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| Where are the men? | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Dec 1 2009, 08:27 PM (302 Views) | |
| Jolly | Dec 1 2009, 08:27 PM Post #1 |
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Geaux Tigers!
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http://townhall.com/Common/PrintPage.aspx?g=47add7da-69c0-49bd-878c-1d18afc45fff&t=c |
| The main obstacle to a stable and just world order is the United States.- George Soros | |
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| dolmansaxlil | Dec 2 2009, 04:50 AM Post #2 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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Interesting article, Jolly. I agree with almost everything it said about how boys are treated at the elementary level. One of our current Board initiatives is to improve boys academic performance. The problem? We're focusing on it by doing more of the same. The problem is that the recommendations rarely tell us to do what might actually work: recognize that many boys do not learn well by sitting quietly in isolation at their desks. When boys are engaged in learning, they are loud. They make connections to their own experiences, which may sound like off-task talk when it's really crucial to their understanding. That's a harder problem to fix, because it requires some teachers to abandon their idea of what a classroom should look like. When I was in the regular classroom, I had many boys who didn't fare as well as their female classmates in reading and writing. In reading, I started giving everyone more choice in what they read, and then had groups of students work together with others reading the same material. Boys will, it turns out, will successfully read far more complicated texts than their ability would indicate if they really WANT to read that text. So I ended up with two groups of boys, two groups of girls, and a mixed group. The mixed group was the largest with 8 students, and they usually ended up splitting themselves in half - boys and girls. The boys groups were louder. They had far more lively discussions. And I let them do that. People were horrified. But my boys made huge gains in reading. They could have their discussions without worry about what the girls would think, so they talked about the topics in more depth. The girls also made gains, because their groups could work in "girl" ways (quieter, get through the discussion so they could do the "real work", etc) without being disturbed by more talkative male group members. The girls gains weren't as large as the boys, because they largely were just working the same way we'd always asked them to with the bonus of that no-boys grouping. The boys gains were HUGE, because they were allowed to work in ways that they needed to learn - which didn't look much like a normal classroom. In my new job, I'm facing a strange twist on this problem. Boys are far more unlikely to be nominated for classroom enrichment/gifted programming. 75% of boys who qualify for my program weren't noticed by their teachers. On the other hand, the main testing tool we use to determine if students meet criteria heavily favours boys. So I'm fighting bias for girls on one hand, and a bias for boys on the other. Edited by dolmansaxlil, Dec 2 2009, 04:51 AM.
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"Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst." ~ Henri Cartier-Bresson My Flickr Photostream | |
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| Jolly | Dec 2 2009, 07:10 AM Post #3 |
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Geaux Tigers!
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Be careful, the article was writen by a lady who most would consider very right-wing. The liberals will take your membership card away from you! Seriously, Education needs to step back and take a look at what works for who. Maybe some classes should be entirely segregated, maybe we need to introduce more play time back into the school day, maybe we need to ban homework in elementary grades and curtail it in higher grades. Maybe we need to reevaluate curriculums, and teach fewer subjects in more depth. At least in the U.S., we need to figure out how to deliver a better public education for the dollars spent. Lots of things to work on... |
| The main obstacle to a stable and just world order is the United States.- George Soros | |
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| dolmansaxlil | Dec 2 2009, 09:12 AM Post #4 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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She may be right-wing, but she's still right. I know why it would be considered a right-wing idea - we're not supposed to think of men as a group needing anything beyond the way things have always been. But in education, our boys are being lost. Girls have made oodles of gains in math and science, but boys have always lagged in reading and writing and we're not doing the right things to fix it. And, believe it or not, I fully believe in segregated classes for grades 7-9. They did a pilot project near Toronto a few years ago and the success for both sexes was extraordinary. It's a lot easier to get a hormone-crazed teen to take educational risks and have meaningful discussion when the opposite sex isn't in the room. And fewer subjects in more depth - absolutely! We spend so much time making sure they know a little of everything that we don't drill down so they get depth (and, therefore, deep meaningful understanding) in anything. I'm a big fan of "orbital studies". That is, you take a deep, complex theme (War, for example) and have the kids look at that one theme through all the disciplines (Science, Literature, Arts, etc). Teaching a big idea in a connected way like that encourages deeper exploration. I'm not completely anti-homework - but I am anti-meaningless homework. And much of it IS meaningless.
Here, too. I think that, on the whole, I'd take my system over yours. But that doesn't mean there isn't lots of work to be done. |
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"Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst." ~ Henri Cartier-Bresson My Flickr Photostream | |
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| Kincaid | Dec 2 2009, 10:14 AM Post #5 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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Dol, I can't remember if I've ever disagreed with your take on education - and I don't here either. I hope your ideas gain traction and win out. On a side note, I would love to see how medication for ADHD and ADD would be viewed in different classroom styles. That is, if you segregated boys and had a louder, more active class room, would it be less likely that a teacher (or the parents) of those boys would feel the need to medicate? |
| Kincaid - disgusted Republican Partisan since 2006. | |
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| Kincaid | Dec 2 2009, 10:23 AM Post #6 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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One thing I would disagree with in the article is the claim that elementary schools are "dominated by feminists". Knowing my wife and the staff at her school, that claim is simply untrue and unsupportable. Also, it isn't clear in my mind, and given Schlafly's history I doubt it, but I would hope that she (and no one else) would ever advocate requiring a 50-50 male/female ratio in college. Yes, let's reform the way boys and girls are taught in elementary education up thru high school, but then let's let the colleges take the best and the brightest. |
| Kincaid - disgusted Republican Partisan since 2006. | |
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| Jolly | Dec 2 2009, 11:15 AM Post #7 |
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Geaux Tigers!
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Might be a bit less of that, if boys were getting exercise throughout the day. |
| The main obstacle to a stable and just world order is the United States.- George Soros | |
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| John D'Oh | Dec 2 2009, 11:20 AM Post #8 |
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MAMIL
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Blaming everything on feminism is a bit of a mantra for some on the right. She makes some very good points regarding the differences between boys and girls, but this whole 'the feminists are to blame' is a load of bollocks, IMO. |
| What do you mean "we", have you got a mouse in your pocket? | |
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| Kincaid | Dec 2 2009, 11:22 AM Post #9 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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Well, they did promise some kind of sexual revolution, in which I was sadly on the outside looking in. |
| Kincaid - disgusted Republican Partisan since 2006. | |
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