Single-gender classrooms foster personal and academic success.
Stand still long enough on a bridge and you’re likely to feel it moving. Spend time in a boys-only classroom and you might expect the same. Arms are moving, legs are bouncing – the room seems to buzz around you. And while your hair might just stand up a bit from the electricity in the air, you will be impressed by what you see – most eyes are focused on the teacher.
What is it about boys-only classrooms that have students, parents, and teachers equally enthusiastic? Is it the curriculum, the teaching, or the absence of girls? According to the experts, it’s a little of each.
The rationale for single-gender education has shifted fundamentally over the past 15 years. Traditionally, boys and girls were educated separately, primarily during high school, to minimize distraction and keep hormones out of the classroom. And while that rationale may still hold true, more recent research suggests there is more to it. From kindergarten through high school, advocates of single-gender education cite two main advantages for boys: teachers can tailor lesson plans to capitalize on how boys learn best, with more action and hands-on work; and boys feel more comfortable participating in all subjects, even the fine arts and literature.
Years ago, the only single-sex schools in the Twin Cities were private – most have since merged to form coed institutions. Over the past few years, however, the doors to single-gender classrooms have started opening again; and both students and teachers are excited to talk about their experiences.
The early years
According to Dr. Leonard Sax, head of the National Association for Single Sex Public Education (NASSPE) in Poolesville, Md. and author of Why Gender Matters, differences in brain development make single-gender education most influential during the youngest years – when hormones have not even entered the picture and most parents don’t think gender matters. Yet single-gender alternatives are all but nonexistent in the elementary years.
One exception is Harvest Preparatory Boys Academy in North Minneapolis. Now in its first year, Boys Academy is a Minneapolis charter school with 140 boys enrolled in grades K-3, with plans to expand to K-6. One hundred percent of the students at Boys Academy are black and most have more to deal with than typical elementary school kids. Eighty-five percent of the kids come from low-income families and are considered “at risk” for a future involving crime.
At Boys Academy, students find healthy role models and learn how to communicate effectively, while developing self-confidence and self-discipline. In addition to addressing special socioeconomic needs, Boys Academy keeps students interested in academics by offering frequent breaks, projects, and adventure stories – designed with a boy’s development in mind.
According to Sax, we’re missing the boat by not offering more single-gender educational opportunities in the early years. He calls Boys Academy a pioneering school – one that may just pave the way for future single-gender elementary schools.
Middle school
The benefits of single-gender education during adolescence are easy to comprehend. Amoses Holton, a seventh grader at Battle Creek Middle School in St. Paul, says he gets more work done in his classes that are boys-only. “When girls are in the room,” says Holton, “I want to look at them.” Without girls present, he says he listens better during class. Out of sight, out of mind.
This is the first year Battle Creek Middle School has offered single-gender classes. Seventh grade English, history, math, and science classes are taught separately; the remaining three elective classes of the day are coed. Next year, grade eight will assume the same single-gender format.
Peter Christensen, principal of Battle Creek Middle School, says single-gender classes help boys feel more comfortable in classes that are often more difficult for them than for girls of the same age.
Student Raymone Johnson agrees. “You don’t get pressured by the girls,” he says. “The boys don’t laugh at you when you don’t know the answers. Everyone is more helpful and respectful of you.”
Johnson also notices a difference in the way his teachers present the material for his boys-only classes. “The classes are more active,” he says. “There are more projects, reports, and experiments than my other classes.”
“In education, oftentimes, girls are the gold standard,” says Christensen, “and boys are treated like damaged girls.” Since girls develop more quickly than boys in many ways, the traditional classroom approach better suits them. Separating the classrooms lets both groups use their strengths and overcome their weaknesses. Dr. Sax says that the differences within each gender prevent the classes from reinforcing stereotypical gender weaknesses.
High school
High school boys are benefiting from single-gender education, too. Matt Deutsch teaches a boys-only world literature course at Burnsville High School. It’s a class wherein boys “take more risks in class, sharing their opinions more openly” than most boys in coed literature courses. “One of the biggest surprises to me was what the class ‘sounded’ like,” says Deutsch. “Imagine 32 boys all talking during a group activity.” Not your standard fare for a literature course.
At the same time, in another room of the high school, a girls-only class studies an almost identical curriculum. “Every Thursday [the two classes] meet as a large group in the lecture hall to talk about a wide range of tops relating to the class,” says Deutsch, “[including] common themes in the literature, differences between boys and girls, gender roles and stereotypes, and a wide range of other activities.”
In the classroom, Deutsch says he has made only minor changes to the way he teaches. “I have added more competition and hands-on work,” he says, “I talk more about meta-cognition [thinking about thinking] and visualization.”
These two sections of world literature are the first single-gender classes offered at Burnsville High School. Some students signed up looking for a change, others wanted to learn how to socialize better with their own gender, and some just wanted fewer distractions in the classroom. Deutsch says the response has been “overwhelmingly positive,” from both students and parents. “One parent felt like this class was really giving her son a chance to shine,” says Deutsch. The class will be offered again this spring.
Several other public high schools in the Twin Cities have offered an occasional single-gender class in courses like voice and social studies. Several districts are compiling statistics to back up the claims that student success rates are higher in single-gender courses.
A boys-only tradition
In the fall of 1987, St. Thomas Academy became the last all-boys high school in the state when Cretin and Derham Hall merged to become Cretin-Derham Hall. While these and other single-gender private schools were closing their doors or merging to form coed schools (including Totino-Grace, Benilde-St. Margaret’s, and Shattuck-St. Mary’s), St. Thomas, along with Convent of the Visitation School, continued their long-standing traditions of boys- and girls-only education.
For these schools, single-gender education isn’t anything new. It’s got nothing to do with staying up-to-date with research; instead, it’s been the backbone for each school’s academic excellence. Mike Sjoberg, dean of students at St. Thomas, says they have an “approach to learning and discipline which more easily relates to the male way of learning and maturing.”
Boys in an all-boy high school will definitely have a “wider educational horizon,” says Dr. Sax. That’s definitely the case at St. Thomas, where most students complete four years of mathematics, science and a world language, though only three are required in each. It’s easier to avoid stereotypes like “geek” and “jock” in an atmosphere where everyone is expected to put academics first.
Senior Tim McMannus has attended St. Thomas since middle school. While switching to an all-boys school in seventh grade was an adjustment, McMannus says he really appreciates the personal and educational advantages an all-boys school affords him. As the starting quarterback for the Cadet’s second-at-state football team, McMannus remains grounded in his education. “Academics come first. I enjoy all of my classes and have become friends with a lot of my teachers,” says McMannus. On a personal level, he says, “I can really be myself at school.”
“There is a level of comfort that allows the boys to ask questions without fear or embarrassment,” says Sjoberg. Boys can be themselves all day long – not just behind the closed doors of a single-gender classroom.
The choice is yours
Despite being an advocate of single-gender education, Dr. Sax says it’s not for everyone. He and the folks at the NASSPE, however, think the choice should be available to everyone – not just those considering a private education.
This fall, the U.S. Department of Education loosened restrictions, allowing for classes and entire public schools that focus on single-gender education. The new rules let school districts and communities decide when same-sex education will foster greater academic success. However, it has to be voluntary. “Substantially equal” classrooms must be available for students who wish to remain in a coed environment, and coed schools must be available in the area surrounding a single-sex school. The new regulations have no effect on private education. Check with your school district to learn about any plans for single-gender education.
Laurie Kocanda is a Minneapolis-based freelance writer. Originally published January 2007.
