With all the debate about educational reform I think the balance of the shortage of male teachers is a subject that frequently gets missed. Odds are that if you visit your local elementary school you’ll find a slim handful (if any) of male teachers. It’s brought up in the following Boston Globe article by some folks that gender shouldn’t matter as much as the “quality” of the teachers ……….. which is obvious, but not really the point.
Gender plays a major role in how we see and respond to the world and it doesn’t make sense that this wouldn’t be just as crucial in education. For young impressionable little boys having male role models in the classroom in larger numbers seems to me to be a major issue to look at. It’s not about male teachers being better than female teachers but just like we need more balance in the board rooms we also need more balance in the classroom.
Why I hadn’t thought of before was ……
Even more eyebrow-raising, the research questioned whether a predominantly female teaching force is causing more boys to be labeled as behavior problems because women may struggle in handling the sometimes rambunctious nature of boys. It also questioned whether boys may respond better to a coachlike sternness found in some male teachers.
Hmmmm, could part of the increase in behavioral problems and boys getting labeled as behavioral problems be less about the gender of the students and more about the gender of the teachers?
Hunt Is One For More Male Teachers - Boston Globe
