Lesson 8
Single Sex Classrooms
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List and describe 2-3 possible advantages of single sex classrooms.
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Grades are better – in the video it was proven that 71% of the students beat the national average in reading and 79% of the students beat the national average in math in Woodward Elementary School, Orlando Florida.
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Better behaviour – The girl students say that they behave better when the boy students are in a different class. They say the boys are a bad influence on them. ”Everyone is in the same boat”, said one girl in the video. There is nothing to distract you.
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List and describe 2-3 potential disadvantages of single sex classrooms.
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Critics are worried that girls will lose out. This is driven out to throw back curriculums because girls are taking homech rather than math and science.
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All girl classrooms can make more gender stereotypes rather than taking them away.
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Boys classes may be used as punishment by parents/teachers for the boys who are not doing well in a coed environment.
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After watching the videos and reading the articles, describe your stance on the single sex classroom issue. Provide some reasons why you agree or disagree with the concept.
I do not agree with single sex classrooms for many reasons. One reason being that I think that kids need to interact with both sexes. This is important because if kids don’t interact with both sexes later on in life they won’t know how to talk to each other or they won’t know how to work with each other. I think that single sex classrooms teach boys and girls can’t interact as friends.
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Would you want to be educated in single-sex classrooms? Why or why not?
I would not want to be educated in a single-sex classroom. Even though some schools who have single-sex classrooms their students grades are higher than schools with mixed sex classrooms. I think the grades have more to do with the teacher teaching the way they are supposed to. If the teacher knows how to teach and how to control her class from being distracted by anything or anyone then the students grades are still going to be high whether they are in a single-sex classroom or not.
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Would you want your children educated in single-sex classrooms? Why or why not?
I don’t think I would want my own children to be educated in a single sex classroom. I would want my children to be brought up in the same type of classroom I was brought up in. I would want my children to socialize with both sexes because I think that would be good for them in the future.
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Are single-sex classrooms a form of discrimination? Explain.
In my opinion, single-sex classrooms are a form of discrimination. They say schools can’t have separate classrooms for African Americans then another separate classroom for Caucasians because it is a form of discrimination. How isn’t single sex classrooms a form of discrimination if this is? Everyone must be equal in my opinion. However, there are such things as private girls’ and private boys’ schools where the students’ parents are paying for their child to go to private school for them to be secluded from the opposite sex.
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Summary
Single-sex classrooms is a hard topic to talk about with students. I was one of those students who was in a classroom with both boys and girls so of course I am going to be in that side of the debate. I believe that what I learned was all to do with the teachers. I was never distracted by a boy because my teachers always knew how to control the class even if I was being distracted by a boy. I understand why some people would want to be in a single-sex classroom because of the grades being better. However, in some schools the grades are not always better with single-sex classrooms therefore I am sticking with the classrooms being mixed sexes.
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Research Question
Do girls distract boys in school?
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Research Analysis
I personally believe that it depends on how old the students are. An elementary boy probably isn’t going to get distracted by an elementary girl. Usually for the boys in middle school will get distracted by what girls wear because that’s when they would hit puberty. According to the week website school officials are changing the school uniforms to make sure that girls don’t distract boys. On a poster at Haven Middle School in Evanston, Ill., says, "Are my pants lowering your test scores?". This is where students are protesting the dress code policy. The girls were not allowed to wear leggings because it was “too distracting” but then over 500 students signed a petition against the new dress code and the girls started to wear leggings, yoga pants, and shorts. Girls shouldn’t be told that their clothing is responsible for boys' bad behaviours. That is the boys fault not the girls fault.
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Research Reference