Gender in the classroom
Presented in partnership with Plan International
Illustration: Melissa Cheung
It?s 2016. We have gender parity in Prime Minister Justin Trudeau?s cabinet. We know that ?girls can do anything? and that it?s OK for boys to wear pink. And yet, if Arwyn Carpenter?s kindergarten students in downtown Toronto are at all typical, gender roles are still alive and well, and a big part of our kids? experience at school.
?Right now, most of the girls are drawing flower patterns in the sand, and they?re talking about who can make the most beautiful flowers,? says Carpenter, as she watches them play outside during afternoon recess. ?The boys are running back and forth to the water fountain with buckets, getting ?gas? for the gas station they?ve made in the sand and pouring the ?gas? down the slide. Oh, and now some of the girls have run over to join the boys.? As Kevin Davison, a Canadian researcher in gender and education who currently teaches at the National University of Ireland, Galway, explains, gender can be described as the social and cultural beliefs we attach to being male or female. ?We?re all gendered, and we all live our experiences of gender every day,? he says. ?There?s nothing wrong with that?we?re not aiming for some ideal of androgyny.?
What we are aiming for, though, are classrooms and schoolyards where all students can learn to their full potential. Too often, however, gender stereotypes?and their real-life applications?get in the way of that. Whether boys are seen as,...
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