Girls in the Physics Classroom: A Teachers' Guide - Institute of Physics

2: Lessons from research
Table 2.3: Teachers’ preconceptions about students’ achievements
Topic Girls Boys
How difficult do
students find, e.g.
very not at all very not at all
electric circuits and symbols 1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5
8. The findings reported here
come from the section 3 of
Murphy and Whitelegg’s report.
2.1d Reviewing action taken
A questionnaire with a five point scale, (e.g. appendix 4.2)
can be used to monitor the impact of intervening to change
girls’ experience of physics. If you have attempted change,
you could re-administer the questionnaire to find out if students’
views have shifted.
2.2 The curriculum perspective 8
Did you know?
Curriculum relevance
● Gender-determined notions about the personal
relevance of physics lessons also influence feelings of
competence. Perceptions about relevance cause
students to choose to, or to feel able to, engage with
learning and they therefore influence what they are
able to learn. For example, some boys will avoid
activities about health and domestic situations while
others will approach them tentatively. Some girls will
avoid activities featuring machinery if the emphasis is
on mechanics and the purpose is not socially relevant
(e.g. health and safety).
● What boys, more than girls, pay attention to and feel
competent in is generally valued and judged to be
relevant in physics.
● Differences in perceptions of relevance also affect the
problems that students identify. Girls are more likely
than boys to give value to the social context in which
activities are set; boys are more likely than girls not to
focus on the context.
● A UK study of A-level physics teachers reported that
girls found electrical circuits, electromagnetism and
mechanics more difficult than boys did. Mathematics
teachers agreed about mechanics being more difficult
for girls. Boys and girls in the study considered that
they were equally successful across all topics.
Curriculum interventions
● Curriculum changes that increase girls’ engagement
and achievement in physics have no detrimental effect
on boys’ overall achievement and in some cases they
have improved all students’ performance.
● Some students, particularly some boys, reject these
curriculum changes because they have learned not to
pay attention to social contextual issues and feel
disadvantaged when required to do so.
Could this be happening in your school?
Some questions to consider:
● Do you think that there are physics topics or aspects of
physics that are more difficult for girls than boys?
● Do students differ in what they believe they are good at
in physics?
● Is this affecting how they engage with topics in
physics?
● Are there gender differences in test results for these
topics; for which girls and which boys?
2.2a Finding out what is happening in your school
Student questionnaires
If you used question 4 in the first questionnaire in appendix
4.2, you will have information at topic level about students’
views of how well they understand topics.
Teacher questionnaire
You might want to examine other teachers’ as well as your
own preconceptions about the achievement of students in
physics. To do this, you could list the topics in your student
questionnaire on a single side of A4 paper and then ask
colleagues to rate how well they consider that girls overall,
and boys overall, do in relation to them. Use two columns
side by side (table 2.3). If you are working in a single-sex
school, you can still use such a questionnaire but use only
one column. You could use the following open-ended question
after the list to find out colleagues’ reasons for their
views. What do you base your views on?
● research
● analysis of performance
● experience
● observation
You could follow up this questionnaire with interviews to
probe colleagues’ views and the basis for them.
Observations
You can use an observation schedule to consider:
● how girls and boys approach tasks and if there is a
gender effect;
● how well students understand the physics tasks
through their engagement with the tasks.
What you plan to observe will vary, depending on the type
of school that you are in and what questions you want to
explore. It is useful to set yourself a specific period of the
lesson for observing. You might want to observe overall
behaviours:
● If you allow students to choose their groups, what
groupings do they prefer?
● If you select groups, which arrangements are the most
successful?
● If it is practical work, which students collect
equipment? How was this decided?
● If there is a planning element to the activity, are the
14 I NSTITUTE OF P HYSICS R EPORT G IRLS IN THE P HYSICS C LASSROOM: A TEACHERS’ GUIDE FOR A CTION D ECEMBER 2006