Boys-only schools? Good or bad idea?

[Esta3GG]

I am so disappointed with the school experiences my son has had so far that I am beginning to wonder if he might be more comfortable in a more obviously male environment - particularly having access to male teachers.

I am sick to death of him being in totally female-dominated environments where any typical boyish behaviour is criticised and repressed.

Has anyone experienced something similar and found that single sex education was a good way to go?

I agree that teaching is not held in the esteem here as it is in other cultures. But it pays pretty well and in a world where there is no such thing as a job for life anymore it is still a safe bet - with nice long holidays. And there is the potential for career progression and advancement to a lucrative headship. Teaching is a good job for those who want to do it.
Men are happier to go into secondary teaching - but not primary.
People find it all slightly suspicious nowadays when men work with young children. It is bollocks of course but tabloid madness over the past decades has created a culture of total neurosis when it comes to men working with young children.

This article from the Guardian points out that attracting men to work in primary schools works almost virally - once there is one bloke in a school others will follow. The female dominance thing is an issue.

A lot of this boils down to simply not understanding boys' physicality in my opionion. It seems to me that the point when perfectly normal physical play stops and bullying starts is a mystery to a vast number of (predominantly female) teachers.

I'm going to go out on a limb here re gender differences, which is not something I normally subscribe to...

I have observed also, in many areas of life, that women have a lower threshold of risk, or a more sensitive perception of risk, than men. This is well recognised in business for example as a contributing factor to the lower number of female entrepreneurs.

So when the two kids come brandishing the big sticks at each other, a man is more likely (without even really analysing it as such) to think "well, the sticks aren't that heavy; they're not sharp; in relation to the size and strength of the kids they're not actually going to get seriously hurt with them - even if one does get a bit of a wallop accidentally. A woman is more likely to think "OMG boys and sticks - ahhh! put them down before somebody gets killed!"

This may just be conditioning, or it may be innate, I don't know. It may be that men, having been boys and having male bodies, just naturally understand things like how much weight a boy can handle without losing control; whether his coordination is up to keeping control of an object, etc. etc. Women don't have such a natural sense of this in relation to boys, and maybe judge it according to how it was for them as girls, or just err on the wide of caution to make sure, or something.

You see this all the time when fathers play physically with their sons, and the mothers panic about them being too rough.

Thing is though confidence, that there's lots of research that indicates women do better in fields like banking because they are more risk averse and that the whole banking crisis wouldn't have happened if there had been more women in that field.

I do recognize some of what you say but I think it's a question of balance as with all things.

I think boys AND girls should be encouraged to understand when risk, adventure and physicality is a good thing and boys AND girls must also understand when it isn't.

A lot of kids are hindered because of gender stereotyping - girls are assumed to be passive, quiet, still and risk averse and boys are assumed to be boisterous etc etc. As a result girls often lack the confidence and risk taking qualities that would benefit them and boys often lack the ability to communicate and conform that would benefit them.

I've seen an enormous number of parents justify their boys' bad behaviour on the grounds that boys will be boys but they're absolutely on the case as soon as their girls step out of line.

And while I think BOYS AND GIRLS would benefit from more risk and physical play there comes a point where they also need to sit still and shut up.

I think we do our boys a huge disservice by assuming and encouraging 'masculine' behaviour and kudos to be linked to sport and physicality and not academic performance and communication and the reverse for girls.

I think better awareness for parents and teachers in gender stereotyping and trainign in how to overcome it would be hugely benefiicial for all of us.

In the real world those people who are completely limited to one set of stereotypically 'masculine' or 'feminine' qualities are going to very limited in terms of employment and socially.

It is odd that single sex schools in some ways are ironically more likely to break the stereotypes in that you don't get the assumption that girls won't do science and maths in a girls school and they're not squeezed out by boys' attention seeking whereas in a boys' school boys are allowed to be boys without necessarily being considered naughty but it shouldn't have to be this way.

In the last 50 years in some ways gender stereotyping has become more ingrained rather than less. You just have to go in to a toy shop and look at what are deemed 'boys toys' and 'girls toys' to see this.

Schools should be setting out to subvert such stereotypes and bring out the best in individuals.

I like my sons' boys only prep school because I think they do understand how boys work, think and play and yes there are male teachers.

The school fields have trees and bushes around them in which the boys can play and the boys learn to play proper competitive sport.

The other side is that there are a good number of male teachers across a range of subjects and so subjects aren't seen as particularly masculine or feminine (the head of maths is a woman, the heads of music and art are men, for example). Consequently, there is huge kudos for being in the school choir or orchestra just as there is for being the football or rugby team.

I read a recent report - not the research itself - that said it is no longer true that girls do better in single sex environments. They just do better...

But our DS, while not being especially sporty, did not thrive in a mixed environment prep. He didn't do badly but there were some teachers who seemed to fall into the trap OP has outlined. And his headmaster, form teacher and we were all unanimous that a single sex school would suit him better - as it has. So like happygardening, I think it's a question of the individual child. He has friends outside school, some of whom are boys and some not; some he made at prep school and has continued to see, some he has made through other means. While I agree that in previous generations the segregation meant problems later on for some, you can easily avoid that trap.

We have no girls in our immediate family cousins etc are boys but I do not see this causing my DS2 (boys only boarding school) any particular problems. He is relaxed and friendly around everyone regardless of gender/age/class. Admittedly he was at a mixed boarding prep but he has been brought up to be courteous to all and rather than talking solely about himself to encourage others to talk about their interests etc. and to respect the idea that we all have different opinions/views. So I agree with spendthrift you can easily avoid problems arising from segregation.

DS1 is a very "physical child" - hope I'm not hijacking the thread but this is a little bit to do with the different ways of learning - getting him to sit still to learn his spellings is a disaster. Letting him walk around the kitchen reciting them works like a charm. [hsmile]

All good points fivecandles and I agree about the stereotyping, completely.

The only thing that worries me about all encouraging physical ways of learning, whatever that might mean, is that to an extent it is consolidating the stereotype rather than encouraging boys (because it's rarely assumed that girls need this sort of learning) to develop different skills.

So, it's all very well encouraging kids to learn their timestables whilst cutting down trees or whatever but ultimately they will have to conform to the exams system as it is which involves sitting still and writing for hours at a time.

My concern is that an awful lot of boys think that the world will cater to their particular needs rather than understanding that it is more likely that they will have to fit in with the way the world works.

I saw some research albeit a while ago which said that boys are more likely to overestimate their ability and the reverse is true of girls and this does tally with my experience as a teacher.

There are very few jobs left which require physical strength and activity and they're likely to be poorly paid.

Likewise those jobs which seem to be ideally suited for those qualities we stereotypically associate with girls - caring, passivity, gentleness - are also likely to be poorly paid.

Boys and girls both need a range of skills - they need to be confident, good communicators, determined, flexible but they also need to be polite and learn how to conform to different environments.

As a mother of two boys and I'm sure all mothers of boys will agree that boys have an enormous amount of energy which they need to channel somewhere. Most state schools primary and secondary and sadly even many independent schools provide insufficient physical activity. DS1 at his excellent comp does 1 session (double lesson) a week. Ok after school clubs are available but they are exactly that after school. DS2 at his independent boys boarding school does a physical activity 6 days a week and all boys have to do a minimum of 4 a week often in the middle of the day. I really do believe having channelled this enormous level of energy somewhere DS2 then finds it easier to sit down and concentrate in lessons.

You're sure all mothers of boys will agree... that their boys also conform an old stereotype?

Is it a stereotype? I would say that in the vast majority of cases its a fact!

"boys have an enormous amount of energy which they need to channel somewhere"

Maybe a "fact" if you say "some boys" and also acknowledge "some girls".

Maybe a "fact" if you remember that there is a large cultural component to gender differences, so it being "more boys than girls" is not something that is necessarily going to be true under another set of circumstances.

Not anything like a "fact" if by fact you mean "thing that is universally true and absolutely determined".

I have a boy and a girl.

Both have enormous amounts of energy.

Both have this 'channelled' through physical activity at playtime, in PE lessons and in very energetic after school activities (DD dances, DS does football, cross country etc). Both are also members of the scouting movement, which encourages controlled risk taking and physical challenges for both sexes.

They go to a mixed state school, which is good for both of them. DD can be more energetic, less 'ladylike', and much less 'girly gossipy' than might be expected in a girls' school, DS has role models who balance physical energy with focused hard, neat work and who model things like empathy and emotional complexity for him (he finds these things VERY hard). I have actively rejected an all boys option for DS at secondary because I feel it would upset the balance he has arrived at.

Good posts fivecandles, particularly this:
"In the last 50 years in some ways gender stereotyping has become more ingrained rather than less. You just have to go in to a toy shop and look at what are deemed 'boys toys' and 'girls toys' to see this.

Schools should be setting out to subvert such stereotypes and bring out the best in individuals."

happygardening- I disagree- not all boys have enormous amounts of energy!

I am going to get an axe for DS1 then, so he can learn his tables! Not something I've tried yet and we have a tree in the garden. If he knows the tables well he will race through his exams and not have to sit still for so long..... More seriously I have been hoping that the sitting still bit will come with some maturity. I know he has to pass exams but at the moment a mix a physical and quiet is a good learning approach for that child. DS2 is less fussed about moving around and happier to sit quietly.

In direct contrast to teacher, we have sent the DSs to a single sex school precisely so that they can have role models who have focussed hard neat work and who also happen to be boys. At the previous school we were getting to the stage where only girls did that - DS1's class in particular had some alpha females, as alpha as only a 7 year old girl can be, who between them had managed to deter anyone else from being good at schoolwork because they could never be as good as the alpha gang.

As a mother of 2 boys and 2 girls I would say that energy doesn't necessarily go with boys, it is totally down to individuals. I totally agree with fivecandles about gender sterotyping and mums of boys justifying bad behaviour with the boys' excuse - I see it all the time. I will not tolerate bad behaviour from my boys and have been very hard on them and funnily enough neither of them is boisterous/can't sit still/aggressive.

I do think it is a lot to do with how we subconsciously bring them up.

Having said all that, I am not one who advocates there are no differences betwen boys and girls, I do think there are but not in the dramatic sense I see described by some parents.

You only have to go out on a weekend and see (which always winds me up, frankly), in the same family girls are all dressed up to the nines with ribbons, pretty dresses, matching shoes and the boys looking hideously scruffy with unmatching tracksuits and worn out trainers. A pet hate of mine!

I think that much of teaching has indeed become very feminised and much "boy" behaviour defined as bad and "girl" as good (being astonishgly dull and passive, largely).

Accessing a 50%+ male staff room was one of the key drivers of moving my son for year 4. I would have been happy for it to have been to a mixed school, but it happens to be a boys' one.

My boy isn't particularly hearty and is v comformist, so slightly different issues, but I want him to see that music, art, story writing etc are things that men do and lead at, rather than dismissing them as "girl" just because the girls seem to develop in these areas earlier.

And speaking up for the "naughty boys", I do wonder whether my second one, who I am happy to admit is a bit of a little bggr woudn't stand out quite so much at a boys' school (think iceberg, with the tide moved up a bit).

For instance when I was called in to school to discuss a discipline breakdown with consisted of him repeatedly pulling his wooly hat down over this face in the queue for break, because it made him into a zombie, aparently. This appeared to be the greatest infraction of discipline, health and safety encountered all term. Sigh.

Teacherwith2kids

I am not quite sure what you are saying about what is expected in a girls school?

Are you saying that in a girls school there would be a greater expectation for a girl to be ladylike or a girly gossip?

Because my experience is the exact opposite.

What I was saying was that because DD spends a large proportion of her time at school with boys, she can indulge the side of her nature that is not remotely ladylike and enjoy very 'boyish' conversation (she's highly knowledgeable about football, Star Wars, bushcraft and the particular refinements of specific lego models).

She also has a much more feminine side which she indulges when dancing ... only the bruised shins give her away as she prances about the stage in a ballet tutu...

I accept that in some all girls' schools there may be less 'girly gossip' among the girls than there may be among the girls at a mixed school (though having experienced both myself I would say that that is precisely the reverse of my experience). However, in all girls schools there is no haven from girly gossip as complete as DD finds amongst the boys in her mixed school!

There is no haven from the girly gossip 'tis true

I do have to say though that my experience has been the opposite.

The girls find these things for themselves (if they don't also have brothers) and there is no means by which they have to 'move away' from the 'girls' to join the 'boys' playing football.

The girls move very smoothly between activities because there is no demarkation between games mostly boys are playing or mostly girls are playing. They are not having to chose an activity which is one or the other.
And playing rugby at school there are girls who are the best in school at rugby, the fastest runners, the stringiest kickers - those 'tough' roles are not predominately occupied by boys.
So girls (like my dd) have a sense of themselves as being strong and fast and tough.

On holiday there were a group of boys teasing her group of younger boys and girls. It ended up with them getting too cocky and she challenged three boys to a swimming race. She was not quite 9, they were around 11. Of course she beat them easily (or I wouldn't bother to tell the story ) but her friends were all 'but they're boys'.

My point I guess is that she can be both simultaneously at her school. She can do ballet and be the best as science and collect unicorn rubbers and meccano and there is no choice to be made about doing those things with girls or boys. They are just activities.

"My point I guess is that she can be both simultaneously at her school. She can do ballet and be the best as science and collect unicorn rubbers and meccano and there is no choice to be made about doing those things with girls or boys. They are just activities."

That is exactly the same as for DD in her mixed school - so my point is that those things are absolutely achievable in a mixed school. The children are just children. She plays with whoever enjoys doing a certain activity.

My experience of an all girls school - having come from a family with brothers - was very, very different. Lots of worry about being dressed 'right', lots of seeing the opposite sex as 'different', LOTS of bitchiness and a huge focus on appearance.

Boys schools all the way with teachers who actually like boys and who are not 21 and fresh out of teacher training!