So the other day, I got into an, umm, discussion with the soon-to-be hubby over educational research. Poor guy, he didn’t live through last year’s school uniform debate around here [actually I'm sure he's grateful], so he had NO idea what he was getting himself into.
We were talking about Dr. Leonard Sax, who’s well known for advocating single-sex education, and for his concern over underachievement by boys. We’ll just lay out my biases on the front end:
- I’m a skeptic about educational research, having seen so-called research so recently used against my free-spirit daughter to force her into a uniform.
- Single-sex education is one of the many pieces of spaghetti thrown against the wall by the Metro schools in the past year. Thankfully, that one hasn’t stuck yet.
- When women start making equal salaries with men, and stop suffering economically for raising children, I’ll start worrying about male underachievement.
Now, after the fact, I’m able to grant some of the soon-to-be’s points, namely that, in general, boys and girls may learn differently, or in general, they may be attracted to different types of activities, and that can affect their schoolwork as well.
Part of what makes me so argumentative on these points is that I was not a typical girl in many ways. I used to break my sister’s Barbies — had no use for them myself. I always loved math and science in school. I was [female stereotypically] quiet and a good student, but I didn’t hesitate to argue if I thought another student, or even a teacher, was wrong. At various points, I’ve tried hard, but I’ve never been all that worried about clothes.
But here’s where it all goes off the rails. I could easily envision choosing a single-sex environment for both of my kids. I don’t know that I ever will, but I can envision a situation where I might. And even better, both my kids meet your stereotype of their gender. The 2yo is boisterous, full of fun, and sometimes aggressive. He can’t sit still and he likes to be in charge. You might say that describes any 2yo, but when the 8yo was that age, the volume of everything she did was different. She was most definitely 2, but in a very different way than her brother. Even today, she loves the color pink. Dance. Dolls. Makeup and dress-up. She’s a girly-girl.
Now, I’ll say on the back end here, I also haven’t read Sax’s books. I’m probably right in guessing though, that what he says is more nuanced than the public perception of his work. But here’s my real problem–leaving him aside. I disagree with viewing children by group when it comes to education. You can’t convince me that all 7yos need the same thing, nor all girls, all boys or even all below-average readers in the 5th grade in your neighborhood. Public education — all education to a large degree — is about giving all kids exposure to the same set of facts. The idea that we all need to learn to read, do some math, understand a bit about the world around us. But I reject the idea that there’s one way to teach all that stuff….not even four right ways.
It took me a long time to get to the point where I knew that I learn best by reading and most especially by writing. I became really good at taking notes, because I couldn’t remember anything someone told me. But once I translated it onto paper, or typed it into the computer — boom, had it down cold. For the moment, it appears to me that my daughter learns really well by hearing and speaking, but it may be that her reading and writing skills are still developing and that will change. Point being, we’re all different. School is a warehouse. There are reasons for that, some good. But we don’t all fit in that round hole. I want schools that can handle that.
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