so far it seems as if this is going to be a very good school year.

Minutes later the second graders come streaming into the room. Recess has ended, and it is time for the boys and girls to take their seats and prepare their desks for reading instruction. Nina asks the children to get into their reading groups.

“Ahhh, Miss Rodriguez, do we have to?”

“Yes, you do.”

“But it’s not fair!” whines Roberto. “Why do you have to put me and Jose in a group with girls? Why can’t we be in an all-boy group, with our friends? I hate girls!”

“Roberto, please,” Nina says quickly as she helps the students arrange their desks into small groups of four.

“Yeah, we hate those stupid girls,” sneers Jimmy from the corner. “Yeah,” echo several more boys, chiming in. “Shut up, you guys,” complains 8-year-old Saundra in the middle of a group of girls. “Stupid, yucky boys,” whines one of the girls in a taunting, singsong tone.

“Okay, that’s enough,” cries Nina, with increasing exasperation. “Settle down, now. Open your books and let’s get started. Everyone will stay in their assigned groups until I say you can change.”

As the children begin to get settled, Nina gives an inward sigh. She knows that she should be used to the back-and-forth baiting and banter of eight-year-olds by now, but she isn’t, and this gender-related silliness is especially annoying. Nina had begun her career as a preschool teacher 7 years ago in a Hispanic community on the other side of the state. She worked in a newly established, experimental, and progressive daycare center and preschool that offered teacher education vouchers to the preschool teachers as a way to offset the relatively low wages they received. Nina smartly took advantage of the vouchers and, although it took a long time, combining full-time employment and college courses, she managed to complete an associate’s and later a baccalaureate degree in early childhood education. Last year she was hired by the East Newtowne school district as a second-grade teacher, with a class of energetic, primarily recent immigrant youngsters of Hispanic descent.

As a teacher, Nina faced a host of new issues in the move from preschool to elementary education. Along with the obvious differences of age and size, there was little similarity in the ways that the East Newtowne teachers helped guide the children’s social and cognitive development, particularly in terms of gender equity. At the preschool there were many opportunities provided for the young children to engage in cross-gender play. The boys played house, and the girls built with blocks, with no problems mixing together in common activities.

Since leaving the preschool, Nina had tried to keep up with the latest research on girls’ development. She had been especially interested in the research that found that girls are losing their self-confidence at earlier and earlier ages. In schools, boys become more demanding of teacher attention, while girls become less likely to speak up in class and tend to withdraw. Although she knows that in elementary school girls tend to do better academically, Nina worries about the long-term effects of these early messages on their self-confidence and their academic achievement.

It sure can be difficult to raise competent girls, especially in her cultural community, where traditional gender roles are often quite entrenched. But with the shifts in the economy, it has become increasingly difficult to be a stay-at-home wife and mother. Nina understands these difficulties. When her own father had died, she worked part-time to help the family. She wants more Hispanic girls to be better prepared to become wives, mothers, and paid employees outside of the home. Nina also knows that if girls don’t take traditionally “male” courses, such as upper-level math and science, many well-paid careers will be closed to them in the future.

Nina has found that it certainly is hard to counteract the messages about gender roles that the children receive from home, the gendered toys with which they play, and the World Wrestling Federation and Barbie lunch boxes that they bring to school. Even the majority of teachers in East Newtowne Elementary prefer to line the children up by gender, boys on the left, girls on the right. Although Nina is convinced of the importance of gender equity, achieving it in this school with kids at this age feels like swimming upstream.

She turns back to the class. Finally, the children’s desks are rearranged, and they settle into their assigned cooperative groups. “Who can tell me what happened at the end of the story that we read yesterday?” Nina begins, to no one in particular. Rose raises her hand and begins to speak. “At the end the hero, ummm, she, I mean he climbs to the top and . . .” Few of the children can hear Rose end her sentence, because a group of the boys starts to giggle out loud. “Miss Rodriguez, Miss Rodriguez, she made a mistake. She said ‘she’ instead of ‘he’!”

“Yeah,” laughs Jimmy. “She!! Like a girl can climb the mountain and save the city!”

“Be quiet, Jimmy. You’re so immature,” calls Marlene as she glances at her friend Rose, looking embarrassed and sitting in silence. “My mom says a girl can do anything a boy can do.”

“Miss Rodriguez,” calls Bonita over the now-rising laughter of the boys. “Why can’t we have a story with a girl hero? Why are all the heros always boys?”

“Why don’t we write a story? A story with a girl heroine. We can all work on the storyline together,” answers Nina, pleased with herself for thinking so fast on her feet. “Great,” call out the girls, but when Nina glances around the room, the boys’ faces register shock and disbelief. “Oh, nooooo! No way!” calls Pedro. “Boring,” calls Roberto. “Come on, Miss Rodriguez. If the girls are in the story, it wouldn’t be exciting at all. They’d be playing house or doing dress up. Girls wouldn’t like slay a dragon with a sword.”

“Yeah,” agrees Juan.

“They wouldn’t wanna slay anything,” adds Carl.

“My daddy says girls should stay at home and take care of the house,” adds Jaime. “This is stupid. We don’t wanna write this story, Miss Rodriguez. It wouldn’t be any fun. Girls don’t do anything interesting.”

Nina feels at a complete loss. She hears herself saying, “That’s nonsense, Jaime!” and busies herself settling the children down again. For the moment, she thinks, I won’t deal with this one, and she turns their attention to the story they are to read next (one, she notes ruefully, with a male protagonist again). But that evening, with a little time to think, she determines to challenge these pupils. Not only do the girls need role models of selfconfident, proactive, and successful females, but also the boys need to learn about competent females, maybe even more than the girls do. After all, it is only September, and she hasn’t really had a chance to work with these kids very long. She could change the curriculum. She could challenge the classroom dynamics. She could begin to instill in those boys “a little respect!”, and she could begin to work on the girls’ self-confidence. But how? Sitting after dinner with the usual stack of student journals in front of her, Nina decides she needs some advice, and that evening, knowing she’ll never do it if she waits too long, she decides to call a few colleagues.

Dr. Johnson, her best and most caring early-childhood professor, laughs when he hears her voice. “Nina Rodriguez, how nice to hear from you!” Yes, he says, he knows this problem really well, and “it’s worse in some communities than others, where the mothers are home and the families are pretty traditional.” He goes on, “Why don’t you make sure you have some books with girl heroines and then give the students a choice? They don’t all have to read the same book—or write the same story, for that matter.” He suggests that she then have the students read their stories aloud to each other and make sure that the boys listen when it is the girls’ turn. “Boys are always like that, and you just have to be firm with them.”

Her next-door neighbor at East Newtowne, a fellow second-grade teacher, is equally sympathetic. “Don’t you know it!” Maria Kelly exclaims. “These kids can be really mean to each other, and those boys are so sexist; mine are too. Whatever you do with your storybooks, let me know. We can put up a united front on the playground, maybe, make sure that those bullies leave the girls alone. It’s really important to protect the girls, don’t you think?” Maria reminds Nina of that workshop they attended a year ago, at which the speaker had recommended a book on caring and education by Nel Noddings as well as Women’s Ways of Knowing, a book saying that girls learn differently, that they are less competitive, more attuned to relationships with each other than the boys, and like to work with each other in cooperative groups. “You have those learning groups and that’s working really well, isn’t it? Keep emphasizing that they have to work together. And maybe some days the girls should have their own times together, too.”

Yes, Nina thinks, I do want to protect and nurture those girls. Agreeing with both these colleagues, she still feels that something is missing. “I don’t just want to protect these girls, I want to empower them. I don’t just want to keep the boys away from the girls, I want the boys to learn something, too!” Her final conversation is with her mentor and friend at her old alternative preschool. “How did we get the boys and girls to work together so well?” she asks Dolores Trujillo. “Was it just that they were young?” Dolores laughs and says, “Absolutely not! Remember how we taught them? Remember the rules and how we wrote the curriculum?” And Nina does remember. They had never lined up the children by sex, or made “boy” and “girl” classroom tasks or areas. There had been encouragement of gender-neutral activities, but there had also been explicit lessons about gender awareness. When Nina finishes with Dolores she still feels confused, but not quite so unsure. Maybe she could try some combination of her advisors’ ideas. Her past students had been preschoolers; would second graders take to such a direct approach? Is Maria right that they have to take this issue into the playground, too? Should she think about the whole school, or is her classroom the best place to start? What balance of choice, persuasion, and requirements should she choose, so as to avoid alienating the boys too much? And what about the parents? Would they understand and support her? She determines to design her new combination of approaches that very weekend.

READER REACTIONS TO NINA’S SITUATION

REACTIONS TO “SEXISM AND THE CLASSROOM”

Many respondents focused on Nina’s actions in the classroom environment. Most expressed the need for teachers to be able to effectively manage sexist attitudes and behaviors. Nearly everyone talked about the need to have explicit conversations with young students about gender roles but noted that these conversations must take place in an atmosphere of trust to avoid backlash. However, as shown later, some respondents also looked beyond Nina’s specific actions to ask questions about underlying attitudes as well as about the specific cultural context she and her pupils occupied. Finally, a few also looked outside of her individual classroom and asked questions about the broader community and society.

Nina’s Actions

Many people saw the problem as one of inadequate classroom management. This classroom environment has not been conducive to bringing about respect and learning, because the children had not been taught to treat one another in mutually respectful ways. Nina was faulted for failing to address specific sexist remarks, for ignoring disrespect early on, and for her failure to set up and articulate behavioral expectations (with consequences for noncompliance) for the class. As one respondent put it, “She must insist on respect, and call kids on gender-related insults.” But suggestions for how to begin ranged from starting “where kids are at,” as in single-sex groupings; to helping kids teach one another to be assertive; to a zero-tolerance policy. Respondents also noted the bickering between boys and girls and the devaluing of women and girls. At the heart of it all, they found, were disrespect, lack of trust, and the kids’ inability to see the world from the perspective of the other gender. Gender polarities cast males and females as opposites and placed them into two mutually exclusive categories. Some respondents were fearful that children, especially boys, would learn to place a higher value and more prestige on boys and men, seeing one gender as better than the other.

My first reaction was that of frustration. I have experienced some of the same behavior from the children, and it is hard to change. My students are primarily of Mexican descent. They come from homes with traditional gender roles. I believe that Nina should recognize where the kids are coming from and get them to verbalize it. I would start from discussing similarities and differences and move into acceptance.

—Bilingual Teacher

Nina should have dealt with the issue immediately instead of essentially ignoring it. When she put the students into assigned groups she should have explained the reasons for the groupings. When she said, “That’s nonsense, Jaime,” she does nothing to address the specifics of what was said; yet when the situation is happening in the classroom that is the most teachable moment. Dr. Johnson makes the sexist suggestion that she has to make sure that the boys listen. (And not vice versa.) Just cracking down on the boys without talking about the deeper issues will instigate more resentment and problems. Maria Kelly’s advice to “protect the girls” ignores the deeper issues of students developi...

Table of contents

• COVER PAGE
• TITLE PAGE
• COPYRIGHT PAGE
• SERIES PREFACE
• PREFACE
• I CASE STUDIES AND REACTIONS
• II PUBLIC ARGUMENTS
• III FINAL ARGUMENTS, AND SOME SUGGESTIONS AND RESOURCES FOR FURTHER REFLECTION
• BIBLIOGRAPHY