1
Boys, Gender and School Literacy Achievement
Current Insights and Possible Ways Forward

• RAI Presentation
• Cork Education Support Centre
• Monday May 18th 2009
• Dr. Brian Murphy,
• Education Department, UCC

2
PISA findings 2006 for reading literacy with
respect to the gender variable

• Females obtained significantly higher mean
  reading literacy scores than males in all
  participating countries (Eivers et al. 2007, p.
  22)
• Mean scores for reading literacy
• GIRLS BOYS GAP
• PISA 2006 average 511.2 473.0 38.2
• PISA 2006 (Ireland) 534.0 500.2 33.8
• Percentage of students scoring at highest
  proficiency Level 5
• GIRLS BOYS GAP
• PISA 2006 average 11.0 6.2 4.8
• PISA 2006 (Ireland) 14.6. 8.7 5.9
• Over twice the number of boys scored at or below
  the lowest proficiency Level 1
• GIRLS BOYS GAP
• PISA 2006 average 14.2 25.8 11.6
• PISA 2006 (Ireland) 7.7 16.7 9

3
PISA trends for reading literacy in Ireland with
respect to the gender variable

• Across PISA 2000, 2003 2006 a consistent trend
  emerges with respect to reading achievement in
  Ireland
• Mean reading literacy scores
• GIRLS BOYS GAP
• PISA 2000 542 513 29
• PISA 2003 530 501 29
• PISA 2006 534 500 34
• Over twice the number of boys scored at or below
  the lowest level of reading proficiency (level 1)
• GIRLS BOYS GAP
• PISA 2000 8.3 13.5. 5.2
• PISA 2003 7.7 14.3 6.6
• PISA 2006 7.7 16.7 9

4
Trends re gender and reading from PISA 2000,
2003 2006

• In all OECD countries girls recorded higher
  levels of engagement and interest in reading and
  higher levels of performance in reading literacy
• Girls
• Perform better on reading both main types of
  texts but especially on continuous text
• Report reading a more diverse range of materials
  (beyond newspaper, magazines and comics
  especially fiction)
• Read more frequently for leisure
• Hold a more positive attitude to reading

5
Trends re gender and reading from PISA 2000,
2003 2006

• High percentage of males who never read fiction
  for leisure (33.1 boys v. 18.9 girls, PISA
  2003)
• Girls outperformed boys on the three reading
  process subscales (reflect/evaluate, interpret,
  retrieve)
• Largest difference (37.2 points) on the
  reflect/evaluate scale
• Smallest (22.3) on the retrieve scale (PISA 2003
  findings cited in Shiel 2006, p. 88)

6
Clear reality emerging

• What is clear is that across OECD nations girls
  of all social classes and of a majority of ethnic
  groups outstrip the achievement of their male
  counterparts at language and literacy (Francis,
  2006)

7
Summary of issueCore dimensions

• An international and Irish problem with boys
  achievement in schooling generally
• Boys more likely than girls to have specific
  problems with basic literacy
• Significant gender differences in text choice,
  amount of time and enthusiasm given to reading

8
Summary of issueCore dimensions

• As they progress through school reading seen as
  an activity more appropriate to girls than boys
  and differences widen (Smith Wilhelm 2002,
  Millard 1997)
• Boys failing to make proper progress in literacy
  and their peer cultures and school contexts
  exacerbate their difficulties (Hall Coles,
  2001, p. 212) across the developed world
• Gap appears to be widening of late

9
In summary

• language - both talk and the in-school business
  of literacy - is not something boys need or want
  to see themselves good at, it is not something
  which interests them, not something they DO.
• (Carr Pauwels 2006, p. 168)

10
Important caveats to the overall discussion

• Boys not a homogenous group - no such thing as a
  generic boy
• Some boys, certain boys and not all boys are
  underachieving and not all girls are succeeding
  or outperforming boys
• Particular problem with in-school language and
  literacy practices as boys identified to engage
  powerfully with a range of out-of-school literacy
  practices rarely drawn upon in classrooms

11
Important caveats to the overall discussion

• Gender one of a range of factors that impact on
  educational attainment. Impact of other variables
  e.g. ethnicity but particularly socio-economic
  status
• Gender as a social construct, shaped by larger
  cultural, institutional and material processes
• Conditions and performance of gender dictated by
  a variety of material, social and psychological
  and individual life circumstances

12
An alternative model

• Traditional binary model generally used to
  rationalise the issue
• Position encapsulated in the Sé Sí Gender in
  Irish Education report in the following quote
• It is difficult to assess the extent to which
  this reflects innate dispositions towards
  different subject areas and the extent to which
  it arises as a consequence of socialisation and
  social conditioning. (DES 2007, p.4)

13
Binary model of explanation

• Difference in learning/language learning between
  boys and girls has been attributed to two broad
  headings (nature/nurture debate)
• The essentialist (nature) position
• A biological/neurological/physiological argument
  where gender/gender difference is a matter of
  biology and biological sex

14
Binary model of explanation

• The anti-essentialist (nurture) position
• The individual learner as socially constituted
  and socially situated negotiating cultural and
  material circumstances
• A socio-cultural argument where gender/gender
  difference is about socially constructed maleness
  and femaleness and performance of same
• (genderverb, are/have but also do gender)

15
Further explanations Binary model

• Essentialist (nature) position
• Anti-essentialist (nurture) position
• In conjunction with specific dimensions generally
  labelled
• Identified gendered reading behaviours
• School and curriculum factors
• Home background factors

16
Some identified responses

• No one-size-fits all strategyabout changing ways
  of thinking rather than prescribing ways of
  doing
• The essentialist response
• The anti-essentialist response

17
A middle ground response

• A balanced middle-ground emerging comprising
• A richer diet of text
• A richer diet of text activity
• The transformative or rhizomatic literacy
  pedagogical framework (Rowan et al. 2002)
• Embraces use of digital texts and popular culture
  as counter narratives
• Requires deconstruction of many assumptions
  associated with boys, essentialist views of
  literacy, technology and popular culture through
  text and practice