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Tuesday 16 December 2008

Why are girls outperforming boys in school?






It is widely acknowldegd that girls are now outperforming boys in their educational achievement. What factors have influenced this change and how effective have they been?

25 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think the main reason for why girls outperform boys in school is because girls are so much better organised! they have a lot more struture when it comes to education and they are well-prepared. Also, the fact that girls have that primary socialisation from their family e.g reading books, allows girls to perform better later on in life

Anonymous said...

there is a lack of male primary school teachers as only 16% of primary school teachers are male

a pole done by Yougov found that 39% of childeren aged 8-11 year old boys had no lessons with male teachers and the majority of the boys questioned said that a male teacher made them behave betterand 42% said they work harder

recent rsearch has suggested this pole is too simplistic as Francis found that 2/3 of 7-8 year olds thought that the gender of teachers did not matter

James Ghafoor 12RAS

Anonymous said...

girls are doing better because education has apparantly become more feminised according to Tony Sewell (bbc 2006). There's a decline in traditional mens jobs e.g. iron and steel industries. This decline in mens jobs has impacted on boys negatively, as they have become less motivated, thinking there are no 'proper jobs'.

Anonymous said...

Girls are outperforming boys in school because thier leisure activites are less distracting compared to boys . Boys are more active and prefer to do hobbies such as sports . However girls tend to socialise more through talking to friends. This helps improve thier vocabulary and thier overall language skills.
Priya

Anonymous said...

Personally i agree with the article Women now have far more career options open to them than the traditional nurse or childcare worker due to the success and impact of feminism e.g- new laws. I think girls can appreciate having the variety to choose from and try to get good qualifications to meet their goals.

There are also far more role models out there for girls, women working and being successful in non traditional fields like science or medicine. Girls can see this and have someone to look up to, letting them see and gain help in reaching that career they wish for. I believe this is effective however i still can't think, even now of as many famous women in these fields although i know there are more thank in previous years.

-Helen- 13SEV

Anonymous said...

i Belive that girls are now doing better academically than boys as they have a much larger choice of careers to choose from than there was 30 years ago when the main option for them was to be a housewife.

Girls between them have alot of competition too when it comes exam time wher they put alot of hard work and effort in too.

boys are seen to be in a'laddish' culture in which it is not cool to be academic.

Anonymous said...

One reason why girls are outperforming boys is because the exams themselves have changed. As the exams have become more coursework-based, boys are having greater difficulty in achieving high grades.Girls are more conscientious and organised than boys which makes them more successful.

Irim Hussain

Anonymous said...

GCSE's were introduced in September 1986 which brought with it the introduction of coursework to most subjects. This was an advantage for girls but disadvantaged boys. This is because girls are more meticulous with their work, spending more time of it but always ensuring that they meet the deadlines. Also, girls mature earlier than boys meaning that they have more of an ability to concentrate for longer, compared to boys of the same age. These characteristics and skills allow girls to achieve greater success in today’s society than boys.
Emma Halliday 13BW

Anonymous said...

Claire Power 13MCB

There are many reasons why girls are now outperformig boys, girls are alot more organised allowing them better revision etc..and they are more likely to hand work in when a dealine is set. Also girls gain skills in their primary socialisation that enable them to be tidier, more organised and more willing to read, and work. Whereas boys, in their primary socialisation gain skills that enable them to be athletic and stong etc. Teenagers are very much influenced by their peers, and boys have that laddish part of them where it is not cool to work and they would much rather go out with their mates. Girls now also have more role models to look up to, and there is also a lack in traditional mens jobs, meaning that boys see no point in school as they have no job to go in to at the end.

Anonymous said...

Girls tend to work harder than boys these days as they see career opportunities that in the past might not have been open to them.

Whereas boys are victims of a "laddish" culture in which it is not cool to be academic, this is one of the reasons why they are not performing as well.

Anonymous said...

I think that girls are outperforming boys within education because of laddish subcultures. Within school, boys feel like they have something to prove by not concentrating on their work, and instead acting masculine. You rarely see an anti-school subculture with, girls as trying hard within education is not a threat to their femininity.

Matthew Parry 12SD

Anonymous said...

From my own knowledge i would say that boys who aren't socialised to be typical boys (e.g. playing sport tend to do better academically . But other factors such as class are probably at work here, because a middle-class boy is less likely to feel the need to be laddish and show that he's tough.

I certainly think girls can be more self-motivated to work mentally and they tend to have a higher boredom threshold than boys, which could be down to girls partaking in more subdued activities. However this theory doesn't fit with many boys playing with inanimate Lego sets.

Oliver Shaw 12ALQ

Anonymous said...

The gender gap in achievement can be the result both internal and external factors. External factors such as the changes in womens employment, has been the encouragement girls need to do better at school, boys may not feel the same kind of encouragement as they have always had jobs available to them. Coursework is an internal factor which has enabled girls to outperform girls as they are far more organised on average than boys so their coursework marks are usually better.

Bethany said...

I think one of the reasons that girls are outpeforming boys is down to the 'laddish' subculture which has been recently recognised by sociologists. These subcultures have lead to the thought of a boy who completes work being a 'swot' or a 'sissie', this has meant that many boys are underperforming.

Bethany PW 12RAS

Anonymous said...

Girls are out perfroming boys in school as it's noticed girls are much better at things such as multi tasking and being more organised so the academic environment is much more suited to them. Also, girls do mature faster than boys, and learn how to conduct their selves is particyular environments unlike boys who firstly more interested in sports, such as football, which not only would they prefer to play but watch on t.v, and also, the mature slower and thus want to cause disruption, and mess around rather than considering their future.

Anonymous said...

Girls have seen to be more organised throughout history for example keeping things tidy and in order which could be used in the household aswell as in education. This would help them in school where they could keep notes and organise their folders. Girls are also known for finding the time to get things done for example they tend to plan their time better than boys and create set schedules which allows them to get the work they need done without rushing it, leading to better grades.
Boys however are known to become distracted easily. This could be because there are many home activites to become drawn to such as the xbox and ps3.

Anonymous said...

The main reason girls now out preform boys in school is because when GCSE's where introduced they also introduced coursework as a major part of the qualification and this is more suited towards girls as they tend to be more organized and better at meting deadlines than boys.
Another reason is schools have also become more feminised, prioritizing traits such as methodical working and attentiveness, which are commonly associated with girls over competitiveness and leadership, which are seen as more masculine traits.
Ashanti Bolloten
12KK

Anonymous said...

The introduction of GCSE's has led to more coursework in courses, which girls are usually better at doing than boys, as they are traditionally more focused and organised, due to the way they are socialised, initially in the home and then in early school life. Boys are usually more suited to less academic and more practical subjects, and often suffer from lack of concentration and self motivation to do work, leading to worse results.

Anonymous said...

Girls are outperforming boys in school partially due to the fact that girls are much more efficient in time management. Therefore this allows them to be significantly more organised. However boys tend to cram tasks and information in to a short period of time.

Abu 13 SEV

Anonymous said...

I think the main reason girls are out performing boys in school is because of the self-fulfilling prophecy, girls are labelled as being more hard working and effecient than boys by teachers and this leads to them outperforming boys =D

Anonymous said...

I think that girls are outperforming boys far more nowadays due to the wider range of career and academic options available to them and the constant influence of equality between both genders.
In comparison to what the norm used to be back in 60's, it was of the stereotypical image of girls looking after the children and husband while he provides for the family.
Now girls have the opprtunity to reach their full potential and in general are more organized and consciencious about aiming and achieveing high.
On the other hand boys are influenced by the typical view of achieveing a high status amongst their peers by not concentrating and being less academically successful.
Sonam Kaur 12KK

nadia mahmood said...

i think that girls are outperforming boys in schools because they're getting better A-level results than the boys.
They overtook boys at GCSE level a few years ago. And the fact that more girls are aiming for careers and university than in the past is one reason for the rise.becasue of equal rights acts girls now see the oppertuninties that are there for them to grab, therfore they try harder at school in order to make a good career for themselves instead of following the traditional ideology of women.
Another is that the introduction of more course work and modular exams suits girls better. as they spend more time in organisation of work and ensuring that they meet deadlines.

Anonymous said...

I Think this Can Be Linked To The Family. Primary Socialization Can Be Part Of The Reason Why Girls Ane Achieveing Better Than Boys In School.
Girls See Their Mothers And Todays Societies [Which A High Pertcentage Is Lone Parent Mothers] And See There Mothers AIming High And Doing Well Without Men, Therefore There Mothers Raise The Bar For Them And Encourage Achievement And Carries On The Process Of Equality Or Rising Above Males.

Anonymous said...

Girls preform better then boys due to their different behaviour, males seem to have a laddish behaviour, leading them to mess around, while girls have more motivation. Another explaination could be that girls are labelled more positivly then boy due to their attitudes and appearance, resulting in more attention from the teachers as they are put to the front of the class, and there are more females teachers to relate to females.

Nyomi Bates 12EJ

Anonymous said...

The fact that it is widely accepted that girls academic afluency is now at a greater rate than that of boys has come as a result of factors of social change in the educational and work enviroment.

With greater inscentives for females to continue into higher education as a result of the action taken by Liberal Femenists to combat inequalities through legislatory means. Specific examples being those such as The equal pay act. This offers further reasoning for females to attain as work is now a more appertising prospect.

Junaid Hussain 13RGS