Avoiding Gender Bias in the Classroom

Teachers oftentimes have no conscious knowledge that they may be relying on gender biases. However, once the problem has been acknowledged, several steps can be taken to reverse the bias and prevent any future incidences.

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- 1
  
  Change the language your use to interact with students. Small words make a huge difference when it comes to creating an equal playing field for boys and girls. Rather than referring to students as "you guys," for example, use "you all." Other phrases commonly lean toward a male-only viewpoint, such as using the pronoun "he" repeatedly. Gender is commonly assigned when hearing certain occupations, like assuming nurses are females or pilots are males. Cutting those habits out of the teaching environment can help your students to avoid it as well.
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  Review and rework the curriculum to include more female influences. Curricula need to be reviewed to ensure the focus is divided as evenly as possible between males and females in topics of learning. If the subject is science, for example, include just as many female scientists and scientific discoveries as male researchers, emphasizing the importance of both. Encourage students to learn more about an equal representation of people.
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  Choose girls just as often as boys to respond to questions or perform actions at the blackboard. Encourage the girls to speak up as often as the boys so that they have representation within the class. TeacherVision.com suggests keeping a list of the students, divided by their gender, and checking off each time someone is chosen for an assignment. This visual cue shows whether your actions are equal within the class.
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  Encourage students to acknowledge and discuss gender bias. Students could be asked to discuss how they feel about the minimal coverage of women in the curriculum or asked to research females' achievements that are just as valuable as males' but receive little recognition. Addressing the issue of gender bias within the classroom can help students understand why such biases exist and how they should be remedied.

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Rashmi Apr 27, 2011
correct

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Avoiding Gender Bias in the Classroom

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