Gender Differences In Education

Question 1

What are the differences in achievement between boys and girls on starting education?

Answer 1

• 2013 teacher assessment of pupils at the end of yr 1 showed girls ahead of boys in all 7 areas of learning assessed.
• A DfE study (2013) found that in state primary schools, boys were 2 1/2 times more likely than girls to have statements of special educational needs.

Question 2

What are the differences in achievement between boys and girls at key stages 1 to 3?

Answer 2

• Girls do consistently better than boys.
• Especially so in English, where the gender gap steadily widens with age.
• In science and maths the gap is much narrower, but girls still do better.

Question 3

What are the differences in achievement between boys and girls at GCSE?

Answer 3

The gender gap states at around 10 percentage points (2013).

Question 4

What are the gender differences in achievement between boys and girls at AS and A-level?

Answer 4

• Girls are more likely to sit, pass and get higher grades than boys, though the gap is much narrower than at GCSE.
• Ex: In 2013, 46.8% of girls gained A or B grades at A level, but only 42.2% of boys.
• Even in ‘boys’ subjects (e.g maths, physics), girls were more likely to get A-C.

Question 5

What are the differences in achievement between boys and girls on vocational courses?

Answer 5

A larger proportion of girls achieve distinctions in every subject, including those such as engineering and construction where girls are a tiny minority of the students.

Question 6

How has the external factor of the impact of feminism affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 6

McRobbie’s study of girls’ magazines (1994):

• 1970s: They emphasised the importance of getting married and not being ‘left on the shelf’.
• Nowadays: They contain images of assertive, independent women.
• The changes encouraged by feminism has raised women’s expectations and self esteem.
• May also affect girls’ self-image and ambitions with regards to the family and careers.
• This may explain improvements in their educational achievement.

Question 7

How has the external factor of changes in the family affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 7

• Increased number of female-headed lone-parent families may mean more women need to take on a breadwinner role.
• This creates a new adult role model for girls: the financially independent woman.
• To achieve this independence, women need well paid jobs and therefore good qualifications.

Question 8

How has the external factor of changes in women’s employment affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 8

Important changes:

• Equal Pay Act (1970) and Sex Discrimination Act (1975).
• Since 1975, pay gap has halved from 30% to 15%.
• Proportion of women in employment has risen from 53% in 1971 to 67% in 2013.
• Breaking through ‘glass ceiling’: invisible barrier keeping women out of high-level professional + managerial jobs.
• These changes have encouraged girls to see their future in terms of paid work rather than as housewives.
• Greater career opportunities + better pay for women, + the role models successful career women offer, provide an incentive for girls to gain qualifications.

Question 9

How has the external factor of girls’ changing ambitions affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 9

Sharpe interviewed a group of young girls in the 70s and 90s.

1970s: Women had low aspirations and believed that they should just find themselves a husband.
1990s: Women were career driven and had aspirations.

Question 10

How has the internal factor of equal opportunities policies affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 10

Policies such as GIST (Girls Into Science and Technology) and WISE (Women Into Science and Engineering) encourage girls and women to get into non-traditional areas.

Question 11

How has the internal factor of positive role models in school affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 11

Female teachers are more likely to be a particularly important role model as far as girls’ educational achievement is concerned since, to become a teacher, the individual must undertake a lengthy and successful education herself.

Question 12

How has the internal factor of GCSE and coursework affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 12

Mitsos and Browne: Introduction of GCSEs was when the gap in gender achievement began to increase. They found girls were more successful and better suited to the GCSE and coursework system because they:

• Spend more time on their work
• Care about presentation of their work
• Are better at meeting deadlines
• Bring the right materials and equipment to lessons

Question 13

How has the internal factor of teacher attention affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 13

Francis found while boys get more attention from their teachers, they’re disciplined more harshly and felt picked on by teachers, who tended to have lower expectations of them.

Question 14

How has the internal factor of challenging stereotypes in the curriculum affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 14

Weiner found that gender stereotypes have been challenged in learning materials. This has been done by removing sexist images from textbooks.

Question 15

How has the internal factor of selection and league tables affected gender differences in achievement?

Answer 15

Slee argues that boys are less attractive to schools because they’re more likely to suffer from behavioural issues and are four times more likely to be excluded.

Question 16

How do liberal feminists see gender differences in educational achievement?

Answer 16

They believe that further progress will be made by continuing development of equal opportunity policies, encouraging positive role models and overcoming sexist attitudes and stereotypes.

Question 17

State four ways in which radical feminists say school remains patriarchal.

Answer 17

• Sexual harassment of girls continues at school.
• Education still limits girls’ subject choices and career options.
• Male teachers are more likely to become heads of secondary schools.
• Women are under-represented in many areas of the curriculum. For example, their contribution to history is largely ignored. Weiner describes the secondary school history curriculum as a ‘woman-free zone.’

Question 18

Define ‘symbolic capital’ and explain how it affects the educational achievement of working-class girls.

Answer 18

• Symbolic capital refers to the status, recognition and sense of worth that we are able to obtain from others.
• This affects the achievement of w/c girls as they gain symbolic capital from their peers, which created conflict with the school.
• This also prevented them from gaining educational capital (qualifications) and economic capital (m/c careers).

Question 19

Briefly explain how hyper-heterosexual feminine identities negatively affects working-class girls education.

Answer 19

• Many girls have invested time, effort and money into constructing ‘desirable’ + ‘glamorous’ hyper-heterosexual identities.
• Girls’ performance of this identity brought status from their female group + avoided them being ridiculed or called a tramp from wearing the wrong brand.
• However, this brought them into conflict with the school.
• Ex: punishment for having the wrong appearance.

Question 20

Briefly explain how boyfriends negatively affect working-class girls education.

Answer 20

While having a boyfriend brought symbolic capital, it got in the way of schoolwork and lowered girls’ aspirations. This included losing interest in going to university, in studying ‘masculine’ subjects or in gaining a professional career.

Question 21

Briefly explain how being ‘loud’ negatively affects working-class girls education.

Answer 21

• Some w/c girls adopted ‘loud’ feminine identities that often led to them being outspoken, independent and assertive, for example questioning a teachers authority.
• This failed to conform to the school’s stereotype of the ideal female identity as passive and submissive.
• Brought conflict with the teachers who interpreted their behaviour as aggressive not assertive.

Question 22

What is the working-class girls’ dilemma and how did some of them cope with it?

Answer 22

Either:

• Gaining symbolic capital from their peers by conforming to a hyper-heterosexual feminine identity.
• Or gaining educational capital by rejecting the w/c identity and conforming to the schools m/c notions of the respectable, ideal female pupil.

Question 23

Explain why working-class girls who are successful are more likely to choose a university nearer home. How might this affect their future careers?

Answer 23

• Because of wanting to help their families.
• They had a fear of debt and the cost of living on a university campus was too high.
• Archer: a preference for a local university is a key feature of the w/c habitus.

Question 24

Summarise the possible effects of boys and literacy on boys’ achievement.

Answer 24

DCSF: Gender gap is mainly the result of boys’ poorer literacy and language skills.

• A reason for this might be that parents spend less time reading to their sons.
• Another may be that it’s mothers who do most of the reading to young children, making it a ‘feminine’ activity.
• In addition, boys’ leisure pursuits, such as football, do little to develop their language and communication skills.

Question 25

Summarise the possible effects of globalisation and the decline of traditional men’s jobs on boys’ achievement.

Answer 25

• Significant decline in heavy industries such as mining and shipbuilding since 1980s.
• Partly the result of the globalisation of the economy, which has led to much of its manufacturing industry being relocated to developing countries to take advantage of cheap labour.
• Mitsos and Browne: claim this has led to an ‘identity crisis for men’. Many boys now believe that they have little prospect of getting a ‘proper’ job.

Question 26

Summarise the possible effects of the feminisation of education on boys’ achievement.

Answer 26

Sewell:

• Schools don’t nurture masculine traits (e.g competitiveness and leadership).
• Instead: celebrate ‘feminine’ qualities, such as methodical working and attentiveness in class.
• Argues: ‘We have challenged the 1950s patriarchy and rightly said that it’s not a mans world. But we have thrown the boy out with the bath water.’

Question 27

Summarise the possible affects of shortage of male primary school teachers on boys’ achievement.

Answer 27

• Lack of role models both at home and school is said to be a cause of boys underachievement.
• Ex: large numbers of boys are being brought up in the 1.5 million female-headed lone-parent families (UK).
• 14% of primary school teachers are male and according to Yougov, 39% of 8-11 y/o boys have no lessons whatsoever with a male teacher.
• Most boys said the presence of a male teacher made them behave better.
• 42% said it made them work harder.

Question 28

Explain the difference between a disciplinarian and a liberal discourse.

Answer 28

• Disciplinarian discourse: The teachers authority is made explicit and visible, for example, through shouting, an ‘exasperated’ tone of voice or sarcasm.
• Liberal discourse: The teacher’s authority is implicit and invisible. This child-centred discourse involves ‘pseudo-adultification’.

Question 29

Why does Read conclude that more male teachers are not needed to improve boys’ achievement?

Answer 29

The fact that female teachers were just as likely as males to use a ‘masculine’ discourse to control pupils’ behaviour disproves the claim that only male teachers can provide the stricter classroom culture in which boys are said to thrive.

Question 30

Why might working-class boys form ‘laddish’ subcultures?

Answer 30

Epstein examined the way masculinity is constructed within school. She found that w/c boys are more likely to be harassed, labelled as sissies and subjected to homophobic verbal abuse if they appeared to be ‘swots’.

Question 31

In what ways may the moral panic about boys have lead to the neglect of girls’ needs?

Answer 31

By narrowing gender policy down solely to the issue of achievement gaps, it ignores other problems faced by girls in school. These include:

• Sexual harassment
• Bullying
• Self-esteem and identity issues
• Stereotyped subject choices.

Question 32

How much greater is the class gap in achievement than the gender gap at GCSE?

Answer 32

Three times wider.

Question 33

Summarise the link between achievement and gender, class and ethnicity.

Answer 33

• Girls + boys of the same social class tend to achieve fairly similar results. E.g GCSE: gender gap within any social class is rarely greater than 12 percentage points. Conversely, girls from the highest social class can be 44 points ahead of girls from the lowest class.

The extent to which gender influences achievement itself varies depending on a pupil’s class and ethnic group. E.g the gender gap among black Caribbean pupils is greater than among other ethnic groups:

• Fuller: Many black girls are successful at school bc they define their femininity in terms of educational achievement and independence.
• Sewell: Some black boys fail at school because they define their masculinity in opposition to education, which they see as effeminate.

Question 34

Summarise the gender differences in subject choice for national curriculum options.

Answer 34

Where there’s a choice in the national curriculum, girls and boys choose differently. For example, although design and tech is a compulsory subject, girls tend to choose the food tech option whereas boys choose graphics and resistant materials.

Question 35

Summarise the gender differences in subject choice for AS and A levels.

Answer 35

• Gendered subject choices become more noticeable after 16, when students have more choice.
• Ex: there are big gender differences in entries for A level subjects, with boys opting for maths and physics and girls choosing subjects such as sociology, English and languages.

Question 36

Summarise the gender differences in subject choice for vocational courses.

Answer 36

Vocational courses prepare students for particular careers. Gender segregation is a very noticeable feature of vocational training. For example, only 1 in 100 childcare apprentices is a boy.

Question 37

Summarise the following explanation of gender differences in subject choice:
- Gender role socialisation

Answer 37

Early socialisation:
- Norman: from an early age girls and boys are dressed differently, given different toys + encouraged to take part in different activities.

School:
- Byrne: teachers encourage boys to be tough + show initiative. Whereas girls are expected to be clean, quiet + tidy.

Result:

• Boys are more likely to read books about hobbies while girls are more likely to read books about people.
• This helps explain why boys prefer scientific subjects and girls prefer English.

Question 38

Summarise the following explanation of gender differences in subject choice:
- Gendered subject images.

Answer 38

The gender image of a subject affects who will want to choose it.

Colley:

• Computer studies is seen as a masculine subject because it involves working with machines (part of the male gender domain).
• The way it’s taught is off-putting to females.
• Tasks tend to be abstract + teaching styles are formal, with few opportunities for group work, which girls prefer.
• However, in same sex schools, girls were more likely to take maths and science A levels and boys were more likely to take English and languages.
• This is because there’s no pressure to take a certain subject.

Question 39

Summarise the following explanation of gender differences in subject choice:
- Gender identity and peer pressure.

Answer 39

Dewar: male students would call girls ‘lesbian’ or ‘butch’ if they appeared interested in sport. However, an absence of peer pressure in same sex schools may explain why girls are more likely to choose traditional boys’ subjects.

Question 40

Summarise the following explanation of gender differences in subject choice:
- Gendered career opportunities.

Answer 40

An important reason for differences in subject choice is the fact that employment is highly gendered. Jobs tend to be sex-typed as men’s or women’s.

Question 41

Suggest two reasons why working-class girls may choose vocational courses in subjects such as hair and beauty.

Answer 41

Fuller: w/c girls were more likely to go into jobs such as childcare or hair and beauty because they felt this was their realistic expectation for ‘people like us’.

Question 42

Summarise the following ways in which pupils’ experiences in school reinforce gender and sexual identities:

• Double standards
• Verbal abuse

Answer 42

Double standards:

• Lees: identifies a double standard of sexual morality in which boys boast about their own sexual exploits, but call a girl a ‘slag’ if she doesn’t have a steady boyfriend or if she dresses/speaks in a certain way.
• Feminists: see these double standards as an example of patriarchal ideology that justifies male power and devalues women.

Verbal abuse:

• What Connell calls ‘a rich vocabulary of abuse’ is one of the ways in which dominant gender and sexual identities are reinforced.
• Ex: boys use name-calling to put girls down if they behave/dress in certain ways.
• Lees: boys called girls ‘slags’ if they appeared to be sexually available and ‘drags’ if they didn’t.

Question 43

Summarise the following ways in which pupils’ experiences in school reinforce gender and sexual identities:

• The male gaze
• Male peer groups

Answer 43

The male gaze:

• Mac an Ghaill: male gaze is a form of surveillance through which dominant heterosexual masculinity is reinforced and femininity devalued.
• Way of boys proving masculinity + often combined with telling and retelling stories of sexual conquests.
• Not doing so risks being labelled as gay.

Male peer groups:
- Male peer groups also use verbal abuse to reinforce their definitions of masculinity. For example, as studies by Epstein and Willis show, boys in anti-school subcultures often accuse boys who want to do well at school of being gay or effeminate

Question 44

Summarise the following ways in which pupils’ experiences in school reinforce gender and sexual identities:

• Female peer groups: policing identity
• Teachers and discipline

Answer 44

Female peer groups (policing identity):

• Ringrose (2013) small-scale study of 13-14 y/o w/c girls’ peer groups in a South Wales school.
• Popularity was crucial to their identity.
• Transition from girls’ friendship culture to heterosexual dating culture lead to tension between: an idealised feminine identity of showing loyalty to the female peer group, being non-competitive + getting along with everybody in the friendship culture. Or a sexualised identity that involved competing for boys in the dating culture.

Teachers and discipline:

• Research shows that teachers also play a part in reinforcing dominant definitions of gender identity.
• Haywood and Mac an Ghaill: male teachers told girls off for ‘behaving like girls’ and teased them when they gained lower marks in tests than girls. Teachers tended to ignore boys’ verbal abused of girls and even blamed girls for attracting it.

Question 45

What is ‘pseudo-adultification’?

Answer 45

Where the teacher speaks to the child as an adult and expects them to be kind, sensible and respectful of the teacher.