Girl Reading by Edmund C. Tarbell, c. 1909.
The Church boldly declares that “Each of the sexes is an image of the power and tenderness of God, with equal dignity though in a different way.”¹ A profound statement, surely, yet as an educator I am always quick to ask what this might mean practically for education, particularly given the obvious differences between boys and girls in the classroom. After all, it is not a brain that learns, but a person, and a person who is either male or female. How are we as teachers responsive to the differences between the sexes in the classroom?
My observations come from seventeen years of teaching adolescent girls (roughly ages eleven to eighteen). They are drawn from of working in both co-ed and single-sex schools of diverse socio-economic backgrounds and in different regions; they are also drawn from my observations of men and women who teach girls effectively. They do not presume a single-sex classroom. And yet, you may ask, “Why bother teaching boys and girls differently, if they are all in the same classroom?” In response, I would invite you to ponder once more the quotation above.
You will also notice that most of my observations apply to both sexes: boys need trust and friendship as well as girls. A discerning reader would rightly ask what, if anything, remains unique to teaching young women. Indeed. For if human nature is common to both man and woman, we would reasonably expect common pedagogical practices. And we do find this.
I think, rather, a difference in sexes results in a difference in emphasis of pedagogy, “equal dignity though in a different way.” Put another way, my observations below highlight what is particularly effective with young women, not what is exclusive to them.
Are there pedagogies exclusive to girls? I am inclined to think not. Sound practices derive from the nature of the subject: we teach dogs like dogs, and humans like humans. It turns out that boys and girls, while we might sometimes feel that they are different species, are both human.
THEMES
Certain themes recur as I think through what teacherly traits seem to be the most effective in helping a young girl be responsive to her formation:
Mercy Seasons Justice. Justice is arguably the virtue that adolescents of both sexes are most sensitive to. Are you a “fair” teacher? Do you live up to the standard of behavior that you expect from the students? Do you follow through on your word? Does your gradebook reflect what you actually value in class? Do you set achievable expectations for the students to achieve, but also ones that aren’t too low? Students have keen noses for such questions. Yet, while justice is the bedrock for establishing a good relationship, mercy follows close upon it. We remember that in fact, mercy is unachievable without justice; there must be “just desserts” for mercy to have any meaning. A girl who knows that you are willing to give her a second chance while you hold the bar high is one who will trust you. I remember one of the first seminars of the year with a class of fifteen-year-olds, who were so anxious about what grade they would earn on a seminar that they became paralyzed during the conversation. Only when I ceremoniously threw the gradebook down and announced that they all had A’s did they relax enough to have the conversation. The seminars went marvelously the rest of the year (and yes, the gradebook was reinstated at the next seminar, and this time with no angst).
Trust. Albeit the most important quality, trust is also the one that proves most elusive if you try to achieve it directly. Rather, trust is the overall result of the student’s perception that you are trustworthy. How is that judgment formed? By watching to see if you are responsive to the girl’s perceived or real needs, whether you are a person of your word, whether she sees that you love her, whether you apologize when you make a mistake, whether you are willing to say you don’t know when you don’t, whether you see her as a person. And the tricky thing is that a girl forms this judgment very quickly: buying back trust once a young person has decided you are untrustworthy can be arduous. Establish trust as soon as possible. Communicate your class expectations and expect them immediately. Remind the students regularly of your expectations as they form their habits, but also don’t delay in giving consequences for misbehavior. Share your hopes for the year, show genuine interest in your students. Take advantage of every opportunity to establish mutual respect and trust. You know that you act in a student’s best interest, but does she? Adolescents must be communicated with as persons, and they must have the opportunity to practice real agency. They are neither young children nor adults, and our interactions with them must reflect our affection for who they are right now and our excitement for who they are becoming.
Story. We are historical creatures, born as characters into our story. Clearly, the classroom is a community where both boys and girls require an abundance of rich stories: ones that portray good actions as good and bad actions as bad, that inspire with tales of heroism, that ennoble with stories of goodness. In short, stories that form the moral imagination. This is true of all young people, and especially of young women. Think how happy young boys are to learn the names of all the dinosaurs or the names of the diverse aircraft of World War II. A girl will more likely play with those same dinosaurs but by making a story and character of each figure. Likewise in the classroom: a girl expects a relationship with the material she is learning, and story is a fitting way in which that relationship begins. As a teacher, tell your own stories of the ways in which you have fallen in love with your subject or the topic, share your enthusiasm, introduce the content of your subject in a narrative way. Teach science and math as the stories they are of curious men and women trying to understand the world around them. Teach history as the story of God’s unfolding relationship with us. Teach literature as stories of men and women who are agents in the unfolding of their life, and help students see that they are the protagonists in their own story.
Friendship. Girls, like any of us, thrive on a variety of healthy friendships: peers (of both sexes), younger children, teachers. Even more, friendship is the context in which adolescent girls are receptive to learning. As teachers, we often see this through the via negativa: how many times have we witnessed a girl half-hearted and distracted in class due to trouble she is having in a friendship? A common occurrence for anyone who has taught middle school. Lewis notes that friendship occurs when people love the same truth, when they share it.² Friendship presupposes a shared love of reality. For this reason, providing an abundant variety of opportunities for a girl to develop hobbies and interests becomes paramount. This common love (choir, reading, woodwork, gardening, service projects, cooking, dance, athletics, etc.) draws a girl beyond herself. This is just as true in the classroom. The teacher must share and foster a common love of the subject at hand. Story is a particularly powerful way to do this (see above). But also, as a teacher, take time to delight in learning, share aloud your own wonderings about the subject, and accompany the girl through the difficulties of learning, showing her your confidence that she is capable of great things. A healthy friendship between teacher and student energizes the girl to learn, and strengthens her during inevitable difficulties that arise.
TIPS
How to make all this tangible? Here are some practical tips I have seen work in a variety of classrooms:
- Address the student by name.
- Show your sense of humor. Avoid sarcasm, which can easily be misconstrued by the young and leaves open the possibility that maybe you aren’t joking.
- When working with a girl, consider working face-to-face in addition to side-by-side, especially if she is finding the work challenging.³
- Be consistent and clear in your expectations. Hold high standards, but know when to extend an olive branch and give a second chance. Examine whether your gradebook and weighting reflect what you do and value in class, including the development of student virtues.
- Get to know the interests of your student as well as her context.
- Be judicious in your use of competitions. Consider whether having “boys against girls” might not reinforce an unhealthy opposition between the sexes, or unintentionally convey that learning is about winning. Competitions can be beneficial when there are drills that need to be reinforced or when they express a genuine spirit of play.
- In formal and informal ways point out the virtues the girl has been growing in, not just the work she has done. In particular, note the behavior associated with the virtue. Be specific: instead of “Mary is growing in perseverance,” consider “Mary, I notice that you took advantage of the rewriting opportunity on the essay.” Notice and tell her when she perseveres, ventures a response when she doesn’t feel confident, helps others, asks for help, rises above her shortcomings.
- Teach your subject in a narrative way. This does not mean tacking on stories to “make math relevant.” Rather than assigning a paper on the biography of a mathematician, for instance, teach the actual math in terms of the development of the concepts and questions of mathematics.
- If you teach in a co-ed classroom, don’t favor either sex, whether in your expectations, your body language, or your tone of voice.
- If parent-teacher conferences are held without the student, consider sharing with her what you will communicate to her parents in advance. I will sometimes ask the student if there is anything she wants to add or that I should know in advance of the conversation. If the student is present, speak to her directly and avoid speaking to the parents as if she were absent.
If you are interested in further reading and for a rich study on the subject of woman’s vocation, try John Paul II’s apostolic letter, Dignitatem Mulieris. I have found Leonard Sax’s Girls on the Edge to be helpful as well. And of course there is Edith Stein’s Essays on Woman, the fruit of her years of work teaching in girls’ schools.⁴
CONCLUSION
“The fact that man ‘created as man and woman’ is the image of God means not only that each of them individually is like God, as a rational and free being. It also means that man and woman, created as a “unity of the two” in their common humanity, are called to live in a communion of love, and in this way to mirror in the world the communion of love that is in God, through which the Three Persons love each other in the intimate mystery of the one divine life.”⁵ When we collaborate with the natural differences between boys and girls as they pursue truth, we help form persons who reflect the Trinity in Its unity in difference.
¹Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Washington, DC: Libreria Editrice Vaticana-United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2000), par. 2335.
²C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves (New York, NY: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1960), 97.
³I am grateful to Dr. Leonard Sax for this insight that he shared at a lecture.
⁴Edith Stein’s practical wisdom shines in this work, though discretion must be taken with respect to her philosophy of woman (for instance, her notion of a female soul). Nevertheless, her experience with girls is invaluable.
⁵John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem, 7, accessed August 30, 2024, https://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/apost_letters/1988/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_19880815_mulieris-dignitatem.html.