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Boys score as well as or better than girls on most standardized tests, yet they are far less likely to get good grades, take advanced classes or attend college....
The sometimes controversial Christina Hoff Sommers wrote about this problem of "Boys at the back" in our public schools, illustrated in this chart posted by Mark Perry.
A reason is differences in 'noncognitive skills'
Boys score as well as or better than girls on most standardized tests, yet they are far less likely to get good grades, take advanced classes or attend college. Why? A study coming out this week in The Journal of Human Resources gives an important answer. Teachers of classes as early as kindergarten factor good behavior into grades — and girls, as a rule, comport themselves far better than boys.
The study’s authors analyzed data from more than 5,800 students from kindergarten through fifth grade and found that boys across all racial groups and in all major subject areas received lower grades than their test scores would have predicted.
The scholars attributed this “misalignment” to differences in “noncognitive skills”: attentiveness, persistence, eagerness to learn, the ability to sit still and work independently. As most parents know, girls tend to develop these skills earlier and more naturally than boys.
That last sentence, which I've highlighted, may hold a key to the gender gap in school performance. Boys lag girls in developing both noncognitive and literacy skills. Over time schools have pushed down more rigorous academic and organizational requirements to younger grades, making it more likely for boys to develop early gaps that often persist into the college years.
A related reason for the gender gap may be what David Brooks called the lack of cultural diversity.
… The education system has become culturally cohesive, rewarding and encouraging a certain sort of person: one who is nurturing, collaborative, disciplined, neat, studious, industrious and ambitious. People who don’t fit this cultural ideal respond by disengaging and rebelling.
Far from all, but many of the people who don’t fit in are boys....
Brooks is describing what is often called the “feminization” of public schools. This term is distasteful to some, probably because it reinforces gender stereotypes. Whatever the label, it does appear that schools have become “culturally homogeneous” in a way that hurts boys more than girls. It starts in elementary school when an early reader is told that he got the wrong answer because he picked “mad” instead of “sad” to describe how the boy in the story feels after he doesn’t get the bike he wanted for his birthday. It continues through high school where group discussions in history class only allow expressions of compassion for victims of war but no praise for brilliant military maneuvers. The message is clear – only certain types of behaviors and thoughts are welcome in the classroom.
There’s no doubt that students do need to be ”studious and industrious” to perform well academically. It just seems that public schools are misguided in the methods they use in trying to develop those qualities in all students, particularly in boys.
Suggested reforms
Sommers points out that this gender gap should motivate schools to find ways to promote boys' academic achievement, as they have done for girls in recent cases when the gender gap has been reversed. She suggests some changes that the British, the Canadians and the Australians have implemented.
... These include more boy-friendly reading assignments (science fiction, fantasy, sports, espionage, battles); more recess (where boys can engage in rough-and-tumble as a respite from classroom routine); campaigns to encourage male literacy; more single-sex classes; and more male teachers (and female teachers interested in the pedagogical challenges boys pose).
One example of how poor noncognitive skills can create a misalignment between grades and test scores
I know of a case where a middle school boy consistently earned almost perfect test scores in his social studies class and who reached the finals in his state's geography bee contest. However, his overall grade was significantly lowered by his poor class notes, likely due to a deficit in "noncognitive skills". Because of his grades, and because "behavior and work habits" counted so heavily in the admissions process, he was shut out of his high school's honors history track. If not for his parents' intervention to override the school's policies, allowing him to enroll in the honors course, he might have languished in courses that were too easy and boring for him. As it happened, he went on to graduate with honors and enroll in an elite university.
(A version of this post previously appeared on Cost of College.)
29 comments:
I have one of these boys. I laughed mightily on finding out he qualified for JHU-CTY AP courses, but his high school wouldn't put him in honors much less AP for those subjects. It isn't just behaving in an age appropriate male manner, it's not having the neurological development and explicit instruction needed to develop good handwriting. Unfortunately, afterschool neurological development just can't be done.
The cost to me is of course lost merit money and the many hours of 'you aren't stupid, school just doesn't work for kids with illegible handwritng'. I'm glad NYState is going to testing on computers - boys like him will be able to submit legible essays, with penmanship not being a factor in the grading.
This has been true for many years. It certainly was true, and much discussed, when I was taking standardized tests in the late 70's. At that time, the thinking was that standardized tests discriminated against girls. Now the thinking seems to be that grading discriminates against boys. Everyone is missing the points. Grades and standardized tests are not measures of general intelligence or worthiness as a human being. Sigh. Grades are designed to measure what has been learned,and are often used to predict college success. Standardized tests were designed to measure likelihood of success in college. The real question is, which measure predicts college success better? Perhaps neither?
In any case, this is not something new, and certainly not anything having to do with recent "feminization" of school. I suspect what we are seeing is that boys do better in one-shot, high pressure situations, and girls do better in more low key situations.
And one more thing - I was the anomaly - a girl who scored much higher on the standardized tests than my grades would have predicted. In my case, my HS grades were much more predictive of my college grades than my test scores. My grades continued to be not so great. The problems I had with getting good grades - time management, organization, etc - have plagued me throughout life. Perhaps all of us, boys and girls, need to learn those lessons that our overly "feminized" teachers are trying to help us learn. In the end, I think there is a lot of value in life to being organized, not procrastinating, and being able to work well with others.
There are 11 years between my oldest and my youngest and I definitely saw the feminization over time, as older teachers (who tended to appreciate boys and deal with them more effectively) retired and were replaced with much-younger teachers. The new teachers seemed to see boys as defective girls and they rewarded those (girls) who made their papers look pretty. They often had fits about boys turning in papers crumpled from their backpacks, even if they were 100% correct. (girls like my DD, too)They really rewarded the "teacher-pleasers" - all girls. The school itself also changed between my pairs; the older one attended the 7-8 JHS, with a HS format and approach and the younger one the new 6-7-8 MS (despite parents overwhelming vote to keep the JHS). As a MS, all of the artsy-crafty, touchy-feely stuff was just like ES, the academic emphasis was gone, everything was done in teams and kids had NEST every day. Nurture, something, something, trust - aka navel-gazing. In a word; torture for almost all boys and for girls like mine. My DD lucked out and got a male gym teacher who told them "do something quietly and don't get me into trouble" but my son got the drama teacher (double torture).
I was called in for a full team conference because my son said, "I don't need to be loved in school; I have parents for that. School is for academics." Heresy, which I compounded by agreeing with him. Yes, his grades suffered from a number of teachers - as did my DD's.
I don't see a change at all. Crumpled papers were just as unacceptable in my elementary school in the late 60's as they are today. I was actually made to stay after school every day for a month for "remedial handwriting" in the 4th grade. And we were so touchy-feely that in 8th grade English, we spent a month reading I'm OK, You're OK. It was the late 60's, early 70's, and schools were rampant with that kind of thing.
My father, who went to school in the 40's and 50's, used to yell at me constantly for messy papers which he said would NEVER have been allowed in his school. He said that in his day, everything had to be done in pen with no crossouts. They were expected to copy things over to be neat. He couldn't understand why my teachers were not making me do that.
No, I don't think schools have changed much expectations for neatness.
Now they don't teach handwriting.
Schools have changed in ways that probably favor girls – pushing literacy skills to earlier grades and the introduction of the middle school model (late ‘80s?) where social relationships and character education often take a back seat tor academics. This ties in with Katherine Beal’s Atlantic article about changes in grading that include increased emphasis on group work and literacy skills in math classes, for example.
http://kitchentablemath.blogspot.com/2013/03/are-grading-trends-hurting-socially.html
Schools have also pushed story-writing (Writers' Workshop), with its endless navel-gazing about "small moments" and boys tend not to want to write that kind of story (and girls like mine). Schools are also pushing "projects" down into lower grades, disadvantaging many kids who are not sufficiently organized and lack the "executive skills" (and most young kids do; parent involvement is necessary) to keep track of deadlines etc. It's developmentally questionable, at best, and tends to hit boys harder.
My main point is that girls have gotten better grades, and boys better SAT scores for eons, perhaps as far back as SATs go. So whether or not you are a fan of projects in elementary school (and I am not, mainly because I am a lazy, disorganized mommy), it doesn't have a bearing on this. The theory we always heard back in the 70's, that the SAT discriminates against girls, is also probably not the reason.
My brother and I tested the exact same for IQ and his SAT score was within 10 pts. of mine. Yet I was salutatorian of my high school class while he barely graduated by the skin of his teeth. The reason was that I was willing to "play the game" while he refused to do any assignment he deemed "busywork" (which unfortunately was a large percentage of the homework). He would always ace tests but his final grade would suffer because of all the zeroes in the homework.
When he got to college and could actually pick the courses that interested him (primarily hands-on music technology ones), he got excellent grades. He's had a successful career as an audio engineer.
The old-fashioned apprenticeship model would be much more appropriate for boys like my brother than the current academic high school curriculum.
Grace - thank you for putting this up!!!!
"The new teachers seemed to see boys as defective girls ..."
Hee, hee, hee. Oops, that's not funny.
When I was in 4th grade, I remember being called up to the front of the class to be congratulated on my perfect geography test score. The teacher wanted me to explain to the class how I studied.
When my son was in first grade, I commented to his teacher (who was near retirement, BTW) that our son loves geography and could find any country in the world. She said: "Yes, he has a lot of superficial knowledge". That was one of many teacher-to-parent twits I've received over the years. At another time, she regaled us about how the first grade teachers study ways to help kids find their "voice". Heck, I wanted them to work on holding a pencil correctly and writing a coherent paragraph.
I remember talking to my son's second grade teacher about how he isn't holding the pencil correctly, and how I was surprised to learn that the schools never teach that. She told me that it was probably too late to change it, and besides, he would figure it out. When I was in Kindergarten, I distinctly remember practicing on yellow paper with wide lines and a dotted line in the middle. I remember them teaching us how to hold a pencil. I also remember being taught phonics. That's another case of how direct tangible knowledge has evolved into a process of vague "whole language". It's part of the fuzzification of K-6 education.
So, nowadays, facts are "mere" and skills are "rote", but these are real, tangible things that many kids can grab onto. They are not fuzzy. They don't require joining some vague "voice" club or figuring out how to translate perfectly understandable math into words.
K-6 education has evolved to reflect the beliefs of the people who teach those grades, and these people don't properly reflect a large portion of the population. On many occasions, I got the message that these teachers didn't like smart kids. They didn't want to face the reality that all kids do NOT necessarily even out by fourth grade, something I was told on a number of occasions. Several teachers seemed to go out of their way to let us know that our son was really not that smart - probably to put us on the defensive and keep us our of their hair. If you change education from facts and skills to "understanding", then you can claim the higher ground and pretend that all kids are equal. You can also claim control over defining what that understanding is.
In K-6, my son got portfolios and rubrics with several pages of meaningless numbers between 1 and 5. Assignments and tests were hidden away in portfolios (never to be seen again) and we got to see only the fuzzy rubrics. This sort of fuzzy anti-analytic approach to education ruins many kids. If these kids can hang on (perhaps with help at home) until high school, then things will get better - not perfect - but better.
My son clearly saw this change when he got to high school. He loved it. No more math that allowed the teacher to define fuzzy roadblocks of understanding. Doing the math showed the understanding. This isn't always the case, and he really sees the difference between his math and science classes and his English and history classes. You would think that history would be different, but there are too many chances for teachers to screw up your weighted grades with "interpretation". Interestingly, his Spanish class is much more like a math and science class than an English or history class. More facts and skills.
Our middle school honor rolls and our high school rankings are dominated by girls. Last year's top ten were all girls. I think this reflects on how many girls (and parents of girls) are valuing education more now than when I was young. This is good. Change is not necessarily only based on how schools have changed. It used to be that only girls got braces. They had to look good to catch a man. They had to be slim, trim, and lovely. Now, everyone gets braces and girls are encouraged to care about academics and sports.
I don't see a big difference in my son's high school versus my old high school other than the fact that it's OK for many girls to want to get good grades.
I see a big difference in K-8 education, but not so much in high school. Still, that causes a lot of long-term damage.
There is also the pressure and competition for college admission. When I look at the weighting details of many of my son's classes, there is still a lot of fuzzy grading and grading that has more to do with details than understanding. In my son's AP Physics class, the labs are a huge part of their grade, and those grades are greatly influenced by format - things like numbering the pages. My son doesn't care about those things. Perhaps girls are better with those details and better with the fuzziness of English and history interpretations. Chasing after these "hanging fruit" points is quite different than how one might do on the AP test. I think one has to make a distinction between what's going on in K-8 and high school. I don't like it when people come up with a decent idea, but then try to force all of reality to fit.
A lot of the ES stuff - and I agree with Steve's comments - has migrated to the 6-8 grades with the advent of the MS, as opposed to 7-8 JHS. We saw a big difference when the JHS the older kids attended had become a MS for the younger kids (over strong parent opposition). The school lost most of its academic orientation (although thankfully still had honors classes in all academic subjects) and stressed all of the worst aspects of adolescents. I see the ES teachers as essentially playing school, the same way they probably did themselves when they were kids - lots of touchy-feely, artsy-crafty stuff, lots of projects, lots of groupwork and no academics. They really don't seem to understand that (1)lots of kids really dislike that stuff and (2) they are failing to build a solid foundation for the rest of the kids' schooling. I've never seen a boy play school and I've seen plenty of girls who didn't - but those aren't the people who become ES teachers.
CORRECTION to my 2:04 comment:
Schools have changed in ways that probably favor girls – pushing literacy skills to earlier grades and the introduction of the middle school model (late ‘80s?) where academics often takes a back seat to social relationships and character education.
Last time I checked our local high school, leadership positions and honor society membership were dominated by girls.
I went to school under the old junior high model, and did far LESS academics than my son does now in middle school. The difference is just astounding, in fact. We read I'm OK You're OK, and learned to play bridge ("leisure studies") in 8th and 9th grade English. My son learns (explicitly) how to create topic sentences, how to structure paragraphs, and how to bring in supporting evidence. It is highly scaffolded - too scaffolded for my taste - but there is no question that he is learning real skills. He is now a better essay writer in 7th grade than I was in 12th grade, mainly because of the stress on academics.
My HS honor society was also dominated by girls. I don't think much has changed since those days. But... drumroll please... my son made high honor roll this period, and I noticed that it was half boys on the list. And I didn't even count the names where I couldn't tell if it was a boy or girl.
Maybe it's time to view the saying "Everything I really needed to know, I learned in kindergarten" not as a life lesson on sharing and taking turns, but as an indictment of all the teaching and learning that came after.
What I would attempt as a means to interest boys would be more competitive activities. Boys like to show off. I think boys have lost interest as the society for our children has evolved to everybody-gets-a-trophy. I think academic contests beginning at early grades would keep boys engaged. Then, even though Steve's kid's knowledge fails to impress the teacher, he could show her and everyone else that he knows a lot of stuff.
Dan K.
My younger kids' ES didn't allow any kid to get more than one ribbon at Field Day, regardless of how many competitions s/he actually won! The following year, the kids were "sick" that day; we went downtown to a museum, Dunbarton Oaks gardens and a nice lunch.
Boys also do not tend to like the kinds of books that ES teachers like; chick lit and oozing emotions. They like battles, adventures, sci fi etc - and so do lots of girls. This goes double for writing about feelings. Give them some balance; Ransom of Red Chief, Bright Candles, Robinson Crusoe, Trials of Hercules etc.
Kids do love competitions -- many girls enjoy them as much as boys. We have active participants in chess, instrumental music, band, dance and Scrabble competitions, as well as team sports. We have academic awards strictly for achievement, but also awards for good sportsmanship, leadership, attendance, teamwork (awarded at a different time). I think it's important both to validate the high performers and to give those who have less academic or athletic ability to be recognized for their strengths. Of course the two categories overlap -- sometimes the high academic achievers are also leaders or the best sportsmen, but both areas are worthy of recognition.
One high school had a feature I've not seen before or since; a hallway lined with pictures of kids who had been recognized or had awards for activities done outside of school; gymnasts, dancers, artists, musicians, elite sports, eagle Scouts etc. I thought it was a very nice thing to do.
I appreciate what people have pointed out about awards and extracurricular competitions that are available. My point, though, is that competition as part of the learning in the classroom would appeal especially to boys. Sure the girls might like it too, but I thought we were considering things that boys like. I think that in-class Jeopardy-like games about geography or history are worthwhile. Math races are also fun for some. Being the fastest at long division doesn't mean you are the best student, get the highest grades, or would win the school math medal. But it's fun to race. I would sure rather do that than write extended responses describing the steps of long division. Whenever someone wins, someone else loses. I get that, but we're not talking about the whole class grade being based on a contest. Kids that don't like it only have to endure it one hour every two weeks or so. But you might get a few who otherwise tune out to tune in for it.
I hope my posts didn't make you think that I don't see massive imbalances in classroom practices that disfavor boys and non-girly-girls. I do and think that things need to change, so that various interests and instructional needs are met, but it really needs a change in attitude on the part of ES-MS teachers. Boys are NOT DEFECTIVE GIRLS; they are essentially different and their differences need to be accommodated.
@Dan - I completely agree with you on the appeal to boys of a little classroom competition. My 10 yo son *loves* that stuff, regardless of the subject. Those teachers, usually male, who have classroom competitions have consistently been his favorites. He ends up being much more interested in their subjects than in the subjects that are taught without any competitive element.
While I agree that competition is used by many as a motivator, I don't see how that is going to work in the included classroom. Around-the-world, jeopardy, and such verbal games requiring quick thinking were banned here as being a setup for failure for the included. Will you have decks of questions and responses times differentiated to each child?
I think that it was a comment on this website which identified Everyday Math as having been specifically designed for the full-inclusion environment, since mastery of anything was not required. It made sense to me, and I can see that other current practices, like groupwork, Readers'/Writers' Workshop may function in the same way; to disguise real differences in ability, preparation and motivation.
When I was teaching in a classroom that had children of very disparate abilities, I would assign them to one of two teams and have the teams compete. I made sure there were strong and weak students on each team, and sometimes I made the questions fit the child so all students had a chance of answering correctly and helping their team.
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