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PSY 211
Research Paper
3/20/06
Gender Differences in the Classroom
Gender bias in the classroom is possibly one of the most pressing issues facing educators
today. It exists in classrooms all over the world, despite the efforts that many teachers make to
prevent its occurrence. Whether this discrimination on the basis of sex is intentional or
unintentional, it is nevertheless a very real phenomenon that could potentially have an effect on
the educational success of schoolchildren everywhere. A number of researchers have studied
gender bias in the classroom and have found that in general, the way teachers interact with
students of different genders differs in a multitude of ways, such as the amount of instructional
attention, criticism, and feedback each gender receives, which gender is more likely to engage
in student-initiated communication, and the relationship between teacher-student interactions
and physical proximity to each gender.
Communication related specifically to instruction is not always equally distributed among
boys and girls in a single classroom. In fact, studies have shown that overall, females receive
less instructional attention in the classroom than their male counterparts do (Marshall &
Reinhartz, 334). Researchers have discovered that “boys dominate in the classroom. They get
more attention from teachers and interact more with them than do girls” (Einarsson &
Granstrom, 118). This phenomenon could be occurring for a number of different reasons; for
instance, males could be viewed by educators as needier than females, or perhaps females are
seen as more capable of completing various classroom tasks, and therefore do not need as
much instructional attention as males.
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Whatever the underlying cause, these inequities in teacher attention are certainly very real.
When observing in Mrs. Burke’s 3rd grade classroom, I witnessed several instances in which
the girls in the class were given a great deal less instructional attention than the boys in the
class. For example, I kept track of the number of times Mrs. Burke made instructional contact
with both males and females during one two-hour time period, and found that in a class fairly
equally split between each gender, females made sixteen instructional contacts with the
teacher, while males made twenty-three instructional contacts with her; this discrepancy
between the amount of attention boys and girls in the same classroom received is as large as it
is obvious. In addition, while the students worked in groups of three on a math problem, Mrs.
Burke clearly gave her male students more attention than her female students. As the children
combined their individual answers, which they had each written on a separate sheet of paper,
into one group answer to be written on a large sheet of paper, Mrs. Burke sat on a desk and
communicated with an all-male group for approximately three minutes. The rest of the time the
children worked in their groups, Mrs. Burke walked around the classroom, observing, perhaps
making comments or answering questions here and there, but not once did she stop and talk for
an extended period of time with another group of students.
The results of my observations confirmed the results of the research that I read. In the
article, “Sexism and Sex Discrimination in Education,” O’Reilly and Borman write,
“Conventional sex-role ideology may convince teachers that boys give them more trouble than
girls, but it also makes them give boys more attention, help, and teaching” (110). The instances
in which I witnessed Mrs. Burke giving her male students more instructional attention support
the idea that researchers such as O’Reilly and Borman have put forward: in the classroom, girls
make less instructional contacts with their teachers than boys do (110).
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Just as males and females receive different amounts of instructional attention from techers,
so do they receive different amounts of criticism, as well. In fact, boys are more likely to be
criticized by their teachers in the classroom than are girls (Einarsson & Granstrom, 118). In
“Challenging Gender Bias in Fifth Grade,” Matthews, Binkley, Crisp, and Gregg note that
while doing research in the area of discrimination on the basis of gender in elementary
classrooms, they found that many researchers pointed to the fact that “teachers punish boys
more severely than girls for the same infractions…” (54). During my observation in Mrs.
Burke’s 3rd grade classroom, I witnessed an example of this phenomenon. As the students were
working independently on their science packets at their desks, Mrs. Burke told a male student
to sit down in his chair and get working on his packet. However, this boy was not the only
child in the room standing at that time; there were also two female students standing, as well.
Mrs. Burke did not ask the girls to sit down, yet she did ask the boy to sit down. This
occurrence illustrates the idea that in the classroom, male students receive more criticism from
the teacher than do their female counterparts.
In “The Other Side of the Gender Gap,” Warrington and Younger write that “boys tended to
receive more rebukes, and felt overwhelmingly that they were discriminated against because
far more negative attention was unjustly focused on them” (498). Negative teacher attention,
one can argue, has been shown to be focused, perhaps unfairly, on males as opposed to
females. When observing in Mrs. Burke’s classroom, I saw an example of this very issue. I
kept track of every instance Mrs. Burke gave disciplinary attention to both the male and female
students. What I found was that during one two-hour time period, the girls in the class made a
total of nine disciplinary contacts with Mrs. Burke, while the boys in the class made a total of
nineteen disciplinary contacts with her. In addition, I observed that while the students were
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completing a multiplication worksheet, a time period of approximately ten minutes, Mrs. Burke
reprimanded thirteen boys for various reasons, such as talking with a neighbor, not working on
the assignment, or disturbing others. However, she did not reprimand a single female student
during that time. The discrepancy between these numbers is blatant, yet the reason such a gap
between the amount of criticism male and female students receive exists is not as obvious;
perhaps girls truly are better-behaved than boys, or perhaps it is simply a matter of stereotypes,
and males are unfairly categorized as in need of discipline. Nonetheless, the results of my
observations support the idea that males receive more criticism from their teachers than
females do.
Yet another inequity exists in the classroom: the amount of support and encouragement that
teachers give to their students is not equally distributed among both genders. Marshall and
Reinhartz note that “girls…are provided less constructive feedback and encouragement than
boys…” (334). They also write, “In a 1990 study, Good and Brophy affirmed additional
differences in the way teachers treat students. They noted that teachers…reinforce boys for
general responses more than they do girls” (335). Perhaps beliefs about motivation are what
cause educators to participate in this type of gender bias; some teachers may believe, either
consciously or unconsciously, that male students need more encouragement in order to succeed
in school than female students do, and therefore give support in a unequal manner. Whatever
the reason, there is certainly evidence in support of the claim that teacher do not praise girls as
frequently as they do boys.
During the course of my observation in Mrs. Burke’s classroom, I noted that Mrs. Burke did
not distribute encouragement equally among her male and female students. For example, I kept
track of how many times Mrs. Burke praised her students, marking in my notes which gender
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each instance of encouragement was directed toward. I found that during the time I was in the
classroom observing, she praised her female students a total of three times, yet praised her
male students a total of seven times. There is an obvious difference between the amount of
encouragement each gender receives, and this information corresponds with what researchers
have found: in the classroom, girls receive less feedback and praise than boys do (Marshall &
Reinhartz, 334).
The amount of interactions a teacher has with students of each gender is not only affected
by what the teacher does, but by what the students do, as well. In fact, research has shown that
male students are more likely to instigate communication with their teachers than their female
counterparts are (Einarsson & Granstrom, 124). The fact that boys generally initiate contact
with teachers more than girls do could possibly help explain why there is an inequity in teacher
attention between each gender. For instance, perhaps because more male students initiate
communication with their teachers than female students do, teachers are more apt to focus their
attention, whether it be instructional or disciplinary, on these male students. On the other hand,
perhaps because boys are given more teacher attention in the classroom, they are more likely to
instigate communication with their teachers.
The results of my observations in Mrs. Burke’s 3rd grade classroom were consistent with the
research on this particular issue; I found that during one two-hour time period, the male
students in the class raised their hands to ask Mrs. Burke an instructional question in front of
the class four times, while the female students in the class did not raise their hands to ask any
questions in front of the class at all. During this same time, I also kept track of how many times
students of each gender raised their hands to ask Mrs. Burke a question on an individual basis.
Again, the results were consistent with my previous research: Mrs. Burke was asked individual
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questions by girls in the class eight different times, while she was asked individual questions
by boys in the class a total of thirteen times. During my observation, I witnessed firsthand what
researchers such as Einarsson and Granstrom argue happens in the classroom: in general, boys
are more apt to instigate contact with their teachers than girls are.
The physical proximity of teachers to students may also have an effect on the amount of
teacher-student interactions that occur with each gender in the classroom. In “Sexism and Sex
Discrimination in Education,” O’Reilly & Borman argue that, “teachers interact with boys no
matter where they are in the classroom, which allows boys to move around independently;
however, teachers respond to girls mainly when they are physically near the teacher, thus
encouraging clinging, dependent behavior in girls” (111). Perhaps this phenomenon is
occurring simply because teachers feel that they have to give more of their attention to their
male students in order to ensure their success in the classroom, or perhaps it is because female
students are more likely to work independently than males, and therefore do not capture the
attention of the teacher as often as males do. Whatever the case may be, the research done on
this particular issue only goes to support the idea that in general, male students receive more
attention from their teachers than their female counterparts do.
During the course of my observation in Mrs. Burke’s classroom, I wanted to keep track of
the number of times that Mrs. Burke initiated instructional contact with her students, and which
gender each of these contacts were made with. Not surprisingly, the results I got were
consistent with the research that I found on the subject: during the two-hour time in which I
was in the classroom observing, Mrs. Burke initiated nineteen instructional contacts with her
male students, yet only initiated seven instructional contacts with her female students. The
children in the class were working independently on various assignments during the vast
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majority of this time, so in order for Mrs. Burke to initiate contact with students of either
gender, she had to physically travel to where the students were working. She interacted with
her male students a great deal more than she did with her female students, despite the fact that
both genders were spread out through the room in the same manner, reinforcing the idea that in
general, teachers interact with their male students no matter the distance between them, yet
they tend to only interact with their female students only if they are in close proximity to each
other (O’Reilly & Borman, 111).
Researchers have made a number of different observations about teacher-student interaction
as it relates to gender, and have found that overall, male students receive more attention in the
classroom than female students do. Some assert that males make more instructional contacts
with teachers than females do (Marshall & Reinhartz, 334), while others claim that boys are the
recipients of a larger amount of teacher criticism than girls are (Einarsson & Granstrom, 118).
Some have found that female students receive less support and praise than male students do
(Marshall & Reinhartz, 334), some have concluded that boys generally instigate
communication with teachers more frequently than girls do (Einarsson & Granstrom, 124), and
still others have found that teachers tend to interact with male students no matter where they
may be in the classroom, yet only interact with female students if they are in close proximity to
each other (O’Reilly & Borman, 111). One may conclude from the research on each of these
components of teacher-student interaction that males and females are not treated equitably in
the classroom; overall, male students receive more attention than their female counterparts, and
the effects of this gender bias occurring in education today may be widespread and have
serious consequences for the academic success of children everywhere.
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References
Einarsson, C. & Granstrom, K. (2002). Gender-biased interaction in the classroom: the
influence
of gender and age in the relationship between teacher and pupil. Scandinavian Journal of
Educational Research, 46, 117-127.
Marshall, C. & Reinhartz, J. (1997). Gender issues in the classroom. Clearing House, 70, 333341.
Matthews, C. E., Binkley, W., Crisp, A., & Gregg, K. (1997). Challenging gender bias in fifth
grade. Educational Leadership, 54-57.
O’Reilly, P. & Borman, K. (2001). Sexism and sex discrimination in education. Theory Into
Practice, 23, 110-116.
Warrington, M. & Younger, M. (2000). The other side of the gender gap. Gender & Education,
12, 493-508.