Great Results in the Boys’ Classroom
To expect a second grade boy to sit still in his chair all day at school is not only unproductive, it’s detrimental to his learning potential. Given the opportunity to move around in a structured environment, boys are allowed to explore their boundaries and stay engaged in the learning process. Based on this knowledge, we have incorporated active academic games like Spelling Baseball, Math Basketball, and Reading for Football Yards. To give you a sense of what these games are like, Math Basketball consists of solving problems individually in order to get to shoot for team points. Reading for Football Yards has boys working individually through 100 yards of books, ten yards per book, in order to score field goals for their teams.
Sometimes it’s hard to get boys to read, but we have found that boys will develop a love for all literature if they begin by reading books they prefer. Non-fiction stories that involve boy-friendly themes and strong male characters are popular, and we have been successful in using these types of books as an entry point to other learning exercises. Other strategies that have worked well for boys, in our experience, include graphic organizers, team-competitive learning, and opportunities for immediate feedback. Teachers often struggle with discipline in the classroom, but we have found that discipline problems are not an issue when boys are actively engaged in decision-making and in their learning.
Great Results in the Girls’ Classroom
We feel that girls need to be encouraged to be risk-takers when performing academic tasks. We have the girls work collaboratively in groups, and we place the natural leaders with girls who are less dominant. During math lessons, we use this strategy to promote positive support within the group. All girls can then experience what it is like to be a leader while also receiving positive feedback from their partners. In small groups, girls can work on and complete tasks together in a non-threatening and productive way, while in larger groups their accomplishments can be celebrated. It has been amazing to see how the girls encourage one another to accomplish the task at hand. Being able to count on one another, both academically and socially, has been a key to their academic success.
The benefits from being in a same-sex classroom have carried over into their everyday lives as well. Girls have been doing more than just excelling in math and science; they’ve taken ownership of their own learning experiences. The girls’ renewed self-confidence has helped them to achieve in extra-curricular areas like music, gym, and art. Some of our quietest girls started volunteering for music solos and girls who had never shown interest in extra-curricular activities began participating more in and out of the classroom.
From Our School to Yours
Our overall experience with single-sex classrooms has been positive, and other schools in our district have expressed interest in adopting the format as well. We feel it is possible for all public school students to have the opportunity to thrive in a single-sex classroom. We have seen it work in our classrooms and believe it can work in classrooms around the country.
Annette Duncan is a second grade all-boys teacher, and Amy Schmidt is a second grade all-girls teacher. Both are doctoral candidates at the University of Northern Iowa.
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