Girls and boys in education
That girls do better in education compared to boys, is regularly found out. At the moment, a discussion about this is going on in NRC and Volkskrant. HAN-teacher Gerda Geerdink took her doctoral degree in the differences between the sexes with Primary School Teacher Training-students, and interferes with the discussion.
It started with a research of several grammar-school students, on the output of boys and girls at their own school. This research showed that the percentage of girls graduating per year has been 8.8 percent higher compared to the percentage boys, since the introduction of the second stage of secondary education, eight years ago
‘Independent Study is the cause’
On the correspondence page of NRC Handelsblad of 13, Lydia Sevenster-van der Lely, teacher in biology at the same school, argues the Independent Study to be the cause. Boys are, before the age of 22, not able to study as independently as the Independent Study expects from them.
Motivation
Gerda Geerdink, teacher at HAN responds one week later, 20 June in NRC. She thinks the conclusion, that the Independent Study is to blame, is drawn too soon. It is an all-times problem, even in the 17th century this problem was noticed. She argues that boys don’t do worse, but girls do better. It does not have anything to do with role-models either, her research shows. Also brain cells and testosterone are not the determining factors. According to Geerdink the appearance has more to do with what the students are getting at and how schools deal with independent learning. And this has to do with differences in motivation: girls are rather intrinsically motivated whereas boys are rather extrinsically motivated.
The crown prince at the Primary School Teacher Training (PABO)
In the Volkskrant of 23 June can be read a report: Boys don’t want to do the Primary School Teacher Training. It is especially women who teach in primary education, wheareas the achievements of girls and boys don’t really differ. Still, the shortage of men in primary education is undesirable. 75 percent of the school-principals is male. Geerdink: ‘Children get a totally wrong impression about society; men work at the office, women take care of the children.’
How boys do at the Primary School Teacher Training (PABO) : ‘Boys are often approached as crown prince, (..) but they actually feel less challenged. They think the PABO is too much without engagement.’
The articles can be found via
http://newsportal.lexisnexis.nl/han
(Only via the HAN-web)
