CONWAY — This year’s incoming sixth graders at St. Joseph Elementary School are participating in a new learning technique. This class of about 40 students is being separated by gender in the classroom.
“I’ve thought about doing this for a long while,” said Susie Freyaldenhoven, elementary principal. “Sixth grade is a time of great transition for children. They tend to wear their emotions on their sleeves.”
During her seven years as principal of the school, which includes fourth through sixth grade, she said she has noticed that middle school students go through the greatest hormonal changes — adolescents begin turning into adults.
“I think when children are going through puberty is a perfect time to separate by gender,” Freyaldenhoven said. “The attention they receive from the opposite sex is often distracting in the learning process.”
After gaining the support of teachers, Freyaldenhoven wrote a letter to parents and students at the beginning of the summer break asking their opinion about dividing the group by gender.
By mid-June she had the support she needed and informed parents of the decision through a second letter on June 20.
“I was surprised by the support,” she said. “The majority of the feedback was positive both from parents and students.”
Freyaldenhoven said parents did have questions and she addressed several of these in a letter on the day-to-day instruction of the children.
She said many parents asked if the children would be separated all day and if they would still have two teachers. It happens that the sixth grade has two teachers — one male and one female.
Freyaldenhoven said the children would have several periods joined together including art, music, recess and lunch. They will also have each teacher for half a day.
The separation of genders would not affect any student with special education needs, she said.
The idea for the separation came from research the showed how boys and girls learn in different ways.
“In the last 10 years, there has been much research on how the male and female brain learns differently,” she said. “Not better or good or bad, just different.”
Freyaldenhoven also visited Web sites for schools already separating classes by gender, like the Jacksonville Public Schools, to compare test scores and feedback.
One of the books she reviewed was “Why Gender Matters: What Parents And Teachers Need To Know About The Emerging Science Of Sex Differences” by Dr. Leonard Sax.
The research is compelling. According to Dr. Sax, in the 1960s through the 1980s, much of the research tried to affirm stereotypes or promote gender-blind teaching. In addition, many studies used adult subjects, he said.
However, as researchers began actually using children in their studies, the results were intriguing.
For instance, in his book, Dr. Sax states, “there’s good evidence now, from several different sources, that newborn baby girls really do hear better than newborn baby boys. The female-male difference in hearing only gets bigger as kids get older.”
This may explain why boys, who tend to seat themselves at the back of the room, may find themselves daydreaming when they are supposed to be listening to a soft-spoken female teacher.
On the other hand, girls who tend to sit on the front row may feel like their male teacher is yelling at them.
Dr. Sax noted a study that demonstrates 11-year-old girls are distracted by noise levels about 10 times softer than noise levels boys find distracting.
So, the boy tapping his desk at the back of the room, may be completely distracting the girl at the front of the room.
Freyaldenhoven said the research shows her belief that separating the children by gender will help their academic performance.
“Academic performance and behavior in the classroom go hand in hand,” she said. “I want to take the strategies offered by the latest research and apply it to the different groups.”
She will be providing professional development to help the teachers adjust their teaching styles to the children’s learning styles.
“I read that when helping boys with an assignment, teachers should sit next to them and spread out the materials. They prefer shoulder-to-shoulder interaction,” she said. “Girls are different. They prefer a teacher look them in the eye and smile.”
Freyaldenhoven said she created a list of instructional strategies for the teachers to refer to when preparing for classes.
In order to determine whether separating the children by gender works, Freyaldenhoven said she would look at test results, SAT 9 scores, behavior referrals from teachers and feedback from parents and teachers.
“If it works well, we’ll keep it and maybe think about separating fourth and fifth grades too,” she said. “I think it will be good for the kids in the long run.”
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