Gender Separation

I ran across this, this morning and couldn't help but wonder what the far reaching implications of this can be??
Aren't we separated enough already??

http://xfinity.comcast.net/articles/news-national/20120708/US.Single.Sex.Classrooms/?cid=hero_media

ALL of your thoughts and comments are welcome!!

Respectfully

MissPlaced

To me, I think I can see the merits and demerits of both. I guess if its a public school, then let the school board decide, if its a private school, then it should be up to the school to make the decision.

I love school topics...

"the movement is widespread in states like South Carolina, which has more than 100 schools that offer some form of a single-gender program." Guess where I live?

My district uses single-sex classrooms, and we have seen success in doing so. Boy and girls are different - In elementary school they act different and learn in different ways. I wish I could take you into our classrooms and let you see what it is like. I have also had teachers that told me they could teach one sex better than the other.

With that said, you can see where I stand. I am not sure when they merge back (I will find out tomorrow), but there doesn't seem to be any social problems.

More to follow.

We know anything the ACLU is against is bound to be beneficial..that alone tells me it must be a good thing..So of course they will fight it tooth and toe nail until it is banned.. that is a given.

An update to my earlier post... Our schools have single sex classrooms in first and second grades, so they merge back together in third grade. More to come...

Edit to add other information...

Both boys and girls use our same state standards. That means they both - by state law - are taught the same content and tested with the same tests. They are just taught with different activities and lessons. Our program is a voluntary program. We still have coed classrooms. It is the choice of the parent to decide what path to take.

Hi,

do you have an example of an activity where boys do better than girls? And one with which girls learn better than boys. I'd be curious to hear how the differences manifest.

regards myrti

As a parent, as a father of 2 beautiful girls and a on-his-way-to-become-a-big boy (ages 4,6 and 9) I cannot disagree more with that system.

More and more, parents expect parenting from schools, teaching our kids how they should think and act.
I myself, do NOT blindly trust the views of our teachers, do NOT think the teachers are responsible for the up-bringing of my kids and do NOT agree with the view that parents are allowed to get children, both work 40+ hour work-weeks and pay other people to attend to our children.

I am not saying my wife should stay at home for the kids while I'm at work, not at all, she works 16 hours a week as well so we can get around with me working 32 hours, but thinking kids are better of separated then together seems plain wrong.

What's the next step? Forbid parents to get mixed children (sex / color / beliefs / you name it) ????!!!!

(or am I missing the point?)


Just my 2 cents,

\0/
-Sec

@ -sec,

No, You're not missing the point.
In order to have a healthy well balanced discussion all sides of an issue must be looked at.
I can see the merit in what you're saying.
Being a parent myself( My Kids are now grown)I felt much the same way as you do, Truth be told, i could have been considered one of those pain in the neck parent's, because i held a tight rein on what they were allowed to teach my kids....simply because IT"S MY JOB to prepare my kids for life..PEROID.

@ rigel,

The only "seperated" class's we had when i was in school(Junior High) were PE(physical Education) and Home Ec(Home Economics),Later this changed as the male population of the school were made to take Home Ec, this wasn't necessarily a bad thing as the male population needed to know how to cook,clean,shop,sew....

Now "SHOP" ( Wood Shop and Auto Mechanics) were generaly "Seperated class's" IE Males only...That needed to be changed, because just as the "BOY'S" needed to take home EC,"Girls" needed to take Shop, if for no other reason then to learn how to change a tire,check their oil,tranny fluid,and where to put these fluids,and most important of all, how to keep a mechanic from trying to guess their net worth at the garage!!

(NOT intended to insult mechanic's at all, i know many fine mechanic's, who know mechanic's, who's eye's will glaze over and they begin to breath hard as an uniformed woman enter's the shop, trying to find out why her brakes are squeeking, and the mechanic will talk her into having a full brake job,when all she need's is Brake Pads, she then open's her wallet and he smiles all the way to the bank..)

To my mind "Seperation" isn't always a good thing....and it's not necessarily a bad thing either.....I'm still thinkin about this, my main concern is who's gonna walk thru this open door and use it for shall we say less then honorable purposes???

@ the_patroit11,
Care expound on Merit's/demerits as you see them??

@ myrti,
Do you have any examples, that you would care to share??

@ lora,

We know that the ACLU are pot stirrer's....BUT ACLU aside, what makes you think this has to be a good thing??

and finally i would like to 1) WELCOME -sec to BC, and 2) Thank you all for participating in this discussion

RESPECTFULLY

MissPlaced

Heya MissPlaced,

no I don't actually, which is why I would like to hear what rigel has observed in his schools.

I went to a mixed school with mixed PE classes, no separation at all. I was also rather unaware of that whole gender differences through much of my childhood and teen years. I played with cars, rather than with dolls. I liked lego instead of puppies. During the first few years of school this was never an issue, I don't think kids at that age differentiate between sexes much. This comes later on, when pre-puberty sets in. When I kept being gender-atypical, eg listening to rap-groups more than to boybands and mising out on all those daily soaps the other girls were always talking about, it made me "that weird girl".
IIRC someone once told me that kids don't judge/notice differences in their class mates until the age of 8 or 9, which would fit roughly with the break I noticed myself. Up till 8/9 my best friend was actually a guy, after he turned 9, he didn't want to have anything to do with girls anymore. They're icky, apparently. (This changed again later on, when he got very interested in girls )

I would not be in support of a permanent separation of the genders, but I can imagine that 1-2 years of separated classes can be beneficial if (and I don't know how realistic that if is) small kids are learning differently based on gender.

EG (and this is completely made up, but just as an example) let's assume that under the age of 8, boys primarily learn by association and girls primarily learn by imitation.
It would then make sense to have a class for boys where the teacher explains to them a new activity by comparing it to something they already know while the girls get a class where the teacher will show them how to do something and they will then have to repeat it themselves.

If you do a quick google search, you can find as many articles saying that the current school system in use is discriminating against girls as articles saying that the current school system in use is discriminating against boys. The fact is that boys and girls are not identical. The question is do they benefit more if you facilitate their learning by taking those differences into account or do they benefit more if you ignore the difference and teach them in a way that is half here, half there but makes them interact with each other. For now I can't say which I would pick.
regards myrti

@MissPlaced: To me, anything that can cut back on disruptive-behavior and confusion (especially now that the school system is more or less just warehousing kids) has got to be a big plus... Why do I believe separating them would help in this way? By looking back to when I was in school and remembering how it was in the few classes and activities that the boys were not a part of was always calmer and more focused.. especially when the their hormones started kicking in..

Quote-box-glitch??? Never mind...

To quote MissPlaced:
"....simply because IT"S MY JOB to prepare my kids for life..PEROID.

To my mind "Seperation" isn't always a good thing....and it's not necessarily a bad thing either.....I'm still thinkin about this, my main concern is who's gonna walk thru this open door and use it for shall we say less then honorable purposes???


RESPECTFULLY

MissPlaced"


You read my mind.

But seriously, I wasn't about bringing that up, but it's another important thing to look at, especially considering all the sickening stories coming out about the Catholic church and - education lately in this part of the world (Netherlands / Belgium). It has affected 1000's of lives in a relative small community, and still does apparently.

Respectfully indeed, +1, and thanks for the welcome MissPlaced!



@myrti:

Could we also please note the sociological effects in general into this discussion, those that affect us 24/7 and not only on school itself? All due respect myrti, I couldn't agree more on the rest you daid!

***

I myself also had mixed PE in "high school" (we have another system here), and espescially on days we did field or ball-sports, we ALL, being around 16, had the time of our lives -

Some classes might generally be more suited or interesting to a specific sex, but what self-respected lady here would agree that computers are something for boys and girls could learn something else that is useful to them?
Even my own girls would kill me for saying that!

My wife, a primary-school-teacher herself, has a need to differentiate between ages though. Younger kids need to learn the basic social structures, before counting and spelling. Then basic communication and the platform on witch children base the rest of their lives. We're talking 3-8 year old kids. We both think separating kids at those ages would harm them far more in the future then do them any good.

After that age though, my wife does see a general tendency within boys for having the need to be physically active, at least more then within girls.
They are experimenting with "variable brakes" as the weather and other factors seem to have a strong influence on kids' behavior. Also, the more "interesting" classes are sometimes given on the playground, although that is not really catching on as I heard, mainly because other people inside get jealous... (Hahaha, go figure!)

In high school however, we both agree that all main classes should be given together, and specific classes could be separated, as chosen by the STUDENT. Give them descent alternatives of secondary classes to choose from themselves and let them figure it out??? Or is that tooo easy?


Kids...

My Daughter-in-law is a teacher,so i asked her about this, because as a teacher i wanted her perspective on this....
Her responce was this:

They don't have "Seperated Class's" at her school just yet, but she has heard about this and did some checking on her own,she can see the positives, IE,Boy's learn differently then girls...and the negatives as well..IE,Children need to be able to get along in ALL situations, so seperating them to her is a negative that would stunt their growth as children and later on as adults, and altho most boys learn with a more hands on approach, so do some girls..I know i do,,I can read about anything and just not get it, BUT show me and i'm all over it!! LOL
I found alot of merit in what she had to say and I agree with her perspective.

When we seperate the children then they both lose out on the positives that they can gain from each other.

RESPECTFULLY

MissPlaced