Challenging Gender Stereotypes in Education

Karen Jones

• Publisher: Learning Matters
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781526494535, 9781526494542
• eBook ISBN: 9781529726237
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Inclusive Education

Gender stereotypes are prevalent in education, as is all spheres of society.

Gender stereotypes squash talent, limit educational experiences and achievement and corrode aspirations - which in turn can limit professional opportunities and prospects.

This book supports you to recognise and challenge gender stereotypes in educational settings and in your own practice.  It iincules practical guidance and strategies.

1 Introduction

Karen Jones

Keywords

• Purpose
• Content
• Features
• Chapter Outline

This Chapter

• sets out the purpose of the book;
• outlines the content and key features of each chapter;
• gives tips on how to engage with the content features and apply ideas from the book in practice.

Purpose of the book

Gender stereotypes are prevalent across all spheres of society, not just education, but because the formation of gender stereotypes coincides with a child’s progression through education, and education is a key site for the perpetuation of gender stereotypes, practitioners at all stages of a child’s education can help children develop a positive image of their gender and neutralise negative gender stereotypes and bias.

This book has been written for anyone working with or aspiring to work with children and young people in education. It is particularly suited to trainee teachers and education students, but also fills a gap in knowledge, identified in research, for teachers and education practitioners (e.g. classroom assistants, early years practitioners). The purpose of the book is to help you develop knowledge of how and when gender stereotypes form, as well as how they can be perpetuated in various ways during a child’s education, so that you can help tackle this problem. This book will support you with research-informed pragmatic solutions to improve practice and transform the school or learning environment.

Overview of each chapter

Chapter 2 explores sex-based differences between females and males, as well as looking at how and when gender identity forms and gender stereotypes take root. In Chapter 3, we will build on this by exploring non-binary ideas about gender in more detail. Chapter 4 will examine the intersection between gender and social background/ethnicity. Chapter 5 examines the impact of gender stereotypes on children’s subject and career choice, as well as the longer-term economic implications.

Following that, we will explore how gender stereotypes manifest and may be perpetuated in specific curriculum and subject areas, beginning with Chapter 6, which looks at early years and children’s play, followed by Chapter 7 (primary and secondary mathematics learning), Chapter 8 (the national history curriculum for primary and secondary schools) and Chapter 9 (ICT).

Next, we will turn to contemporary issues in education, beginning with Chapter 10, which examines dyslexia from the perspective of gender stereotypes. Chapter 11 examines sexism, sexual harassment and sexual violence in schools.

Chapter 12 advocates a whole-school approach to working with parents, communities, colleagues and school leaders. Chapter 13 focuses on how to work with mums in disadvantaged communities. Finally, Chapter 14 will consider a future without gender stereotypes, as well as suggesting further activities to prompt reflection and action planning.

Content features

Embedded within each chapter of this book are prompts for self-reflection, practical exercises and activities. You will be given tips on how you can engage with different types of material embedded in those chapters to help your reflections and action planning. The reflection questions and activities in this book have been developed to help link theoretical ideas and learning with classroom practice. Each chapter in the book includes activities that you can do to evaluate your practice or activities that you can do with children in class. There are also suggestions for curriculum and lesson planning, topic selection, and task selection. We hope that these activities provide practical ways to transform the learning environment. Some involve working with parents, colleagues and school leaders.

Activity

Jot down some bullet-pointed notes on what you would like to learn from this book and how you hope to use this in practice (you might like to use Table 1.1). We suggest that you set yourself some achievable goals to test out ideas from the book in your practice. For example, you might want to introduce children to more counter-stereotype role models in storybooks or do more to encourage children to consider a broader range of careers. This might involve planning a time when you can explore why girls and boys are steered towards certain careers. This could include reading Chapter 5 on subject and career choice and setting yourself the goal to complete an activity with children in class. This might include initiating a discussion to deconstruct what makes a good nurse, doctor, electrician, bus driver, care worker, and so on. This could be followed with a discussion to deconstruct why these roles have traditionally been dominated by women or men (e.g. why there are more female nurses than male, more male electricians than female, etc.).

There are many more ideas for classroom-based activities to follow in this book. As you read each chapter, you can use Table 1.1 to plan ways that you can challenge gender stereotypes in education. This will help you to make the best use of this book to transform practice.

Table 1.1

Chapter summary

This book will address a serious issue that is currently highly topical, which has to date received little attention in education courses, initial teacher training courses, or published literature. We hope that you find this book a unique resource for understanding gender stereotypes in education, whether you are currently working with or aspiring to work with children and young people. This introductory chapter provided tips on how to engage with the content features in this book to transform your practice.

2 The formation of gender identity and gender stereotypes

Karen Jones

Keywords

• Sex-Based Differences
• Sex
• Intersex
• Gender
• Social Cognitive Theory
• Social Learning Theory
• Socialisation
• Gender Identity
• Gender Stereotype Definition
• Gender Stereotype Formation

This Chapter

• defines and explores terms of reference, including sex, gender and gender stereotypes;
• explores key theories that explain the development of a gendered self;
• examines when gender stereotypes form and how they shape our experience in life.

Introduction

Men really DO have bigger brains: the amazing image that reveals just how male and female brains are wired differently.

This is the title of an article published in the Daily Mail (Prigg, 2014). There are many more articles like this that illustrate just how much attention is given to differences between the sexes. Think for a moment about how many times you have heard phrases such as ‘battle of the sexes’ or ‘the opposite sex’, or even ‘men are from Mars and women are from Venus’ – a throwback to the relationships book by John Gray (1992). Have you ever commented or heard someone else refer to girls/women as more patient, considerate, empathetic or considerate to the needs of others than boys/men? Or have you heard or joked yourself that women are better at multitasking than men? Or perhaps you have heard someone grumble about ‘women drivers’! You will have seen many examples that relate to children in education and in everyday life (see Table 2.1).

Table 2.1

At the root of ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Publisher Note
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• About the Authors
• 1 Introduction
• 2 The formation of gender identity and gender stereotypes
• 3 Challenging the gender binary: exploring the experiences of transgender children and young people
• 4 Constructing self: gender, social background and ethnicity in developing educational identities
• 5 Subject choice, career decisions and gender stereotyping
• 6 Girls and boys: the role of professionals and play in the early years
• 7 Gender stereotypes in mathematics education
• 8 The history curriculum in primary and secondary schools and the representation of gender
• 9 Women in computing
• 10 Gender and dyslexia
• 11 Sexism, sexual harassment and sexual violence in schools
• 12 A whole-school approach
• 13 Empowering women from the bottom to the top: parents, community and partnership
• 14 What next?
• Index