I teach in a DEIS 1 Boys School in Dublin and have noticed a lot of gender stereotyping in the classroom. Something that really stands out to me is that although many of these boys are being raised by their Mams and see how much the women in their life do. They still hold men in a much higher regard. These mothers are doing everything to support their sons, through sports, education and general well-being, but it can go unnoticed and unappreciated.
Our infant school is mixed and lots of the boys had female friends for 3 years and then once they move up to our school, very few of them remain friends with these girls. It can be hard to address gender stereotyping in the classroom in a single sex schools as they don’t have an opposing opinion of girls to say ‘yes, we also like football and minecraft!’.
These lessons from the Development Education Handbook would be a great place to start to begin to open conversations about gender and stereotyping. As mentioned in many of the videos, we need boys to also help accelerate gender equality so it’s vital we still teach these concepts.
