the author notes, "In the last two decades, the education system has become obsessed with a quantifiable and narrowly defined kind of academic success, these experts say, and that myopic view is harming boys." i don't disagree that this view of assessment and education is myopic, but i wonder what the underlying implication is for how we understand the intersections of gender and academics. namely b/c the following two sentences of that same paragraph read:
Boys are biologically, developmentally and psychologically different from girls—and teachers need to learn how to bring out the best in every one. "Very well-meaning people," says Dr. Bruce Perry, a Houston neurologist who advocates for troubled kids, "have created a biologically disrespectful model of education."caught up in this logic is the implicit notion that this "model of education," while "disrespectful" for some, is beneficial for others. doesn't this perspective let the designers of a measurement-obsessed philosophy of education off the hook?
there's something else that bugs me about all of these studies of gender and education (in which I claim to participate, as well, by the way), and that is all that gets overlooked when we ask questions that further dichotomize the experiences of boys and girls, of males and females, as they navigate institutions. could it be that more kids are engaging in exciting, fun, and interesting interactions in which education transpires, but which occurs outside of school; and these interactions of education are becoming more and more dissimilar to how education is being (con)/(de)fined in schools?
yes. and we have plenty of evidence to confirm this suspicion.
still, as the article describes, boys who are "antsy" and restless are internalizing their teachers' reactions to them and in turn calling themselves "stupid." that can't be good.
ok, more on this and the recent barage of "boy" articles and other media in a following post...
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