Girls, Boys, and Learning Styles

In chapter nine, Boaler delves into yet another contentious issue- one that is predominantly present at Amber Hill and yet another contributing factor to their low scores on GCSE’s. Boaler notes that while females in England now attain the same proportion of the top grades on the GCSE examinations as boys, important differences still occur among the top 5% of students in England, United States and other countries.

Until recently, I was ignorant to the idea that gender issues are still present in our classrooms. In fact, I was under the impression that the tables had turned and females were beginning to dominate the areas of Mathematics and Science. When I reflect back on my own high school experiences, it was females who dominated in the mathematics classroom. Because of my school`s small size, advanced math was offered through CDLI. All through grade 10, 11 and 12 I was the only female in my school to complete this course. At the district level, the majority of the class was comprised of females. After high school, I studied Mathematics at Sir Wilfred Grenfell College. Here, the mathematics classroom mimicked my high school math class- the majority of students were females.

At Amber Hill, it wasn’t because the boys had a better understanding of the material, they were simply better at playing the mathematical game and the fact that they had set different goals for themselves. For the boys, speed and attainment of correct answers was more important that the understanding of the material they were “learning”. It was all about rote memorization and reiteration of material for the teacher. In comparison, the girls were not into playing the math game- they had a desire and need to understand. They wanted to know “why” and “how”. It was very disheartening to discover that the reasons for females low performance on GCSE’s was largely attributed to the pedagogical practices employed in their classroom. Had the teachers taken the time to explain the mathematics, females at Amber Hill would have been much more successful.

Boaler introduces the idea of attribution theory and the notion that many females attribute their lack of success in mathematics to themselves. It was evident that the girls at Amber Hill did not blame their lack of understanding on themselves. Numerous times throughout the chapter, in interviews, questionnaires, etc., Amber Hill girls indicated their dissatisfaction with mathematics stemmed from the way in which it was taught, and that it had nothing to do with their own inadequacies. It is very unfortunate that although the girls expressed concern for the way and speed with which the math was taught, the teachers at Amber Hill did nothing to alleviate the problem.

Being a female, it was frustrating to read that the girls at Amber Hill had to make sacrifices to their understanding because the boys (and evidently the teachers) liked to quickly progress through lessons. I wonder how the accomplishments of the same set of girls would have changed had the pedagogical practices employed in the classroom changed? Would they had been successful had they been students at Phoenix Park where students had freedom to develop their own style of working, and who were openly encouraged to think for themselves to develop concepts and theories.