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?

Five candles,

The problem is that 80%+ of the school day is geared towards girl-learning so boys and girls do have to sit still and shut up for a greater time than is necessary or healthy. At the end of the day, no one was designed to sit on their arse for 6 hours a day, especially not boys!

Colleger,

My recollection is that you send your children to private school?

There is an old-fashioned high emphasis put on 'sitting in rows at desks and working in silence' in many private primaries, certainly the ones I have visited. Apparently parents expect it, they want to see the kind of 'traditional' education they had themselves, nothing newfangled like working in groups or talking to one another or learning outdoors or role play etc etc.

I can assure you that in the very large majority of state primaries, no children of either sex spend 6 hours a day sitting still at desks. We do people maths, lots of talk partner work, collaborative group work, a lot of work outside, role play to get ideas for literacy, work with artefacts and costumes and direct experience for history, practical hands-on science and design technology investigation etc etc.

Perhaps it is your picture of what a 'normal mixed school' looks like that makes you inclined to see such schools as 'energetic child' (of either gender) unfriendly.

I agree with teacherwith2kids, I don't recognise the education Colleger describes; although it does require some sitting down writing/reading (can't see how you would do this otherwise), there is a lot of time spent in group work, etc...

You say in the ones you have visited. Does that mean haven't taught in one or send your kids to one as this does not describe any private school I have come across. The ones my boys go to - one mixed, one single sex - have 2-3 hours of timetables sport every afternoon and of course they work in groups - what an odd comment!

But everything you have described is all very flowery and watery and does not compliment most boys learning. There should be a mix. I worry that teachers are so convinced by their training that the current thinking must be right, it seems very narrow-minded to me and it affects the progress of boys and gifted children. Why are there now more girls entering uni than boys or entering better jobs? It is not a case of even-ing out but of overtaking. The most academically successful boys go to single sex schools or tend to be of a certain ethnicity who also send to single sex schools due to cultural beliefs.

Academic results in mixed schools are generally always lower than single sex. But exam results aside, if the teaching profession isn't prepared to look at themselves and admit that boys results are lowering year on year and feminized schooling and attitudes to boys should be changed, then shame on them!

Apologies. I was trying to think of reasons why anyone would claim that children sit on their bottoms for 6 hours a day in school - the only one I could think of would be that your experience was of the type of private school I described. Otherwise where could such a bizarre claim have come from?

As a parent to an extremely able boy (who attends a mixed school and is excelling there) as well as a teacher in whose class boys succeed as well as girls, I am somewhat offended to have it suggested that I am delivering 'feminised schooling' and that my 'attitude to boys should be changed'.

The singe sex schools round here, although nationally famous, do less well than the mixed comprehensive up the road (equally the mixed grammar in the county does significantly better than the single sex ones - in terms of results for both boys and girls) so it is slightly misleading to suggest that boys always do better in boys' schools.

Hmm - and anyone who has had a class re-enacting the Blitz from Londoners' point of view as a whole class role play as a prompt for writing might not describe it as 'flowery and watery'.... equally science practicals that focus on finding the best material for bullet-proof jackets....

My husband is a teacher. He worked in a boys' only school then went to do a placement in a mixed primary. He was so upset by the treatment of boys by female teachers that he wrote an article about it for a national publication. He observed 'normal' boyish behaviour being labelled 'troublesome' - and at the very worst, boys being given labels/considered to have 'problems' when they just weren't being allowed to let off steam. Or the female teachers just didn't get them. Example: at assembly the head mistress asked, 'give me an example of something blue'. A girl said 'flower' and was praised. A boy said 'Chelsea' and was told off. Why??

He also saw boys refusing to do 'girly' activities like singing because it was uncool in front of the girls. Whereas at the boys school he was at, the choir was stuffed full... of boys.

We have never even considered mixed schooling for our sons, partly for these reasons.

Sorry, should put all my points in one post.

What is this 'current thinking' that is 'very narrow minded and affects the progress of boys and gifted children'?? Could you describe it, and where you see it, because I am genuinely baffled from my own experience?

Coffee,

How odd - especially the Chelsea comment, I'd regard that as a great response!

I am trying really hard not to be offended by the idea that female teachers don't get boys. Is the implication that male teachers don't get girls? Or is it just unhlepful stereotyping? Some teachers don't 'get' a small minority of their class each year - as part of a jobshare with someone of a very different character but the same gender we see this all the time, as in there are children who one or the other of us find we have to work harder with than others (and the particular children are ALWAYS different between us - that is personality, not gender). All teachers should - i am sure that there are a minority who don't - work hard and professionally to ovdercome that.

To suggest that it is as grossly stereotypical as 'female teachers - even those of us who are the parents of boys - don't get boys, you have to have a Y chromosome to teach boys properly' is absurd.