Probably the most significant reason we began seeing a decline in literacy among boys during the 1980s and 1990s was that we expected that decline in performance to fit our understanding of the way boys' brains worked (or didn't work).
Lowering expectations on a group as an entity is one of the worst (and easiest) things you can possibly do as a teacher, but for some reason, the educational system has embraced this preconception regarding boys and literacy -- and the results have transferred erroneously onto popular culture, art, bookselling, and publishing.
In recent years, due largely to the popularization of theories that began circulating in the 1990s regarding the innate helplessness of boys when it comes to such things as mastering written and spoken language, as well as developing an enjoyment for reading, boys have been erroneously labeled as populationally -- as a culture -- less than literate.
The theory has caught hold and taken off running in education, publishing, and bookselling.
In a study published last July (2011) on neuroscientific analysis of literacy and gender, David Whitehead (English Teaching: Practice and Critique) points to the recent popular generalizations about brains, gender, and literacy which characterize all girls as being multi-taskers who can sit still and listen, and all boys as spatially-oriented whirlwinds who can't focus on more than one thing at a time.
Whitehead says of these assumptions (and he gives plenty of physiological evidence to criticize these generalizations): "At best, they seem misleading, at worst, they seem driven by a commercial imperative."
Among the consequences of the popularization of certain claims are what Whitehead calls "Unwarranted extrapolations":
Understanding that boys' brains have more testosterone than girls should not transfer into language policies that advocate boys should read action novels.
Very recent studies, published in 2009 in Brain and Language, seem to refute the popularly-held idea that girls and boys have significant innate and physiological differences when it comes to language abilities. Author M. Wallentin writes, " ...A careful reading of the results suggests that differences in language proficiency do not exist. Early differences in language acquisition show a slight advantage for girls, but this gradually disappears."
If modern neuroscience can show that gender-specific differences in language processing abilities disappear (by grade 6), and we continue to buy in to the notion that boys don't read, projecting such expectations onto a population of students is likely harmful.
This is probably why I have seen (in my own lifetime) the gradual de-evolution of literacy expectations and performance of boys as a population in public schools.
The harm, according to Whitehead, is that, since the 1990s, teachers and parents (and the broader community) have bought entirely in to the idea that anything appearing in popular media that was remotely "brain-based associated with boys' education had an unassailable empirical legitimacy."
There will be more on this...
6 comments:
Nice to know there's science to back up what we've known all along.
I would ask what kind of commercial imperative could drive the push of a harmful generalization, however, I've seen how this works with so many other generalizations that the question would be pointless.
It is strange to think that this same culture used to stereotype, generalize, and even demoralize women. Treating them second-class, as though they were mindless, soulless, pieces of property. Now the agenda has switched.
The question is: When will the human race learn that stereotyping and generalizing--imprisoning--its members is ultimately the source of evil?
It's relevant to point out that a large majority of public school educators are women, making the notion that boys do not read easier to believe and harder to ward off.
I spend a lot of time observing classrooms and I see boys huddled off in their own little word that most teachers are afraid to enter.
this is so interesting. As an author I feel it is my duty to write books for boys to show them that they do have those resources available to them. Can you imagine is Harry Potter was written from Hermione's perspective? Only girls would read it.
I remember being one of three girls on the Cross Country team in high school. We got the leftover uniforms, and we had to augment them with t-shirts because there were no women's uniforms.
Cross Country was too tough for girls, one coach told me.
Girls aren't meant to run, another said. It would hurt my "female parts."
Yeah, well, I was on the team for four years. When I graduated there were upwards of fifteen girls and the varsity went to championships.
To the best of my knowledge, everyone's "female parts" work just fine.
Women joined the "girls aren't tough" mindset as well. One teacher told me to "stay feminine."
I did not know what to say.
Men and women do and say stupid, damaging things. These stupid, damaging things get Institutionalized.
Nobody wins, except those who stand to make money from the Institutionalization.
I continue to fight for the girls, who have come a long way and play sports without being told their "female parts" are at risk but still fight to make their way in science, math and technology.
As a woman who teaches technology, I have been on the receiving end of some staggeringly ignorant comments.
And for over twenty years I have fought for my boys, who can and do read.
At least they can do sports without being told their "male parts" are in danger.
But what people need to hear is that stereotyping minds and hearts maims souls.
Books help heal these souls.
More boys need access to these books.
Revolution.
Adults of both genders must make this happen.
I don't know where I read this, but I think it is true.
"Everybody counts or nobody counts."
And that's how I run my classroom.
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