How to Address Gender Bias in the Classroom

Placing boys and girls in nontraditional roles helps discourage gender bias.

Addressing gender bias in the classroom requires a teacher to monitor their own behavior to ensure it does not favor one gender. In his article, "Gender Bias In The Classroom: Current Controversies and Implications for Teachers," author Timothy Frawley explores how, at a young age, children begin to form their own opinions about gender that manifest in how they dress, interact with others and through what they say. Frawley explains that a child's understanding of gender roles comes from verbal gender bias about what they can accomplish because of their sex and from nonverbal ques a teacher may give through feedback, classroom segregation and educational materials.

Instructions

1. Divide your attention equally among the boys and girls in class when providing assistance. Focusing the majority of your attention on one gender group can lead the other to feel inferior, causing a deterioration in their self-esteem and self-confidence. Alternate your attention from boy student to girl student as you make your way across the classroom to prevent unintentional distribution of time.

2. Avoid separating the class by gender, or assigning different activities to specific genders. Separating a class by gender reinforces the concept of gender inequality by suggesting boys and girls should be treated differently. Focus on activities that encourage cooperation among the sexes by having boys and girls work with one another to complete assignments.

3. Resist promoting gender stereotypes in the classroom by rewarding girls for being neat, clean and orderly, while rewarding boys for being outspoken, active and independent. Tolerating certain behaviors from only one group negatively influences how the two groups socialize with one another. Encouraging a child's good behavior regardless of the action will deter children from exhibiting gender specific attitudes.

4. Discourage the permissive attitudes that allow sexual harassment to go uncorrected. Teasing that results in negative comparisons to girls, manifesting from how a boy throws a ball or from crying, implies that being a girls is worse than being a boy. Discipline this type of inappropriate behavior in the same manner as all other types of name calling.

5. Consciously monitor the feedback you give students in the classroom. In a study conducted by education researchers Myra and David Sadker that examined the type of feedback children received when answering questions in-class, it was determined that boys were more likely to receive either positive or negative feedback in regards to their answers, while girls were simply acknowledged for answering. Providing comparable feedback allows both genders the opportunity to expand their ideas through conversation with the teacher.

6. Avoid using inclusive language and assigning stereotyped jobs in the classroom. The use of the term, "You guys" may be common place, but it unintentionally favors one sex while dismissing the other. When assigning classrooms tasks, avoid having boys carry things while girls clean up in order to discourage the assigning of stereotyped gender roles.

Tips & Warnings

• Teachers made aware of gender-biased teaching behaviors, then provided with the resources to combat this bias, promote gender equality in their classrooms better than teachers without proper training.

References

• Education Change Project: Gender Bias In Education
• Questia: Gender Bias In The Classroom
• Kansas National Education Association: Avoiding Gender Bias
• Myra Sadker Foundation: Gender Equity: Still Knocking At The Classroom Door