The trouble with boys

The problem with boys…

This is not a scholarly or well-researched article.  This is just me trying to put my thoughts on paper about something that has been bothering me immensely for a while now.

This article is about our boys…

I have always had a soft spot, call it a sort of sorry feeling, for boys going to school.  As a high school teacher and an English Home Language one at that, I always tried my best to make my subject interesting for those boys who preferred to sit at the back of the class and whom I could see were just biding their time until they could put School well and truly behind them.  The languages just always seem to trip a lot of boys up and I saw many a boy who was fearless on the rugby field, break out in a sweat when he had to do an oral or read aloud.  My classes always involved a lot of moving around, group work and interesting subjects with which I would try to entice the male gender to love my lessons. 

By sheer coincidence I eventually landed up in a Grade 2 and 3 classroom and that is when I saw the scale of what a traditional classroom can do to our boys.  I was faced with 8 and 9 year old girls and boys who were so different developmentally that it was screaming in my face.  You might now argue that that is exactly the reason for the existence of Boys’ and Girls’ schools, but the problem was that the difference between each individual boy was also startling and I remember feeling quite overwhelmed by so many learning styles in one classroom.

I had boys who loved reading and who could sit for long periods of time solving Maths problems.  They were confident in their abilities to write beautiful stories that made sense and who had a perfect pencil grip.  They formed their letters the right way around and were finished ahead of everyone else.  They were the achievers…

Then I also had boys who went pale at the sight of a book and who would struggle reading one page.  They were also often the ones who couldn’t sit in one place for more than 2 minutes.  The same boys often reversed their letters and struggled to form them the way they were taught, thus resulting in stories that made little sense and took ages to finish.  Although they were bright sparks, they were the under achievers…

Sadly, the latter were the ones who are often diagnosed with Dyslexia, ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), Dyspraxia and a lot of other names that I struggle to pronounce, let alone spell! 

Phrases like “not reaching his milestones” or “is struggling to focus” are usually the precursors in pre-school which alert teachers to “problems” up ahead. 

The agony parents and children have to go through when they are sent from pillar to post, from doctor to psychologist in an attempt to diagnose what is “wrong” with their boys, is a hard and deeply personal one.  Often parents blame themselves or worse, each other.  And it is usually the dads who run their hands through their hair and say that they were exactly the same at school - that it’s history repeating itself…

While parents fight tooth and nail against their boys being medicated with well-known “cures” like Ritalin, Concerta and the like, teachers stand on the side line trying to be caring and nurturing, yet exasperated because it’s impossible to teach when a child disrupts a class.

When eventually parents capitulate and accept defeat, they are given a bunch of pills which will supposedly miraculously cure their child so that he can fit into the achievers circle.  Little white pills, broken into even smaller halves or even quarters, are sent to school and teachers set their cell phone alarms so that they can administer the pills at the correct time or face a meltdown later on in the day.

A few days after the boy has started taking medication the expected side effects start.  It breaks my heart every time and I have never gotten used to it and never will.  Boys who used to have healthy appetites, now go green in the face when faced with a lunch box full of tuck.  The obvious result is weight loss… Talkative and often boisterous boys, grow quiet, sullen and tired.  It’s like they’ve had the life medicated out of them!  Once again, the teacher stands helpless – is this what you had hoped for?  At least now he can finish some tasks on time and form the letters correctly.  At least now he can sit still for a few minutes more and focus for longer periods of time.  But is the trade-off worth it?  Because what I have now is a young boy who is a shadow of his former self…

Of course, there are children – boys and girls – for whom medication is a life saver and they flounder when they don’t take it, but I’m afraid in my experience, they are few and far between.

I have come to a point where I believe we need to think differently about how we deal with boys in our classrooms.  The world is changing at lightning fast pace and if my instincts and sources are correct, girls are overtaking boys in almost every sphere of life.  Women are on equal footing with men on nearly every platform even though they might not be earning equal pay yet.  The majority of girls are adapted for school and have evolved with it – they are on average academically and emotionally far superior than boys.  It is only in the physical world where boys still have the upper hand – at least for now.

Curricula around the globe was developed for girls.  Fine motor skills, drawing and colouring in are all activities which most girls naturally gravitate towards.  Although I understand the progression from gross motor skills to fine motor skills to forming letters and eventually writing pieces in which you can express yourself, I fail to understand why we need to put a time frame on this.  In my experience the fairer sex has a flair for expressing themselves from a young age – whether it’s making their needs known in a show of words or writing a love letter on scented paper.  That’s how we roll – we love it!

With boys, on the other hand, actions speak louder than words.  Just observe how boys can play together in the sand pit or with their toys for hours on end without making any intelligent conversation except “bbbrrrmm" noises.  Funny how still they can sit when playing with Lego!

My teachers and I often speak about how we can make our classes better by adopting new techniques to suit all the learning styles in our classroom spaces.  I have suggested on numerous occasions that we should do an experiment by grouping our Grade 2 and 3 children together in 2 groups, namely the “academic” children and the “differently minded” (for want of another term) children.  The idea is to put them in two separate classrooms with each their own teacher to guide them and hero the learning style that best suits the class.  Unfortunately this might not be very PC (politically correct) as the fear exists that one class will be perceived as the “clever class” and the other class… you guessed it.

And so we carry on, imprisoned by the restrictions and milestones the curriculum and our own insecurities and fears impose on us.  Having classes with maximum 15 learners really come in handy here, because we can spend time and effort on every child.  I shudder to think what happens in a class of 30+. 

In our own little way we have started implementing small, but valuable measures to ensure that every child has a sense of belonging in our school and to give them an opportunity to embrace their inherent potential and talents…

We have a sandpit as big as a large swimming pool which give especially our boys, but also the girls, immense pleasure.  Irrigation canals and bridges built from old plastic pipes and anything lying around are all the rage in summer.  Guess who’s focused now?  Teachers provide lots of opportunities for science experiments and baking and also encourage children to bring their own finds from home.  It’s a teacher’s prerogative to give little brain breaks whenever she feels they are needed.  This helps to refocus attention when doing a laborious task.  All of these have proven to be powerful ways of making sure everyone copes.

I have watched with interest many of my Matriculates from years ago as they continued their journey after school.  Not surprisingly the guys who sat at the back of the class, seemingly disinterested in school and who were often the “under achievers”, went on to become very successful entrepreneurs and businessmen.  I am immensely proud of them as traditional schooling must’ve been a tedious and boring process for them.  I also feel sorry for them as 12 years or more seem like a very long time when you are trapped in a system which is not conducive to reaching your potential in your own way and your own style.

Why are we trying to box our boys in?  Why are we ruining the only time in their lives when they can be carefree by expecting the impossible from them?  It is criminal to force them to sit still for long periods of time busying themselves with stuff which they don’t find meaningful or utterly boring.  It is our duty, as educators, to develop a curriculum which is exciting and incorporates that which we all know is going to be needed in the future – curiosity and creativity.

And this is exactly the point.  My opinion is that the traditional curriculum we are teaching at the moment is completely irrelevant and is not preparing our children adequately for the future.  What will be needed, according to the experts, are adults who will be able to think out the box and change direction quickly if needed.  We need to help our children to ask the right questions at the right or even the wrong time!  How important will fine motor skills and writing be in the future?  How necessary the skill to form letters perfectly or even the right way around?!  These are the entrepreneurs of the future, for crying out loud!

I dream of a time when we can restore our boys to their rightful place.  I dream of a time when they can be unencumbered by the weight of having to sit still for long periods of time.  I dream of a time when they can write that essay on their own terms and complete it when they are ready without the fear of being sent to a remedial class.  But most of all I long for a time when medicating our boys become the total exception and not the rule.

That time is hopefully closer than we think…