Games for boys: a qualitative study of experiences with commercial off the shelf gaming

Boys are less likely to receive praise and recognition for good schoolwork, to consider school important, and have fewer opportunities to do the things that they do best (Lopez and Calderon in How America’s boys become psychological dropouts. The gallup blog, 2013). Traditional school cultures have come in conflict with the normal and natural ways that boys behave. As a result, boys have had alienating experiences and high levels of disengagement and lowered academic success in school due to rejection of boy culture, which includes aggressive play, competition, and violent fantasy. The purpose of this study was to explore ways in which we can re-engage boys and enhance their learning opportunities in traditional classroom settings. Boys are drawn to video games, which offer a unique environment where they can engage in learning activities. By taking seriously the indigenous knowledge of this portion of boy culture, we may identify ways in which their expertise can become useful towards common learning goals (Carr-Chellman 2007; Carr-Chellman and Savoy 2004). The current analysis represents the first of a multiphase study that uses an interpretive lens within a CHAT framework to identify relevant learning in Commercial of the Shelf (COTS) games. This phenomenological design identifies learning accounts that map to the United States Common Core State Standards. Our findings suggest that engaged learning can occur for these boys as a result of playing games. COTS games engage boys in normal and natural ways, and consequently can be relevant learning tools that educators, researchers and instructional designers might employ toward traditional learning objectives.     

‘Playing with or like the girls’: advancing the performance of ‘multiple masculinities in Black boys’ childhood play’ in U.S. early childhood classrooms

Play is a gendered activity among young children, especially boys. Boys often tend to be more actively engaged in the (re)production of gendered play. However, most research studies and conceptual papers have misread, ignored, devalued, or scrutinized the gendered ways Black boys engage in play. This idea is particularly true for Black boys who may not play within the monolithic gendered expectations of childhood play. Drawing from [Connell, R. W. (1995). Masculinities. Berkeley: University of California Press] notion of multiple masculinities, I propose what I call the performance of ‘multiple masculinities of Black boys’ childhood play’ to embrace the ways some Black boys engage in play activities, which may not fit within the performance of hegemonic and Black masculine norms and expectations. In so doing, I call for educators to broaden how we view Black boys, and our definition of Black masculinity so that embracing what might be traditionally called ‘less masculine’ and/or stereotypically feminine could be valued male traits. Recommendations are provided for early childhood educators to support the confluence of ways Black boys engage in play experiences.     

Boys’ Underachievement: issues,challenges and possible ways forward

This article considers the issue of boys’ perceived lack of achievement at 16 and the context within which this issue has developed. In addition to conducting a review of relevant literature concerned with boys’ achievement, case study research was carried out in three comprehensive schools in the Midlands, taking the form of interviews with one senior member of staff from each school with a specific responsibility for boys’ achievement. The purpose of the interviews was to consider how different schools perceived the issue of boys’ underachievement and to examine the strategies employed by each to combat it. The discussion of the research indicates some significant factors affecting the ways in which boys identify themselves as being ‘male’ and which may influence their behaviour and attitudes towards school and towards their peers. The authors attempt to place the issue of boys’ underachievement into a wider social context and consider other factors which may have a bearing on the issue. The authors then attempt to relate the experiences of these three schools, and their other research, to the national picture and suggest ways in which teachers nationally may take steps to address the issue of boys’ underachievement within their own schools.     

Working‐class boys,educational success and the misrecognition of working‐class culture

This article contributes to the theory of institutional habitus by exploring the differing ways in which the institutional habitus of two schools in Belfast, Northern Ireland mediates the local habitus of working‐class boys. All of the boys in this qualitative case study live in the same disadvantaged working‐class community but attend two different schools, depending on whether they succeeded or failed in an examination at the age of 11 years. It is argued that these schools have different mediating effects on the boys’ common habitus. While most studies of working‐class boys focus on underachievement, and most studies of working‐class success focus on females, this article draws together the strands of success, failure, working‐class boys and locality, and examines the ways in which identity is constructed and reconstructed in response to schooling. Questions are raised about the interpretation and/or misrecognition of working‐class culture in schools and within the wider discourses of society.     

Guiding Boys in the Early Years to Lead Healthy Emotional Lives

Research has shown that there are distinct differences in the psychological development of boys and girls. It has also been found that boys have more problems in their teen years and into adulthood because of problems during early childhood, particularly in the area of handling emotions. This article first describes gender differences that are supported by research and how society, parents', and teachers' influences shape gender identity during early development. Second, the article discusses problems boys in particular may face later in life if they are not taught how to handle their emotions during childhood. Third, suggestions are offered for teachers and parents to guide boys in early childhood to mature in more emotionally sound ways.     

Examining Boys’ Readings of Gender in the English Classroom

As an opinionated and often challenging class of year 10 boys, they demonstrated a strong sense of their identity as a group of ‘bright boys’. One of their English teachers described the class as ‘boisterous, but very motivated – they love discussing texts’, but she also recognised their tendency to ‘descend into testosterone fuelled competitiveness’. I became interested in the ways these boys read and responded to literature and in particular how their strong view of themselves as ‘bright boys’ influenced their reading of gender in literature. I examine two lessons with this year 10 class in which they discussed representations of gender in two literary texts. I was interested in the ways they constructed and asserted their masculine identities through class discussions about gender in literature and I found myself wondering: how do these boys read gender, and why do they read gender in these ways?     

Talking about Sex in Sex Education

In the context of the recent controversy and confusion around sex education in Britain, I argue that an understanding of how boys and girls talk about sex and an awareness of the different and changing social worlds boys and girls inhabit, are crucial starting points for formulating sex education policies. Sex education is often embarked on without adequate understanding of the social context of sexuality and of the significance of changes in sexual practice that have occurred over the past few decades. Drawing on interviews and group discussion with male and female adolescents, I illustrate the difficulty boys and girls have communicating with each other and how for boys, to be intimate is to forego their dominance. I argue that there is a need to develop ways in which the power relations between boys and girls can be addressed and the derogatory way menstruation, pregnancy, and girls are perceived by boys can be challenged.     

Study of Ways to Improve Effectiveness of The Supply Chains

As for ways to improve the effectiveness of supply chains,this essay focus on 2 parts that involved in the process of logistic and supply chains and analyses ways to make them better preformed.The first one is Home Depot,the other is the Study of Radio-Frequency Identification.     

Pedagogies and critical reflection: key understandings for transformative gender justice

It is widely acknowledged that quality pedagogy is central to improving the educational outcomes of all students. In improving the social and academic outcomes of boys, and more specifically disengaged boys, the productive pedagogies model has been presented as a way forward. In terms of drawing on this model in socially just ways; to facilitate a broadening, rather than reinscribing of boys’ narrow constructions of gender identity, this paper illustrates the imperative of teachers interacting with key feminist understandings of masculinity. Organized around the four dimensions of productive pedagogy, the paper draws on (predominantly Australian‐based) seminal work in the sphere of masculinities and schooling to discuss key strategies and initiatives for improving boys’ educational outcomes. Against this backdrop, the paper demonstrates the importance of two principle understandings. The first relates to teachers understanding masculinity through feminist lenses, as constructed, regulated and maintained through inequitable social processes and the second relates to teachers understanding pedagogy as critical and transformative practice. These understandings are presented as vital to enabling gender justice.     

Peer Status and Aggression in Boys'' Groups: Developmental and Contextual Analyses

The social transactions of popular, rejected, neglected, and average first- and third-grade boys were examined during their initial encounters with peers. 23 groups of 5 or 6 boys each were observed for 45-min free-play sessions conducted on 5 consecutive days, with sociometric interviews following each session. Social preference in the play groups correlated significantly with classroom social preference after the third and subsequent play sessions for the third graders, and after the fourth and subsequent sessions for the first graders. The observational coding system distinguished 4 types of aggressive behavior that were hypothesized to relate to peer status in different ways. The first, rough play, was not related to peer status. However, rejected boys at both ages displayed significantly higher rates of angry reactive aggression and instrumental aggression than average boys. The relation between bullying and peer status varied with the age of the child. Popular first graders engaged in more bullying than average first graders, but popular third graders did not differ from average in bullying. Other questions concerned the temporal relation between play group behaviors and social preference scores within the group. Socially interactive behaviors anteceded high preference by peers, and low preference in turn led to social isolation in subsequent sessions.     

(Re)Configuring masculinities in an ethno-centric Australian community school: complexity and contradictions

This article draws on a case study of 15 boys aged between 13 and 14 years who attend an urban ethno-centric community school located in Melbourne, Australia. The study investigated how the boys' constructions of masculinity were mediated by a strong connectedness to their Greek cultural traditions and ideals. Data generated from focus group discussions provided insights into the complex ways in which the boys individually and collectively constructed their understandings of what it means to be a man. For most boys, maleness constituted cultural traditions and behaviours that must be learnt: a code of conduct which a boy acquires from his elders that is talked into existence and transmitted through a hegemonic discourse. Yet the findings also revealed the agency boys can exercise and the fluidity of their configurations: contradictions and inconsistencies being an inherent part of the recursive process of their gendered identity formation.     

‘They never go off the rails like other ethnic groups’: teachers’ constructions of British Chinese pupils’ gender identities and approaches to learning

This paper examines the ways in which British Chinese pupils are positioned and represented within the popular/dominant discourse of teachers working in London schools. Drawing on individual interviews from a study conducted with 30 teachers, 80 British Chinese pupils and 30Chinese parents, we explore some of the racialised, gendered and classed assumptions upon which dominant discourses around British Chinese boys and girls are based. Consideration is given, for example, to teachers’ dichotomous constructions of British Chinese masculinity, in which British Chinese boys were regarded as ‘naturally’ ‘good’ and ‘not laddish’, compared with a minority of ‘bad’ British Chinese boys, whose laddishness was attributed to membership of a multiethnic peer group. We also explore teachers’ constructions of British Chinese femininity, which centred around remarkably homogenised representations of British Chinese girls as ‘passive’ and quiet, ‘repressed’, hard‐working pupils. The paper discusses a range of alternative readings that challenge popular monolithic and homogenising accounts of British Chinese masculinity and femininity in order to open up more critical ways of representing and engaging with British Chinese educational ‘achievement’.     

Differently Literate: Gender identity and the construction of the developing reader

ABSTRACT This paper argues that three specific areas of influence contribute to shaping the attitudes and expectations of adolescent reading in Britain: that of the family, that of the friendship group and that of the peer group in school. I examine pupils' perceptions of themselves as readers, and the ways in which their early reading experiences have been differentiated in relation to their gender. I provide evidence that reading is constructed within both domestic and school settings as an interest more appropriate for adolescent girls than it is for boys, and examine ways in which their reading experience has been influenced by other members of the family and the wider community. Finally I identify the role of the school curriculum in promoting particular versions of literacy that have more appeal for girls than boys in the survey.     

Teaching boys: towards a theory of gender-relevant pedagogy

This article calls attention to the social and educational challenges facing boys and men around the world. Next, it highlights how the outcomes for males of African descent across the Americas, in particular the USA, are especially troubling. Moreover, a critique is presented about the recruitment campaigns that see increasing the number of Black male teachers as an elixir for improving the crisis facing Black boys. Then, the article focuses on the intersection of race and gender and reframes the discussion around improving the deleterious school outcomes facing Black boys by shifting the conversation to exploring how educators' socialised views around gender influence the ways in which they teach boys. Finally, the article provides practical applications for designing a curriculum that is gender relevant.     

‘The boys’ present… Hegemonic masculinity: a performance of multiple acts

This article explores the performance of masculinity(ies) within the classroom site. Drawing upon research conducted in two co‐educational secondary classrooms, it examines the ways in which two groups of boys took up positions of dominance within their respective classrooms and, more specifically, focuses upon the ways in which they came to construct themselves, and perform, as embodied masculine subjects. In doing so, it examines the gendered and sexualized discursive knowledges and practices mobilized by these boys. Furthermore, it illustrates the ways in which these performances are constituted by, and constitutive of, versions of hegemonic masculinity while demonstrating the range of ways of ‘doing’ hegemonic masculinity—the various performance techniques available to do this ‘work’. The article also examines how these boys' performances served to position their peers within the classroom and, furthermore, explores their intra‐group interactions and the ways in which they came to position each other.     

Gender and Genre: Reading and Writing Choices of Older Juniors

There has been much recent interest in the reading and writing choices children make and how far these choices are affected by their gender. Differences in the reading preferences of boys and girls seem to become more marked as children move through the primary years. Given that literacy involves control over a range of texts, as reader and writer, teachers seek ways of increasing the repertoire of both boys and girls. The first part of this study examines the reading and writing choices of the children in a Year 6 class in both home and school contexts. The questionnaire responses indicated that the children chose very different genres in the home as compared with the school setting and that gender differences were more marked in the home preferences. The analysis then draws on some of the children’s comments and views in exploring the implications of their preferences and the attitudes behind them. Finally, some strategies for encouraging wider and more reflective reading of both boys and girls are suggested.     

Exploring the Spiritual Lives of Adolescent Males

This study explores how adolescent males in secular boys’ schools perceive spirituality and how these perceptions relate to their emotional intelligence. I examined the relationship between spirituality and emotion by inviting the boys to reflect on how the two impact their lives, relationships, and behaviors. My study was designed to provide the participants with collaborative, individual, and written spaces for inquiry. The triangulation of these methods provides a meta-perspective on how boys experience their spirituality and how that affects their emotional intelligence. The results of this study help us understand how boys actualize the values of self-awareness, connection, and inquiry in their perceptions of spirituality. The boys want to know who they are, to connect with others, and to question their worlds. Furthermore, the data linking spirituality and emotion will provide new ways to think about how to foster mindful, empathetic, and emotionally aware boys. This article argues that developing spiritual awareness enhances emotional intelligence, and the capacity to understand this relationship influences behavior in meaningful ways.     

'Spice Girls', 'Nice Girls', 'Girlies', and 'Tomboys': Gender discourses,girls' cultures and femininities in the primary classroom

The past decade has seen a growing political and academic concern with boys' underachievement. Drawing on the case study of a London primary classroom, this article argues that contemporary gendered power relations are more complicated and contradictory than the new orthodoxy that girls are doing better than boys suggests. The girls in this case study took up very varied positions in relation to traditional femininities. Yet, despite widely differentiated practices, all the girls at various times acted in ways which bolstered boys' power at the expense of their own. While peer group discourses constructed girls as harder working, more mature and more socially skilled, still the boys and a significant number of the girls adhered to the view that it is better being a boy. The article concludes that in this particular primary school, girls and boys still learned many of the old lessons of gender relations which work against gender equity.     

Young people's views of sex education: gender,information and knowledge

This paper derives from research that had the aim of understanding more about adolescents' views of sex education and adolescent sexuality. The data are taken from three separate pieces of research conducted in 1984, 1998 and 2003. This paper presents data about gender, information and knowledge relating to sexuality. It seeks to demonstrate that attitudes to information and knowledge vary significantly with gender. The data suggest that many adolescents we studied were offered different access to information about sex and sexuality in their families. The argument is that this has impact on the sources of information that they rely upon and prefer. We investigate the underlying issues about the ways boys obtain not only information about sex, but also their attitudes to sexual encounters. Sources of information and counselling about sexuality varied with gender. Boys and girls were exposed to different kinds of experience, in which information about sexuality and messages about desire also vary. Home and intimacy with parents, especially mothers, is important for many, although not all, girls in a way it is not for boys. This indicates a picture of boys learning about sex and sexuality in ways that by and large do not include adults, or more especially trusted adults, and where there appears to be some elements of exclusion from the family. This has important implications for sex education programmes, and may offer us insights into why the boys resist school sex education work.     

Voicing Resistance: Adolescent boys and the cultural practice of leisure reading

This article describes a theoretically informed methodology for eliciting the voices of adolescent boys identified by their teachers and parents as reluctant leisure time readers. Similar methods have also been used to draw out the voices of the boys’ parents to understand their efforts to guide and maintain their sons’ literacy practices, within the context of one middle class Australian school community. The concept of “voice” in our research of boys as capable but differently committed leisure time readers is informed by a socio-cultural theory that foregrounds the processes of enculturation, appropriation, and agency as fundamental to identity formation. In this regard the varied ways in which the boys in the study have taken up the reading practices valued in their families is illustrative of the mutuality of individual agency and cultural processes. In describing both the theoretical and conceptual framing of a methodology designed to investigate in particular those boys who have resisted their families’ reading dispositions we hope to highlight how individuals struggle to construct new values within patterns of cultural practice.