Gareth Southgate: we need to teach boys differently to girls to get the best out of them

[WarriorN]

Gareth Southgate: We need to teach boys differently to girls to get best out of them https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckgp5g34kzpo

interesting article …

Although I can see the appeal of reducing everything to sex differences, I think there are also great differences within the cohorts of boys and girls, and it's clear many boys do just fine in the current system. What we're really talking about is a cohort of boys who don't do so well, and then struggle to get jobs, as the article highlights.

Anecdotally, looking at my own children and their friends and peers, I'd say boys are more competitive than girls- for whatever reason. So fewer boys than girls are willing to plug away at things they're not great at or settle for being second best. Instead they disengage altogether and act up. Better to appear not to care, than to appear to care and not succeed.

PPs mentioned trades- again, anecdotally, I saw friends of DS decide to become electricians or plumbers, in some cases without realising that this would also involve learning, knuckling down, and not just instant success. So they dropped off the apprenticeships.

More single sex schools do seem to provide an answer, but don't the stats show that boys performance is even worse at single sex (state sector)? So wouldn't that worsen the issue?

The German system has always appealed to me, in as much as I understand it, with its different routes for vocational and academic success.

What does that mean? That men and women must be treated exactly the same regardless of any differences, or that we should expect the exact same outcomes for men and women regardless of any differences?

Equity is about recognizing the differences, the advantages and disadvantages of both sexes, and tailoring opportunities and support to achieve the best possible outcome for both.

Yes, which is what differentiation is. Recognising that we are not all the same and that there is no one size fits all. Even given the same or similar sets of conditions, 100 people will come out with 100 different variations and outcomes.

Assuming,or treating, boys and girls or men and women as if they exactly the same and will make the same types of choice, or have the same types of preference means that we get frustrated when differences in outcome remain.

Crikey, that's a bit sweeping. I can honestly say our plumber, xxxxx & daughter Ltd is not, and the slater who replaced our roof three years ago, was not either. In fact he was so competent and professional that my ds' back up plan, if he cocks up his a'levels, is to go and train as a slater with him.

Boys are generally less mature as teens but they need the same basics, parents who model calm resilience, thinking outside the box and good humour. Parental support can be just as good from a mum or a dad (I'm a single mum). The essential bit is to be open to all suggestions and look for something that suits the teens personalities & aptitude. I expect to be guiding my ds until he is 21 or 22 if he will let me. And that's not a problem.

This is a good point.

clearly many boys are able to succeed within the current system, so the sweeping suggestions of needing to roughhouse and exercise like labradors isn’t always the case.

where education is failing boys is those less academically able, or those with less support at home. These are the kids that then know they won’t succeed, so what’s the point, so they become disruptive, bored, start failing to attend etc.

girls in that bracket will stick it out, and if they don’t get good grades, women’s jobs are traditionally at the bottom of the pile so they can become cleaners, hairdressers, shop assistants, childcare etc. at least til they get married and can sah with babies 🙄.

it’s not seen as acceptable for men to step into “women’s” jobs if they don’t get the academic grades. So here we’re stuck. Society, and boys themselves, don’t think they should be doing the menial “women’s” jobs, but that’s all they’re qualified for. Then what? Yes there’s the traditional manual jobs, but as pp mentioned these now also require college, and learning.

so what do we do? Armed forces? Sometimes I don’t think that’s a bad option, for girls or boys. Learn a trade, learn to work in a big organisation, learn responsibility. Maybe the NHS/civil service/police should start recruiting like the military. Sign up for 5 years and become an accountant or a maintenance worker. I think it’s wrong that police officers need degrees now- some of the best ones I worked alongside I suspect are very dyslexic and simply couldn’t do the academic work for a degree.

Boys often (not always obviously they are all individuals) need a certain level of strictness/toughness to stop them misbehaving IME. Whereas girls are (again not all, individuals blah blah) more prone to people pleasing. So a bored girl is still likely to work hard while a bored boy slacks of. This leads to the girl doing better and having more opportunities.
In the (not so good) old days children were caned for misbehaving and there was less of a gender gap. It's good we don't do that anymore but to replace it I think boys might benefit more from more direct discipline and criticism. The irony is this is the exact opposite to what the MRAs would have- there is a general suggestion from them that telling boys of for being boys crushes their self esteem or something. In reality I think boys really suffer if misbehaviour isn't dealt with quickly and actually seem to prefer teachers that are strict so long as they are even handed.

I agree with this, but they also need to have places to blow off steam and their work needs to be appropriate.

Agree,.but boys and girls need outside space and exercise. Girls might not act out as badly as boys so maybe it's a less obvious need, but exercise and time spent in their body (IYSWIM) is important. Boys need that too but maybe it's more obviously a problem earlier on because they get antsy. But yeah, agree, schools need decent outside space for exercise. And kids need to be separated from screens sometimes so they actually go.oitsode.

Medication is literally the treatment for ADHD. It’s a medical condition.

Maybe not, but we’re still teaching girls and boys in exactly the same way.

However, I think it’s more that different children learn in different ways, regardless of sex. I support children who learn more effectively outdoors. I have had a lot of success with students who can’t cope with the classroom environment, of both sexes.

I teach send children; many have adhd. It’s only useful or appropriate for some children. The side effects can outweigh the benefits in some too. Others it can be absolutely life changing. But environmental factors can be too.

I think the conversation here has focussed on the way schools are set up and run and I feels that’s too simplistic.

it’s more around attitudes from staff to what they see in the eyfs. Not dismissing certain behaviour and tuning into early emotional regulation difficulties.

when boys are around 6-7 they start to notice how men / males act more. This is when role models matter. And role models that suit the child’s personality. Not all boys are into rough housing and competition and it’s incredibly important that that is also recognised. The ones that are finding school challenging need a certain way of being taught that includes firm boundaries alongside meeting their immediate needs.

These approaches scale up throughout school.

it is very possible to do this. I’ve been impressed with a local school who work closely with a local football team outreach to target boys who are struggling with emotional regulation in school.

obviously the exact same thing should happen for girls but again, tailored to needs. And we can’t ignore how society and testosterone have different impacts and influences for boys compared to girls.

Except boys out performed girls last year at GCSE

I found it a mixture of enraging and sensible.
We’ve known about underperforming boys for a long time - it’s not new. But it is annoying that boys have been prioritised in education for the whole of human history until very recently and now that girls finally have a look in (because of working harder) we are told that boys need to be treated differently.
It’s too much of a generalisation that boys need to be taught differently- there are large numbers of academic boys who thrive at school. There are large numbers who hate rough and tumble and are polite and well behaved. Many, many boys have no interest in football. I know lots of boys who would struggle hugely if expected to ‘rough and tumble’ at school and listen to male teachers ‘banter’ about football.
There are sex based differences but boys poor behaviour is far more to do with early socialisation, low expectations and absent fathers (the later of which which Southgate addressed well). The ‘boys will be boys’ attitude stinks and is just an excuse for lazy parenting imo.
The other problem is the idea that boys don’t respond as well to female teachers. In my long experience that can be true - but it always comes from attitudes that have been learnt at home and in early and deeply ingrained misogyny. We never hear it said that girls can’t learn from male teachers! Why on earth can boys not be expected to listen to women? Enraging!
I do agree that there is a lack of positive male role models - but I also think that when we promote these they need to be more ordinary, good men. The focus on sports men and celebrities as role models is part of the problem.
A big gap was that schools are expected to solve this - no mention of helping dads to do a better job or not walk out on their kids. They had some people volunteering as mentors instead.

This simply isn't true.

The gap closed a little last year but girls are still getting higher grades than boys overall.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2q189kv7yo

We really need to look at this as "how can we raise boys to be good men". As a society we are failing. It isn't about prioritising one sex over another, it is looking at the future of our society, our culture, our behaviour and what are positive influences and negative influences. It needs to be acknowledged and talked about.
Over 60 years ago, one of my mum's closest friends lost her husband in a terrible tragedy, leaving her alone with 2 little boys, aged 2 and 4. She always said how grateful she was that the male teachers, the men in her church, the scouts, all stepped up to provide positive, nurturing role models for her kids. They both turned out to be kind, successful, decent men.
Boys who don't have those decent role models in their lives will seek out/gravitate to other role models who may be completely dangerous.
One of the men on last nights documentary made the point that there are far too many dangerous men inveigling their way into the church, the scouts, sports and so on, that there is a high level of suspicion around all men.
We are only just waking up to the online threat and the lack of parenting and action around this.
Steve Biddulph wrote "Raising Boys" decades ago.
We know all this. There is nothing new here.
We need better safeguarding everywhere, more support for parents and much better early years provision.
Good for Gareth to keep talking about it. Maybe if high profile people keep talking about it the penny will eventually drop.

Yes, there have been studies - I've spent a lot of time looking at girls in STEM, particularly IT, because of spending most of my IT career as the only woman in the room. Outside of school, there's often a pattern that boys are left to play on computers, while girls are expected to help with housework. Not universal at all, but enough to be noticeable (can't give you sources right now.(

I suspect it's one of those things - there sre dome differences between girls and boys overall, but there are likely to be far more differences between any two individuals, and it's only at the extreme ends of the bellcurve that you really get major differences- most of us will lie somewhere in the big overlap.

How often do we hear society accept unacceptable or inappropriate behaviour brushed off as ‘boys will be boys’? I think this attitude infantilises boys to their detriment. When do you ever hear the same said about girls? Look at how female antisocial/ unacceptable/ inappropriate behaviour is covered in the news compared to male behaviour. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out females get much more judgement than their male counterparts. At dc very average secondary school the girls get reprimanded much more regularly than the boys for lesser rule infringements. Dd was constantly getting ticked off for an untucked shirt or tie not sitting in it the correct position. Ds has only ever once been told off once for an untucked shirt, even though he never tucks it in.
Ds gets fed up with the pissing around behaviour at school, and would much rather sit with the girls so he can concentrate and get on with his work. In the higher maths class, boys still out number girls, but the behaviour is much better. Personally I don’t think it’s anything to do with male vs female brain / physiology that determines educational outcomes, but a combination of societal expectation, SLT within schools, and that many kids (m & f) aren’t naturally academic and current schooling principles simply don’t work for them. I thought the evidence showed that girls to better in all girls schools and boys generally do better where there is a higher ratio of girls? Or maybe that research is now outdated.
I would hazard a guess that outcomes for boys and girls at grammar school isn’t much different, but the discrepancy between male and female achievement is much wider in non selective state schools?