Review of Strategies to Address Gender Inequalities in Scottish ...

class. Teachers also felt it gave them an opportunity to adapt strategies to boys’ needs tohelp tackle the boys’ behaviour in class routines: boys need a quick start, tasks rightaway, being set to work, providing more structure, more small steps. SGCs were aboutgirls and boys not trying to impress each other. However, the school evaluation of theprevious year indicated no discernible effect of the initiative on attainment.It is important to note that SGCs have been used in a limited way in each of the casestudy schools and for a short period of time. The strategy has been limited in terms ofsubjects and in terms of targeting particular sets of pupils, predominantly the pupils in themiddle range of attainment, although it had been used in one school across year cohortsS2 –S4 in specific subjects.Further, the use of SGCs was focused on wider issues of raising attainment rather thanspecifically on issues related to gender and teaching and learning. In one school the ideaoriginated from the Principal Teacher seeing this strategy as a possible way of raisingattainment and it was introduced to the department as part of the task of setting each yeargroup for the particular subject. There was no extended staff development related togender issues, with only one or two instances of staff attending development courses onthe issue of teaching boys. There was also very limited change in content to match morecarefully the interests of either boys or girls. In only one school was there a coordinateddevelopment between two subjects where the intention was to reduce class sizes as wellas timetable a coherent PSE programme. Discussion had been largely contained withinthe department, with some staff accessing recent articles and the work of another school.In only one school was the initiative related to wider school development processes andcoordinated and evaluated. There were some common threads in the teachers’ views:• the issue of behaviour, particularly in S3 and S4, where boys and girls tend to showoff in the presence of the opposite sex;• S3/S4 was seen as an ideal time to use SGCs – although they were used with S2 inone school, some teachers had reservations about using them with younger stages;• SGCs tended to be targeted at the middle range of attainment, with reservations aboutusing it with higher- or lower-attaining pupils;• they provided girls with the opportunity to develop confidence and to be able tospeak out in class;• in English it was felt that SGCs provided the opportunity to raise issues aboutemotions and experiences for both boys and girls in ways that would not have beeneasy in a mixed context;• they provided opportunities to match content to boys’ interests;• they were considered by some as successful for boys in providing structure, shortclear tasks and increasing motivation;• some boys’ classes proved difficult to manage, particularly where these were larger(~ 30 pupils); here there was a constant need to focus on behaviour. A lot of time wastaken up with this and the pace of covering the course was consequently slower;• in two schools there had not been any discernible impact on attainment; and• in one school there was a view that attainment had improved to some degree.However, there were differences in perceptions across teachers and schools. Someteachers thought it more enjoyable to work with SGCs, finding it easier to build up agood relationship and rapport. Others were less convinced and reported difficultiesrelating to behaviour in boys’ classes. In one instance, a girls’ class was seen as difficultto handle, but this was due to previous disruption.______________________________________________________________________________________Review of Strategies to 36 University of StrathclydeAddress Gender Inequalitiesand University of Glasgow