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Gary Wilson is one of the country’s leading experts on raising boys’ achievement, a freelance education consultant, speaker, trainer, author and former teacher. www.garywilsonraisingboysahievement.com

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boys on the margin research_summary_report 2018

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Boys Writing And The Literacy Gender Gap_ What We Know What We

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Reading- Boys will be Brilliant 16 January 15 (Paula Quinn SEELB)

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Hitting the road block: Boys and literacy

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Gary Wilson talks about getting the best out of boys

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There is a stubborn gap between male and female GCSE attainment in our schools.

It seems to run across most, if not all, subjects and across all stages of education.

Boys struggle to do as well as girls at GCSE, and schools up and down the country are desperately scrabbling around for solutions.

GCSE changes

In my own department, we had seen our results improve for our boys year-on-year and yet the gap remained as the girls saw the same rate of improvement.

But since then, it has narrowed and then last year it finally closed.

It is always difficult to attribute improvements in results to any one thing in education but on this I would point to something we really focused on - study skills.

GCSE differences

In a piece for Tes, Nick Rose pointed to a paper by Griffin et al (2012) titled Do Learning and Study Skills Affect Academic Performance?, which found that pupils' learning and study skills correlated strongly with their academic performance and that there was a statistically significant difference in these skills between male and female students.

It also found that once these differences were controlled for, there was no difference between male and female attainment.

In other words, when male students studied more like a typical female student, they did just as well.

This led to us, as a department, changing how we approached revision with our pupils.

Teaching changes

Firstly, we made sure our advice was crystal clear that not all revision techniques are equal.

Research by Gagnon and Cormier (2019) found that the most effective pupils studied using distributed practice, and these pupils were more likely to be female.

Distributed practice means they didn't just cram for a big test, but revised little and often during the course and revisited previous topics more frequently.

This gender difference in how revision is approached could be due to difference in confidence.

Certainly research involving adults, and, in particular, adults working in finance, has found that males are more likely to be overconfident in their abilities, whereas females are more likely to doubt themselves.

Gender gap

It seems conceivable that this over-confidence in our male pupils could mean that they are less likely to feel the need to check their learning as they are confident (even if this confidence is misplaced).

We, therefore, make sure that pupils have to check what they have learned frequently and do not rely on what they believe they have learned.

This overconfidence can be further reinforced through choosing ineffective revision methods.

GCSE revision

A review of research into effective revision by Dunlosky, summarised in " Strengthening the Student Toolbox" (2013), shows that, for a method to be effective, it must lead to pupils having to struggle and think hard. They need to do practice testing, mix up topics and try to elaborate on ideas.

Methods that were less effective, such as highlighting and rereading notes or summarising notes, don't involve thinking hard. Instead, they give a feeling of confidence as seeing the notes makes students believe they know the content.

The more they reread their notes, the more students summarise what they are reading, the more confident they feel, but without ever really having to check they have learned it and so avoiding a fear of failure (something that authors of Boys Don't Try? point out is another cause of gender disparity in our schools).

As a result, we have been very careful to explain to pupils why these methods don't work and to show them the research to convince them to change what they do.

New approaches

We have also shared this research with parents so that they know how to encourage their children to revise. This, as with everything else, benefits both boys and girls; the girls were just more likely to be doing it already.

So to recap, the changes we put in place were:

1. Teach pupils how to revise effectively

Show them the research that suggests they need to revise from memory and not from their notes. Explain that it is OK if they find this difficult, and that this is part of an important process.

2. No opt-out

We stopped simply leaving revision up to them. It would be nice if children took responsibility for their own learning but children are often quite poor at delayed gratification; boys even more so than girls.

We now use homework time for distributed practice so that pupils are always reviewing things they learned in previous topics. This also gives them opportunities to practice effective study skills throughout their time with us.

3. Honest review

We want pupils to really know what they know and get rid of the overconfidence of assuming that they know things simply because they were in the lesson or have the notes.

We use regular quizzing that helps pupils to see where they may have gaps and use learning checklists where pupils have to answer questions to prove they have learned something, rather than just ticking a box because they think they have learned it.

4. Curriculum planning

We have also ensured that our curriculum reflects what we know about effective ways of learning.

We revisit topics in lessons, review what pupils have learned, and link different parts of the course together.

Our pupils now know that it is not enough to have simply done a lesson. Instead, it is clear they are expected to have learned it as this learning will be called on again.

All of this has, I believe, helped us to close the gender gap in terms of our pupils' outcomes.

More importantly, though, it has led to all our pupils becoming more justifiably confident in what they know and can do and, therefore, less anxious and much happier.
Mark Enser is head of geography and research lead at Heathfield Community College. His latest book, Teach Like Nobody's Watching, is out now. He tweets @EnserMark

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There is a stubborn gap between male and female GCSE attainment in our schools. It seems to run across most, if not all, subjects and across all stages of education. Boys struggle to do as well as girls at GCSE, and schools up and down the country are desperately scrabbling around for solutions.

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If your son spends most of his life on his smartphone, scrolling through websites or sending messages to his friends, there is no need to panic.

While boys have long trailed behind girls in their reading aptitude, the gender gap is closing at last because they prefer reading on a screen to reading the pages of a book.

Since the Pisa education rankings in maths, science and literacy began nearly 20 years ago, girls have done better than boys at reading in every country in which the exams have been held.

Next month, however, the rankings, based on tests taken by teenagers in 80 countries, are expected to show how boys are finally catching up, according to Andreas Schleicher, the man known as "Mr Pisa"...

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Smartphones and screens help boys close gap on girls in reading

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If your son spends most of his life on his smartphone, scrolling through websites or sending messages to his friends, there is no need to panic.While boys have long trailed behind girls in their reading aptitude, the gender gap is closing at last because they prefer reading on a screen to reading

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By almost any measure of school related performance girls do better than boys. Fewer boys are going to university. Why is this happening and what can be done about it?

The data is indisputable: in developed countries boys now lag behind girls in several significant areas of education.

For years, women lagged behind men in educational attainment. More boys went to university, and twice as many men as women got degrees in 1960. Forty years later and, fifty seven percent of university students are women. By almost any measure of school related performance girls are doing better than boys.

Everyone agrees there is a problem but there is little consensus over what is causing it. Are boys doing worse or girls doing better? Is the education system biased against boys? Are boys just wired differently when it comes to learning?

The roots of the new gender gap are complex and nuanced, but if we can't agree on what's causing it, how can we solve it? In the meantime more and more boys will fall behind.

In this Analysis on The Problem with Boys, BBC journalist and father of three boys, David Grossman, looks at the evidence and tries to find a way forward.

Producer: Gemma Newby
Editor: Jasper Corbett

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BBC Radio 4 - Analysis, The Problem with Boys

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By almost any measure of school related performance girls do better than boys. Fewer boys are going to university. Why is this happening and what can be done about it? The data is indisputable: in developed countries boys now lag behind girls in several significant areas of education.

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Save the Children has published a report today which reveals that nearly 90,000 boys fell behind in early language and communication skills by at the age of 5 last year.

The Lost Boys: How Boys Are Falling Behind In Their Early Years, which was commissioned by the charity, focuses on the implications of the well-documented gender gap. It states that boys in England are nearly twice as likely as girls to fall behind in language and literacy and calls for more investment into the early years workforce to close the gender gap.

The impact of the lack of early language skills is apparent - according to Save the Children nearly a million boys are at risk over the next decade unless they have access to high quality early years education. A lack of core language skills could prevent them from expressing thoughts and feelings and stop them from being able to engage with others.

The gender gap is evident in every part of the country, but when disadvantage and gender both come into the equation, the numbers increase dramatically. It is well documented that the risk of falling behind at 5 is much higher for children (both boys and girls) growing up in poverty, and the report confirms that the gender gap is the highest in deprived areas. Nearly 40% of the poorest 5-year-old boys fell behind in early language and communication last year.

When boys fall behind, many struggle to get back on track. In fact they are four times more likely to fall below expected standards of reading by the end of primary school than those who started school on track. The report points to a direct correlation when boys struggle in the early years and the negative impact on their employment prospects and health outcomes.
Victoria Flint, Director of Communications, PACEY, comments:
"While the gender gap in early years is not a new phenomenon, the expectation has always been that boys automatically 'catch up' once they are in school. But this report highlights that the gender gap at age 5 often has a longer-term negative impact on boys' lives, limiting their future prospects. Unsurprisingly, boys from disadvantaged backgrounds fare the worst. High quality early education is absolutely key to narrowing the gap between boys and girls, as well as between the most and least disadvantaged children, with early years practitioners playing a vital role in developing early language skills.

"PACEY is calling on the Government to prioritise support for qualifications and training in its upcoming workforce strategy, as research from around the globe has shown that these are inextricably linked to quality. We shouldn't simply accept existing gaps based on gender or socioeconomic status, nor are we powerless to eradicate them. World class early education would go a long way in helping future generations of children to achieve their full potential."

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Save the Children has published a report today which reveals that nearly 90,000 boys fell behind in early language and communication skills by at the age of 5 last year. The Lost Boys: How Boys Are Falling Behind In Their Early Years, which was commissioned by the charity, focuses on the implications of the well-documented gender gap.

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In the 1940s the Belgian philosopher Albert Michotte identified our tendency to believe we could see causality. His book, The Perception of Causality, published in French in 1945 showed how certain very simple visual sequences carry the appearance of causal connectedness. Click this link for an example. This paper is a good recent update on how illusions of causality bias our judgement.

Human beings are natural pattern seekers. We see shapes in clouds, faces in wallpaper and meaning where there is just random noise. In particular, we believe we can see causes when all we can actually see are effects. In teaching, we look at what happens in a classroom and think we know why it happened. We may, occasionally be right, but usually we'll miss the hopeless complexities of real life preferring to stick with a convenient narrative: Miss Crumb is an ineffective teacher; Gavin is a feckless, work shy toe rag; Parvinder always tries her best. This is much easier than actually doing the hard work of trying to find out what else might have caused the effects we've observed.

One of the most prevalent examples of the perception of causality in education surrounds the observation that girls outperform boys. There's no end of data to support this assumption and it really does seem to be the case that, on average, girls do better at school and are 75% more likely to go to university than boys. The OECD have found that boys are 50% more likely than girls to fall short of basic standards in reading, maths and science. And of course, everyone knows why. As this Economist article explains, there are 3 clear reasons why girls are doing better than boys: girls read more, spend longer doing homework and boys are 'too cool for school'. Simple.

Consequently many, if not most, schools have a gender policy. As Chris Curtis points out here, teachers are under pressure to create a 'boy friendly' curriculum to ensure that boys are more engaged in lesson content, thereby magically closing the attainment gap.

If only reality really were this simple. My suspicion is that what works well for girls will also work well for boys. Chris makes the following observations:

A boy who knows what they want from school succeeds.

A girl who knows what they want from school succeeds.

A student who knows what they want from schools succeeds.

To believe otherwise is to believe that we know the causes for the effects we observe. But it's so tempting, isn't it? In Chapter 1 of my book, What if everything you knew about education was wrong? I tell the story of 'Mr Garvery'.

During a training session, Mr Garvery and his colleagues were presented with data showing a difference in the mean scores for average GCSE points - with girls achieving a higher mean than boys. The obvious conclusion drawn was that this difference mattered and something needed to be done. Urgently. No 'proper' statistics were used to quantify the significance of this difference. So Mr Garvery went back to the raw data and performed a factor analysis of the impact of the following variables:

Gender

Free school meals (FSM)

Originating primary school

Key Stage 2 English/maths/science results

Key Stage 3 English/maths/science results

Reading age

Pupil attendance

Teacher attendance

Special educational needs (SEN)

English as a foreign language (EAL)

All had an impact 'on average', but the most significant factors were:

Teacher attendance

Pupils' attendance

Key Stage 2 English results

Of those factors measured, gender and free school meals were the least significant. When Mr Garvery shared this finding with his head teacher, his was told to stop causing trouble and come up with a suitable gender policy.

Why has the story of boys' underachievement become such a widely accepted and compelling narrative? The problem is that we see graphs with girls' performance clearly ahead of boys', so the cause must be due to gender. The way information is presented makes it appear that gender is the biggest factor underlying students' achievement, but the data makes it clear that attendance and prior achievement correlate much more closely.

Mr Garvery had conclusive evidence that gender difference was among the least important factors impacting pupils' performance. He continued his data exploration and surveyed all Key Stage 4 pupils for gender, as well as whether they lived in houses with an odd or even house number, whether they owned a games console and whether they were left-handed or right-handed.

When I tell school leaders that whether you're left or right-handed might have more bearing on your educational attainment than your gender they sometimes start nodding and you can see a left-handed policy being born. After all, this findings still seems plausible. When I reveal that console ownership was even more statistically significant they look worried: are they going to have to blow the Pupil Premium budget on X Boxes? But when I tell them the most statistically significant factor correlated with outcomes was whether students live in an odd or even house, the relief is palpable. No one can believe that the number of the house you live in can in any way be causally linked with attainment. It's a silly idea and we dismiss it immediately.

The 'pattern' of boys' underachievement is compelling because of the way we think about gender: girls are quiet, hard-working and sensible; boys are immature, unruly and easily bored. But as any teacher and every parent could tell you, these are stereotypes - a shorthand that saves us from having to think about reality. As ever though, reality is always more complex. Recent research into achievement and gender differences has found that school behaviour is much more likely to be a decisive factor for achievement than gender. Hard-working pupils achieve good grades while badly behaved pupils perform more poorly and get worse grades. The distribution of boisterous pupils among the two genders is much the same - about 40 per cent are girls.

I'm not suggesting gender has nothing to do with attainment - it probably does have some bearing - but maybe a lot less than we're inclined to believe. And the extent to which gender might be causal is more likely due to cultural rather than biological causes, as this article makes clear. Our best bet is probably to insist on high expectations for all students and not let boys get away with being 'just boys'.

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What causes the gender gap in education?

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In the 1940s the Belgian philosopher Albert Michotte identified our tendency to believe we could see causality. His book, The Perception of Causality, published in French in 1945 showed how certain very simple visual sequences carry the appearance of causal connectedness. Click this link for an example.

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Despite closing slightly this year, the education gap between male and female students is still of concern to both academics and the government alike.

Last weekend, a panel of experts at the Being a Man festival at London's Southbank Centre debated the possible reasons for the gap, and ways the issue might be resolved.

Chaired by gender research specialist Sandy Ruxton, the experts acknowledged that, since 1996, there has been a growing disparity between the grades attained by male and female students.

A government report published last year found that 7.3 per cent more girls were achieving five or more A* - C grades than boys at GCSE. And, several months ago, Mary Curnock Cook of UCAS revealed that British girls were, on average, a third more likely to progress to higher education than their male peers. But what is the root cause of this problem? Is the curriculum unfairly gendered in favour of female students, or do boys just not possess the desire to learn?

Sean Simms is a transition manager at the UK based charity Working with Men. He proposes that the education gender gap may have been caused by a shortage of male teachers.

"There is a distinct lack of male presence within education," says Simms. "I think it is too simplistic to say that an increase in this male presence would change young boys' attitude to learning and attainment, but I think it would definitely help.

"And why stop at male teachers?" Simms continues. "Why not look to the wider community and ask male family members, entrepreneurs and business professionals to have some kind of contact with young men in education to influence them? That would enable the students to consider possible career paths, and highlight how their education is connected to - and will eventually lead to - what they want to pursue in the future. We need to use these personal insights to create a spark and inspire these young boys."

Credit: Getty

Simms also suggested that the lack of male teachers could be most detrimental earlier in boys' academic careers, despite any major exams being over a decade away.

"There is currently a minimal male presence in Key Stage 1," observes the transition manager, "and this is a crucial stage of education. At this early stage, young boys' education tends to be dominated on both sides of the school gate by women. I believe this lack of a male presence is having a lasting impact on a boy's perception of where men belong in the world of education.

"I've spoken to year 9 boys," Simms continues, "and they've told me that they'd prefer to speak to male teachers. One in particular said, 'they understand us, they've been through what we're going through. They know what it's like to be a boy in this position'. So I suggest, to close this gender gap, we need to get more men present in schools - not just in teaching - but in all areas of the school structure."

Errol Lawson, a motivational schools speaker, believes that it is increasingly difficult for modern schoolboys to establish an identity during their early years. Citing the rise of gender fluidity as a cause for this problem, Lawson thinks that this confusion may be leading to distraction in the classroom.

"To solve this," says Lawson, "I think we need to get back to a place in society where it's okay to be solely a man, and it's okay to be a woman. And we need to teach boys that it is okay to want to grow up and become a typical man, because there are some specifically male traits and qualities that may be useful.

"We need to help them develop that," Lawson continues. "I'm not talking about hypermasculinity here, just character stuff that it might be useful for men to build upon in order for them to function with clearer goals in society."

Ann Cayenne, a conflict resolution worker who works alongside Sean Simms, disagrees with Lawson. She argues that "with working class families, where the father may have a job such as a car mechanic or bricklayer, his son may aspire to that stereotypically masculine role. And then he may not apply himself at school. But the father's daughter, who would likely not aspire to these typically male jobs, would need to study in order to create opportunities for herself - and this would widen the gender gap."

Cayenne also cited the transition between primary and secondary schools to be more socially awkward for boys than girls, and suggested that this emotional turmoil may result in a social environment unconducive to learning.

"Year six is one of these transition points for young boys. They have their SATS and they're getting ready to transition into secondary school. You see boys in primary school and they're hugging their friends and getting on. Suddenly, when they move to secondary school, they're terrified of any physicality."

Sean Simms agrees.

"Absolutely," says the transition manager. "They're terrified of being branded 'gay'. So there's absolutely no touching, and no crying anymore. They have to suppress their emotions as they move into secondary school and, unlike girls, are therefore constantly uncomfortable and distracted in the learning environment."

Credit: Rex Features

The experts concluded that the stigma surrounding male emotion was the probable cause of the gender education gap. Cayenne spoke of Troops to Teachers, a program in which ex-army personnel are brought into secondary schools to teach. This scheme was introduced by education officials who believed that a lack of discipline had led to the disparity between genders. However, the panel unanimously agreed that this was not the case, and that encouraging emotion in schoolboys may instead be the most effective solution.

Andy Wimbush is an English literature tutor at the University of Cambridge. The majority of students who enrol on Wimbush's course are women, a fact the tutor finds troubling.

"Men don't seem to be drawn to creative subjects," Wimbush says, "and I don't know why this is. Is there a taboo in boys being conscientious, being devoted to their work in some way? And, if so, why?

"Possibly, through society's expectations, boys are being dissuaded from these humanities courses because they are subjects in which a little emotion may be useful? Especially in literature, paying attention to your emotions is a way of understanding the work that you are studying. Boys tend to have, what we call in literature, 'the hermeneutics of suspicion' - which means that if they feel a writer is trying to affect them emotionally in some way, they try to undermine that, and pick it apart.

"I wonder whether there's a danger that young men feel as though they can't respond to a work of literature, or drama, or art with sincerity, with openness, with love. I suspect that this is the 'other half', if you like, of the problem we have in getting young girls to enrol on STEM courses."

The panel were angered somewhat by the fact that despite there being a plethora of STEM schemes that encourage young women to enrol onto the male-dominated science subjects, there is no equivalent for young men to point them in the direction of the humanities.

Ann Cayenne concluded the debate by suggesting that there may be double standards in schooling, favouring female students over the male. Indeed, she revealed that many boys she has spoken to believe that teachers treat female students less severely.

"In terms of a solution for attainment," says Cayenne, proposing her answer to the education gender gap problem, "it's all about highlighting potential in young males, offering more opportunities and starting conversations around their individuals goals and aspirations. Helping them get where they want to be rather than telling them what they need to achieve."

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How do we close the education gender gap?

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Despite closing slightly this year, the education gap between male and female students is still of concern to both academics and the government alike. Last weekend, a panel of experts at the Being a Man festival at London's Southbank Centre debated the possible reasons for the gap, and ways the issue might be resolved.

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"I've been working on raising boys' achievement since 1993... you'd have thought I'd have got it sorted by now" is regularly the opening line to one of my INSET days or keynote speeches. It usually provokes mild amusement. "But sadly I'm afraid there aren't that many people working on it." And nobody laughs. Because it's true. Why is it? I always ask. Do people really think that by focusing on the boys the girls are going to suffer? I call that sloppy thinking.

I began working on strategies that hit all the right buttons for boys without disadvantaging girls in 1993 when I had already been teaching in Secondary Schools for fifteen years. 1993 was the first year of OFSTED and we were told: a) there was something wrong with the way we were delivering collective worship, b) there was a problem with the plumbing in the science labs and c) the girls were doing significantly better than the boys. Could we sort it out? So we set to.

What became extremely apparent was that leaving it until boys were in year 11 was definitely too late. By the time boys get to year six, as you will find in most primary schools in the land, there is a small group of boys, the peer police cadets, who are dragging boys off cliffs. If we don't act sooner by the time these boys reach year 10 they can be virtually running the place, telling, as they do, other boys whether its ok to work, to write, to dance, to sing, to care, to read, to share - virtually anything.

So we began to work with our partner primary schools, which I believe is the most effective way of approaching the issue. I discovered the power of using my group of year 8s to help boys in nursery and reception classes with their reading, put together drama projects with year 4 boys. It turned those boys around by giving them a positive focus for their natural leadership ability (the clue's in the name - peer leaders):it allowed them to succeed away from the prying eyes of their peers. I was also challenging gender stereotyping. And didn't those little boys really look up to those big boys!

Throughout these twenty three years I have been in a state of almost total disbelief that the underachievement of some of our boys (it tends to be poor white working class boys at the bottom of the heap) has failed to register in the majority of local authorities and in the country as a whole. Do some people really still think the reason for the underachievement of boys is the lack of male teachers in primary schools? Look, it's not going to happen, get over it, move on. It's not the gender of the teacher that is the most important thing. It's the quality of the teacher and their ability to relate to what's going on in a boy's head, in a boy's world, in a boy's universe. Do some people put it down to laddish behaviour? Well, actually laddish behaviour is a cry for help. Ever seen it that way? Because as far some boys are concerned, it's far better for them to be seen to be not bothered about winning than entering and not winning.

One thing that is certain however, is that for many boys we are simply starting formal education too early, forcing too many boys to read and write before they are mentally and physically ready In Scandinavia, where they don't start school formerly until they're seven, boys and girls achieve in roughly the same way throughout school.

In "The Lost Boys" a report from Save the Children published in July 2016, which looks at how boys are falling behind in their early years, they highlight the situation as thus "Since 2006 there has been a 20% improvement, an 8% reduction in the poverty gap but just 1% reduction in the gender gap". It's not going away. We need to increase the good work with parents pre-school, and the brilliant work that I have seen in many Early Years settings in recent years.

The DFE this year once more presented national statistics that show, yet again, boys being outperformed in every area in the foundation stage, at key stage 1, and in all subjects bar maths at key stage 2. If you'd like to find out more, you can get a quick overview of the results in this infographic.

Perhaps we should take heart that there was a debate in September 2016 in Westminster on the Educational Performance of Boys and that there were calls for action "The issue of our gender education gap and its impact has not been addressed adequately by this house or by successive governments of all colours and the education sector seems reluctant to take action on it. That is a shame." Karl M Cartney MP for Lincoln.

Watch this space.

We should also be encouraged by the many practical strategies that you can implement today that help close the gender attainment gap. Here are four actions that you could try:

1. Try this: In a recent project, part-sponsored by Oxford University Press, we created twenty small groups of peer police cadets.We gave them the name 'THE TRANSFORMERS' (Check out the film on Oxford Owl for School) and gave them responsibility to help out younger boys with their reading, and taking charge of eco projects around the school. Who says we don't have positive male role models? Schools are full of them! Or why not ask your local high school to send you down some of those decent young men on work experience or as Maths Ambassadors or Science Ambassadors.

2. Make a stimulating writing corner in your classroom planned by the children. Instead of having a home corner, have a space research station or a superhero base where missions are planned and reports written for the government. Use the kinds of paraphernalia attached to their favourite superheroes or TV or film characters. You can find lots of ideas from other schools on Pinterest.

3. Seek the boys' help to design and stock an area of the library, giving it real boy appeal. If you need help getting started, take a look at Oxford Bookmatch, a free tool on Oxford Owl for School, that allows you to search hundreds of children's books by genre, children's interests, levels etc.

4. Hold a parents' workshop that looks at boys' achievement to help address these issues. In these sessions you need to highlight the importance of developing independence in boys. Parents need to know the significance of male role models in the family - fathers, grandfathers, uncles, older brothers - and the important role they have in supporting their boys' education. Tell your parents to visit Oxford Owl for Home to access my free advice and 250 free ebooks including boy-friendly Project X eBooks.

Gary Wilson is an Education Consultant on Boys' Achievement, Advisor on (OUP) and author of "Breaking Through the Barriers to Boys' Achievement and Developing a Caring Masculinity" "Help Your Boys Succeed" "Raising Boys' Achievement: Pocket Pal" "100 Ideas for Primary Teachers: Raising Boys' Achievement" and (with Linda Tallent) "Boys Will Be BRILLIANT! " Bloomsbury Press.
garywilsonraisingboysachievement.com

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Four strategies to engage boys in literacy and close the gender gap

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"I've been working on raising boys' achievement since 1993... you'd have thought I'd have got it sorted by now" is regularly the opening line to one of my INSET days or keynote speeches. It usually provokes mild amusement. "But sadly I'm afraid there aren't that many people working on it."

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As a retired primary teacher I find it unsurprising that numerous studies show a gender gap where girls are significantly outperforming boys in literacy. One of the latest studies, commissioned by Save the Children, has found that the female advantage is established even before they step foot in the classroom.

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Concerned literacy educators work tirelessly to close achievement gaps caused by socioeconomic status, race, disability, and English-language proficiency. However, there's one more education gap that needs to be addressed: gender. Educators have noted that girls consistently outperform boys in reading skills, and research bears this out. Studies reveal that the literacy gap between male and female students is both longstanding and worldwide.

Tom Loveless, author of the 2015 Brown Center Report on American Education, noted that in one of the earliest research studies on gender and reading (conducted in Iowa in 1942), both elementary and high-school girls outperformed their male peers in reading comprehension. The most recent data available when the Brown Center report was published showed that girls taking National Assessment of Educational Progress reading tests were rating higher than boys at every age and grade level. Moreover, these findings weren't confined to the United States. Loveless pointed out that reading tests conducted by the Program for International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) and the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) both found evidence of worldwide gender gaps in 2011 and 2012, respectively.

So, what causes this achievement gap, and what can literacy educators do about it? In his report, Loveless stated, "The universality of the gap certainly supports the argument that it originates in biological or developmental differences between the two sexes." In her 2016 article Why Boys Don't Read, Linda Jacobson suggested that the impact may be more cultural: Less support for boys who struggle with reading, combined with a lack of male role models who read, may be discouraging boys from picking up books for enjoyment. Offering yet another perspective, sources such as ASCD and Psychology Today posit that the gap may be due to the way literacy is taught-perhaps educational strategies that are more mindful of the way male brains develop would help close the gap.

Whether the gap is due to biology, culture, or teaching strategies, there are many ways literacy educators can change up reading instruction to meet the needs of their male students. Here are some tips for educators looking to close the gap.

Meet diverse learning needs

Michael Gurian and Kathy Stevens, co-authors of the Educational Leadership article With Boys and Girls in Mind, state that "Research on gender and education reveals a disconnect between teaching practice and the needs of male and female brains." Using information from PET and MRI scans of developing brains, researchers have suggested ways that boys and girls may learn differently. For example, boys' brains had more areas devoted to spatial-mechanical functioning and fewer areas devoted to verbal-emotional functioning compared to girls. In light of this finding, providing opportunities for movement may help boys learn and process information they have read. Here are some tips for integrating physical activity with reading time:

Offer reading instruction in bursts. Give shorter, highly focused reading instruction and tasks throughout the day, rather than scheduling a large block of reading time.

Weave in time for reading for pleasure, and allow students to walk around as they read-as long as they aren't disturbing other students. Consider letting students talk to each other during reading time, which will give them the opportunity to share things from their reading that interest them, amaze them, or make them laugh.

Pair books with activities. For example, ask boys to illustrate scenes from a book as they read, or perform the story with puppets and action figures. Alternatively, follow the reading of a book with an activity based on the story.

Expand what a reading response looks like. After reading a how-to book, the reading response could be to build what was described in the book. Alternatively, a student could film a trailer for a book they'd like to see turned into a movie, or create a book-based video game using a free coding program like Scratch or ScratchJr.

Create a culture of reading

In her article Why Boys Don't Read, Jacobson refers to multiple cultural factors that may discourage male students from reading. As noted earlier, if women read more than men-as stated in this Pew Research study-then boys likely have fewer male role models who encourage them to read. Additionally, students may lose interest in trying to read if they initially find it difficult: According to Jacobson, students "need to feel a sense of competence or developing competence, and if reading doesn't contribute to that then they won't see much point in it." Here are a few tips for educators to help create a culture that promotes reading, with a focus on boys:

Start a book club for boys. Let the members choose books they will all read, and encourage them to share their favorite books with the group. Plan to have food, discussion time, and a related activity at each meeting.

Make boys reading experts. Putting them in the role of "expert reader" will give them confidence in their own reading ability, and will also provide role models for the younger boys. Invite boys to work in the library by shelving books, helping other students find books, or researching new books that the library might like to acquire.

Host monthly reading programs that appeal to a variety of interests. Some ideas include a stand-up comedy show during which a local comedian does a brief act and is followed by boys telling the best jokes they found in a joke book. Alternatively, themed workshops or "ask an expert" events could make good monthly programs. Related books should be available before, at, and after each event. In addition to providing an incentive to read, these events may inspire boys to look to books for more information.

Reach out to fathers and other male family members. Encourage these male role models to let their sons "catch" them reading at home. Male family members can also read to young boys or read the same book as older boys. Provide guidelines to help families engage boys while reading aloud with them, as well as ideas for talking about shared books.

Recruit coaches and other popular faculty and staff to come into your classroom and give brief talks, promoting books that could be of interest to students. High-school or local university students could also come to your class to promote their favorite books or read to younger students.

Reach out to community organizations. Men in retirement groups, churches, and civic organizations may be willing to visit the classroom to read with students or suggest books.

Teach with boys in mind
It's possible that boys lag behind girls in reading skills because educators and parents subconsciously give them fewer positive reading opportunities. Dr. Elaine Reese, author of "Tell Me a Story: Sharing Stories to Enrich Your Child's World," notes that a study by economists Michael Baker and Kevin Milligan showed that parents in the U.S., U.K., and Canada spend more time reading and doing early literacy activities with their preschool-aged daughters than their sons. Dr. Reese suggests that this may be due to evidence that young girls are able to sit still and focus for longer periods than same-aged boys, making it easier to spend time reading together. Regardless, putting extra effort into creating enjoyable reading time with boys could help close the reading achievement gap. For instance:

Make a variety of genres available, including magazines, how-to books, graphic novels, and nonfiction.

Provide fiction that will appeal to a variety of interests. Take a look at Guys Read, a website started by author and educator Jon Scieszka, and investigate the library of titles organized into categories such as "sports," "scales and tails," and "outer space, but with aliens."

Ask your students what they want to read. Pass out a questionnaire at the beginning of the year asking about their passions and hobbies, or create a reading suggestion box where students can leave topics they would like to read about. Enlist your librarian to help find books that match students' interests.

Let them obsess. Once boys find a subject that interests them, allow them to really dig in. It's OK if they read 10 books about frogs, or spend some of their reading time finding information about frogs online. You could even help them out by bringing in or Skyping with a frog expert who can answer their questions or recommend additional books.

Reinforce students' efforts and time spent reading. Ask questions about the material to demonstrate your curiosity and interest.

All students deserve an equal shot at the best education possible, and strong reading skills are a crucial component. If you have boys who are struggling with reading, try a few of these easy-to-implement suggestions in your classroom. The results may surprise you!

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Closing the Literacy Gender Gap: Top Tips for Motivating Boys to Read

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Concerned literacy educators work tirelessly to close achievement gaps caused by socioeconomic status, race, disability, and English-language proficiency. However, there's one more education gap that needs to be addressed: gender. Educators have noted that girls consistently outperform boys in reading skills, and research bears this out.

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In part one of this series, I examined some of the biological and societal reasons why a gender gap exists in education and explored some generic strategies for closing it. In this article, I will explore the gender gap in literacy proficiency and look at ways of raising boys' attainment in reading and writing.

An international PISA survey in 2012 found that 15-year-old boys were more likely than girls of the same age to be low-achievers in school; 14 per cent of boys and nine per cent of girls failed to attain the baseline level of proficiency in any of the three core subjects measured by PISA - namely, reading, maths and science. In fact, six out of 10 students who did not attain the baseline level in any of these subjects were boys.

In this country, attainment data consistently shows girls outperforming boys in reading, with the gap remaining relatively stable from early years to GCSE over the past 10 years. When the National Literacy Strategy was introduced in 1998, only 64 per cent of boys reached the level expected of their age group at the end of primary school compared with 79 per cent of girls, a gap of 15 percentage points. By 2000, the gap had narrowed to six percentage points, but since then it has remained relatively static, meaning 20 per cent of boys (and 12 per cent of girls) start secondary school unable to read at the expected level.

The evidence suggests that the gap is not simply a result of how schools teach students to read. Rather, the foundations are laid much earlier: in 2011, there was a gap of 11 percentage points between boys' and girls' achievement in reading at age five (71 per cent of boys working securely within the level expected for their age versus 82 per cent of girls).

Between ages five and seven the gap narrows significantly: in 2011, 89 per cent of girls achieved the expected level in reading in key stage tests compared with 82 per cent of boys. However, from then on it increased again: at age 14, girls outstripped boys in English by 12 percentage points. And at GCSE, only 59 per cent of boys achieved A* to C in English compared with 73 per cent of girls, a 14 percentage point difference.

In fact, the gap between the proportion of girls and boys receiving grades A* or A across all subjects is now at its widest since the top grade was introduced in 1994: in English, 21 per cent of girls achieved A* or A compared with just 12 per cent of boys.

Improving boys' reading is important because reading and writing achievement are strongly linked. National Literacy Trust data from 2011 shows that 49 per cent of young people who read above the expected level for their age also write above the expected level (42 per cent write at the expected level; nine per cent write below their expected level).

Conversely, 59 per cent of young people who read below the expected level also write below the expected level (35 per cent write at the expected level; six per cent write above their expected level).

National Literacy Trust data also shows strong links between reading and writing in terms of enjoyment, behaviour and attitudes.

For example, 65 per cent of young people who enjoy reading "very much" or "quite a lot" also enjoy writing "very much" or "quite a lot". Young people who read frequently are also more likely to write frequently, with 38 per cent of young people who read daily also writing daily.

Therefore, if schools don't encourage boys to read more, it is likely that other literacy skills will be affected. What's more, poor literacy has a negative impact on a student's achievement in all their school subjects and limits their opportunities in later life.

Why do boys under-perform in reading and writing?

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which runs the PISA tests, says there are many possible reasons for boys' poor performance in literacy and many of them are connected with differences in behaviour.

First, boys don't enjoy reading as much as girls. Girls not only outperform boys in reading tests, they are also more engaged with reading than boys at many levels.

A 2011 National Literacy Trust survey of nearly 21,000 eight to 16-year-olds showed that boys are not only more likely than girls to struggle with reading but they are also more likely to enjoy reading only "a little" or "not at all" (56 versus 43 per cent). The 2009 PISA survey found that across all OECD countries just 52 per cent of 15-year-old boys said they read for enjoyment compared with 73 per cent of girls.

Second, and as a consequence of the fact boys don't enjoy reading, boys read less than girls. In fact, boys spend one hour less per week on homework than girls - and each hour of homework per week translates into a four-point higher score in the PISA reading, maths and science tests.

In 2011, National Literacy Trust research found that 35 per cent of girls said they read outside of class every day compared with just 26 per cent of boys. Meanwhile, the OECD found that - outside of school - boys spent more time playing video games than girls and less time reading for enjoyment, particularly complex texts like fiction. The OECD states: "Reading proficiency is the foundation upon which all other learning is built; when boys don't read well, their performance in other school subjects suffers too."

According to a report by the Boys' Reading Commission (an All-Party Parliamentary Group), boys' underachievement in reading is a significant concern for schools across the UK. In a survey, 76 per cent of UK schools said boys in their school did not do as well in reading as girls; 82 per cent of schools said they had been compelled to develop their own strategies to tackle this.

The issue, so says the National Literacy Trust, is deep-seated. Test results consistently show this is a long-term and international trend.

Boys' attitudes towards reading and writing, the amount of time they spend reading, and their achievement in reading and writing are all poorer than those of girls. However, boys' underachievement in literacy is not inevitable. It is not simply a result of biological differences; the majority of boys can achieve in literacy and can become fluent readers.

What can we do to close the gap?

Rather than being biological, the Boys' Reading Commission found that boys' underachievement in reading was associated with the interplay of three factors.

First, the home and family environment: at home, girls are more likely to be bought books and taken to the library than boys, and mothers are more likely to support and role-model reading for their children than fathers.

One obvious solution, therefore, is to ensure that boys are bought books and taken to the library, and that fathers become more active as role-models by reading to their children more often - and are seen to read for personal pleasure.

Second, the school environment: many teachers have a limited knowledge of contemporary and attractive texts for boys and boys are not always given the opportunity to develop their identity as a reader through experiencing reading for enjoyment.

One obvious solution, therefore, is to ensure that teachers are explicitly educated in what constitutes appropriate choices of texts for boys and also act as role-models in school by being seen to read and discuss books, particularly male teachers in subjects not usually associated with reading.

Third, male gender identities: boys tend not to value learning and reading as a mark of success. One obvious solution, therefore, is to challenge the stereotype in the ways suggested above: ensure parents and teachers (particularly men) act as effective role-models and are explicit about the importance of reading and writing as a means of learning and explicit, in turn, about the importance of learning as a means of succeeding at school and in life.

A sustained approach

These solutions are useful starting points but, alone, will not turn underachieving and demotivated boys into readers; rather, a sustained approach is required.

Schools need to encourage positive gender identities that value reading, develop a supportive social context for boys' reading and counteract the possible negative triggers that can turn boys off.

For example, a refreshed commitment in schools to promoting reading for enjoyment would strongly benefit boys who want to read around their interests. To enable this to happen, reading for pleasure needs to be an integral part of a school's teaching and learning strategy (and built into the curriculum) and teachers need to be supported in their knowledge of relevant quality texts that will engage all students.

There is also the danger that a predominantly female workforce (particularly in the primary phase but also in secondary school English departments and libraries) might subconsciously privilege texts that are more attractive to girls. Schools need to ensure male teachers also act as effective role-models to boys.

Younger and Warrington's four-year research programme (Raising Boys' Achievement, DfES 2005), which examined the relative effectiveness of the strategies employed by schools to raise boys' achievement, suggested four different categories of school-based approaches:

1. Pedagogic: in other words, classroom-based approaches centred on teaching and learning.

2. Individual: i.e. a focus on target-setting and mentoring.

3. Organisational: i.e. whole-school curriculum design.

4. Socio-cultural: i.e. approaches which attempt to create an environment for learning.

It's good to talk

Younger and Warrington's analysis showed that pedagogic strategies to improve reading were most successful when combined with a holistic approach, which focused not on teaching reading but on helping boys to become "successful and satisfied readers".

When this happened and students were given space to talk and reflect on reading, share ideas and discuss why it was enjoyable, standards of reading improved.

Younger and Warrington's research is backed up by OECD data which shows the clear link between the motivation to read and reading skills.

They argued that for some boys the desire and motivation to read needs to be explicitly fostered through reading aloud, having a reading environment, having significant amounts of talk about texts, and having high levels of student-to-student book recommendations, and teacher-to-student and student-to-teacher, as well as quality time to read and then talk about what was read. The research stresses the importance of talk in supporting boys' literacy.

Responding to Younger and Warrington's paper, the National Literacy Trust made key recommendations.

First, schools should promote reading for enjoyment and involve parents (particularly fathers) in their reading strategies. Schools should provide students with opportunities to read around their own interests, and enjoy reading. Schools should have a reading strategy and should focus on the needs of groups of students who are more likely to fall behind - including boys - as well as the effectiveness of the school library in supporting these strategies.

Second, every teacher should have an up-to-date knowledge of reading materials that will appeal to disengaged boys. Schools should have a library at their heart and the school librarian should play an important role in enthusing teachers with the knowledge of reading materials. Schools should be encouraged to invest in their library provision.

Third, school libraries should target students (particularly boys) who are least likely to be supported in their reading at home, perhaps by working in partnership with children's centres to target younger families who most need support. Libraries should also encourage students to take part in important initiatives, such as the annual Summer Reading Challenge initiative.

Finally, every boy should have weekly support from a male reading role-model. One boy in five thinks reading is more for girls than boys. This reflects the fact that mothers are more likely than fathers to support their children's reading, that mothers are more likely to read in front of their children, and that the teacher who teaches a student to read is more likely to be a woman.

Many boys will be supported in their reading by males within the home, but for those who aren't, the recruitment of male reading volunteers is a helpful strategy for schools to employ. Schools could make use of volunteering initiatives to engage young men in the support of boys' reading.

Younger and Warrington also recommended the following:

Pedagogic approaches

Teachers should use a variety of interactive classroom activities including both short, specific focused activities and more sustained, on-going activities, as and when appropriate.

Teachers should acknowledge the central importance of talk - of speaking and listening as a means of supporting writing.

Teachers should take advantage of the gains to be achieved through companionable writing with response partners and through group work.

Teachers should be prepared to take risks to bring more creativity and variety to literacy.

Teachers should make more integrated use of ICT so that quality presentations can be more easily achieved, and drafts can be amended with greater ease.

Teachers should use a proactive and assertive approach in the classroom, which avoids the negative or confrontational, conveys high expectations and a sense of challenge, and uses praise regularly and consistently.

Mentoring approaches

Schools should have a coherent and integrated approach to target-setting and mentoring in which mentors prioritise their time to give credibility to the process.

Schools should ensure there is a mutual understanding and shared commitment to all aspects of the mentoring process, as well as a common belief and conviction among teachers and students in the system.

Mentors should be credible to students; collaborative and supportive on the one hand, offering strategies, advice and encouragement, but crucially they should be assertive and demanding on the other, so that disengaged students have the opportunity to protect their own image and use their mentor's pressure to "excuse" their own involvement in academic work.

Socio-cultural approaches

Schools should ensure boys are actively involved in whole-school activities, such as artists-in-residence schemes, poetry weeks, dance sessions run by professional dancers, and drama productions which allocate lead roles to disengaged boys.

Schools should establish paired reading schemes between boys in different year groups with the explicit rationale of promoting self-esteem among the older "expert" boys.

Teachers should be willing to take risks in order to engage individual students in roles where they are actively supported to make choices and to achieve success.

Teachers and other staff should be fully committed to creating opportunities that afford students the space they need in order to articulate their feelings and emotions.

Conclusion

Of course, focusing on improving boys' proficiency in literacy is not without risk. First, schools need to be careful not to disengage girls who struggle with reading by catering solely for boys. Many approaches that effectively support boys are also helpful to girls, but not all.

Second, it is tempting to treat underachieving boys as a homogenous group, but of course they are not. Not all boys are interested in the same things or have the same difficulties. Not all boys have difficulties because of the same circumstances, either. And, perhaps more importantly, not all boys struggle with reading and writing.

In focusing on raising boys' attainment in English, there is a danger that schools will imply that all boys underachieve and are not expected to do well because literacy isn't for boys: this might become a self-fulfilling prophecy by reinforcing it as a social norm.

Matt Bromley is an experienced school and college leader, an education writer and consultant. He is currently the group director of teaching and learning for a large further education college and multi-academy trust. Find out more at www.bromleyeducation.co.uk and follow him on Twitter @mj_bromley

Narrowing the gender gap

This is the second of three articles on narrowing the gender gap. The third article, exploring the gender gap in maths and the sciences, is due to be published in SecEd on June 18. Read the articles at www.sec-ed.co.uk/article-search/author/133

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In part one of this series, I examined some of the biological and societal reasons why a gender gap exists in education and explored some generic strategies for closing it. In this article, I will explore the gender gap in literacy proficiency and look at ways of raising boys' attainment in reading and writing.