The three duties of the historian of education

The origins of modern schooling in early nineteenth-century Africa have been poorly researched. Moreover, histories of education in Africa have focused largely on the education of boys. Little attention has been paid to girls’ schooling or to the missionary women who sought to construct a new feminine Christian identity for African girls. In the absence of personal accounts of African girls’ schooling from that period, this paper draws on a slim body of 71 letters written by women and girls associated with one British mission society in Sierra Leone between 1804 and 1826 to suggest a fluid and at times contradictory construction of gender and racial identity, which sits at odds with the ideology of domestic femininity that the missionaries sought to impart through girls’ schooling. The handful of letters written by African women and girls also casts doubt on the assumed subservience of black subjects to white officialdom.     

Gender norms and STEM: the importance of friends for stopping leakage from the STEM pipeline

More women are now entering male-dominated fields, yet, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) remain dominated by men. We examined the association between boys’ and girls’ STEM choices after secondary education and friends’ gender norms, and whether pressure to conform to traditional gender norms differs depending on the gender composition of the friend group. Drawing on 3 waves of longitudinal data (N?=?744) from the Netherlands, our sample consists of adolescents in STEM trajectories in secondary education. Their retention in STEM after secondary education gives us a better understanding of gender-specific “leakage” from the STEM pipeline. We found that girls’ likelihood of choosing STEM decreased drastically when friends had more traditional gender norms. Friends with traditional gender norms had less effect on boys. Nonetheless, boys with only same-sex friends were more likely to enter STEM. Our findings indicate that an environment with gender-normative ideas pushes girls out of the STEM pipeline.     

《宁波大学学报》（教育科学版）2020总目次

经过历次课程变革,我国高中学段课程结构日趋科学完善。课程结构演变中,外在显性逻辑和内在隐性逻辑和谐统一。外在显性逻辑以时间为线索,不同历史时期呈现出特定条件下课程结构的价值取向和结构形态的发展规律,分别为政治导向的单一性课程结构、劳动导向的精简化课程结构、知识导向的学科性课程结构、人本导向的综合化课程结构、素养导向的多样化课程结构。内在隐性逻辑以体系本身的要素来构建,逻辑动力上的取向转变、逻辑要素上的立体层递、逻辑本质上的知识控制,从一元孤立到宏观、中观、微观层级系统建构。隐性逻辑是因,显性逻辑是果。课程结构的改进不仅需要理论研究、优化框架等结构内部动因的科学建构,也需要评价机制、教师观念等结构外部因素的有效保障。     

Gender discrimination and education in West Africa: strategies for maintaining girls in school

Girls’ enrolment in primary schools has achieved significant increase and parity with male enrolment in many countries in Africa since the 1960s. Some of these countries include Botswana, Namibia and Tanzania. However, in most Sub‐Saharan African countries, female enrolment still lags behind male enrolment. This paper examines some of the reasons for the persistent gender gap between females and males in the three African countries of Ghana, Nigeria and Togo within the West Africa sub‐region. It discusses gender relations, cultural practices such as early marriage, child slavery, and child fostering/trafficking, poverty and multiple household duties for girls as some of the contributing factors. It is argued that unless these cultural beliefs and attitudes are changed and mandatory measures such as holding parents accountable and responsible are put in place, gender parity and quality education for all, especially for females, will not be achieved in Africa. A number of additional strategies for improvement in school attendance and retention for females are also discussed.     

Equity Gains in Bangladesh Primary Education

Although equity is a desirable objective of any form of development intervention, including education, not many studies dwell upon this important area. Information on related trends is even more rare. This essay uses field-level data from Bangladesh to examine equity levels and trends in primary education, including enrolment and quality of learning, focusing on equity for different gender, urban or rural, economic and ethnic groups. The study shows that while some disparity between girls and boys has been eliminated, girls are still far behind boys in terms of learning achievement. Children belonging to poorer families and ethnic minority groups lag behind the respective dominant groups in terms of both enrolment and learning achievement. At the same time, there have been some improvements for hitherto excluded groups such as rural girls and children of the poor. These changes are attributed mainly to 'positive discriminatory' steps taken by the government and non-governmental organizations in favour of such groups. If this trend continues, Bangladesh can look forward to establishing itself as a more equitable society than it is now.     

Structural Adjustment and Gender Access to Education in Nigeria

ABSTRACT The article reports on relative gender access to secondary (grammar) school education from 1977 to 1990 in Imo State, Nigeria. To this end, time series data on secondary (grammar) school enrolment in Imo State from 1977/78 to 1989/90 were analysed. The findings are: (i) the existence of a gender imbalance in access to grammar school education in which the participation rate for girls was less than 40% up to 1980/81. This is discussed with reference to the prevalence of a gender-biased tradition which restricts girls' access to education; (ii) the dramatic overturning of the gender enrolment imbalance, in favour of girls, from 1981/82 when girls' participation rate in secondary education reached a peak of 56%. This is attributed to the nationwide implementation of a 6-year programme of free and compulsory Universal Primary Education (UPE) in Nigeria from 1976. The free and compulsory UPE scheme (which removed the traditional constraints on female education)had the immediateeffect of causing a phenomenal growth in primary school enrolment that was paralleled in the secondary sector in 1981/82; and (iii) the decline in access to grammar school education, more marked for girls than for boys, since 1986 when free market reform structural adjustment policies (SAP) prescribed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank were introduced in Nigeria. The SAP was accompanied by enormous financial and economic hardship which militate against access to education for the majority of poor Nigerians and for girls in particular. These findings are consistent with reported findings elsewhere in 'adjusting' countries. It is concluded that the financial rigours of the structural adjustments that havebeen imposed on such countries militate against the United Nations Children's Fund and United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation commitments to the elimination of all policies that hinder gender access to education in Africa and the global vision of education for all by the year 2000.     

Gender equality in education: Definitions and measurements

International consensus on education priorities accords an important place to achieving gender justice in the educational sphere. Both the Dakar ‘Education for All’ goals and the Millennium Development goals emphasise two goals, in this regard. These two goals are distinguished as gender parity goals [achieving equal participation of girls and boys in all forms of education based on their proportion in the relevant age-groups in the population] and gender equality goals [ensuring educational equality between boys and girls]. In turn these have been characterised as quantitative/numerical and qualitative goals respectively. In order to consider progress towards both types of goal, both quantitative and qualitative assessments need to be made of the nature of progress towards gender equality. Achieving gender parity is just one step towards gender equality in and through education. An education system with equal numbers of boys and girls participating, who may progress evenly through the system, may not in fact be based on gender equality. Following Wilson (Human Rights: Promoting gender equality in and through education. Background paper for EFA GMR 2003/4, 2003) a consideration of gender equality in education therefore needs to be understood as the right to education [access and participation], as well as rights within education [gender-aware educational environments, processes, and outcomes], and rights through education [meaningful education outcomes that link education equality with wider processes of gender justice].     

Modelling of factors influencing gender difference in mathematics achievement using TIMSS 2011 data for Singaporean eighth grade students

Numerous studies have attributed gender difference in mathematics achievement to various sociocultural influences. Singapore is a country of higher gender equality as represented in the Global Gender Gap Index and Singaporean girls perform as well or higher than boys in international mathematics assessments. This study develops a conceptual model to examine the relationship and effects of parental involvement in education, teacher efficacy, and students’ attitudes towards mathematics on mathematics achievement for Singaporean eighth grade students using Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 2011 data. The study finds that there is no significant gender difference in parental involvement in education and teacher efficacy and there is no gender difference in the attitude of like learning mathematics among Singaporean eighth grade students. The attitude of confidence in mathematics has positive and significant effect on mathematics achievement and the effect is greater for girls than boys. Parental involvement in education and teacher efficacy were found to have greater effect on girls’ confidence in mathematics than on boys’. As such, increasing involvement in mathematics education and providing positive reinforcement to raise girls’ self-confidence in mathematics by parents and teachers should be an integral part of any initiative to reduce gender gap in mathematics achievement.     

Boys as only‐children and girls as only‐children—parental gendered expectations of the only‐child in the nuclear Chinese family in present‐day China

Studies on the effect of only‐child status on girls’ education indicate that the only‐child policy has had an unintended consequence of engendering a child‐centered culture with a strong belief and shared interest among the urban community in educating the only‐child regardless of the child’s sex. As the distribution of education by sex is frequently argued to be a key determinant for gender inequality, this finding seems to carry an unquestioned message that gender equality has been largely achieved for the only‐child generation. So far, however, few studies have examined parental gender‐specific expectations for their only children as an important factor in preparing boys and girls for their different school and social experiences. Based on data collected through semi‐structured interviews with 20 families in north China, this paper explores parental gender‐specific expectations of their only‐children. Parents’ SES is also considered in order to see how class may interact with gender in parents’ expectations for boys and girls as only‐children. The study reveals patterns of differences in parental expectations based on gender, and to a lesser degree, class. The author argues that it would be over‐optimistic to believe that only‐child status and the equally high academic aspirations parents hold for boys and girls have done away with all the deep‐rooted factors against gender equality in Chinese society. Drawing on Bourdieu’s social theory, the author discusses the implications of the findings and provides suggestions for policy efforts and further research.     

埃塞俄比亚中小学教育性别不平等问题探析

在埃塞俄比亚中小学教育中,无论是教育过程还是教育结果,女生都明显处于弱势地位。其中既有经济原因,也有社会性别观念和暴力等因素。要有效减少教育中的性别不平等问题,埃塞俄比亚需要从以下三方面去努力:第一,积极采取措施发展经济,增加教育投入,提高人们的教育支付能力;第二,提高家长的受教育水平并使人们认识到女孩接受教育的重要性;第三,采取有效措施减少针对女童的暴力行为。     

教师的性别角色观：“阴盛阳衰”现象的重要成因

"阴盛阳衰"现象作为当前的一个热点话题引起社会广泛关注。这种现象受现行的教育教学评价体系、家庭教育方式、文化传播、教师的性别角色观等因素影响。其中,教师的性别角色观尤其值得关注。对301名广东省中小学教师性别角色观调查显示:教师的性别角色观存在双性化倾向,理想男生和理想女生的主要特质没有显著差异;教师的双性化性别角色观利于女生发展。理想男生和理想女生的独有特质体现了性别刻板印象,说明教师的性别角色观也受传统文化的一定影响。总的看,双性化是教师性别角色观的一个误区,也是"阴盛阳衰"现象的重要成因。     

The media,marketing, and single sex schooling

The Australian media’s interest in education, as in many Anglophone countries, is frequently dominated by concerns about boys in schools. In 2002, in a country region of the Australian State of Queensland, this concern was evident in a debate on the merits of single sex schooling that took place in a small local newspaper. The debate was fuelled by the inclusion in this newspaper of an advertising brochure for an elite private girls’ school. The advertisement utilized the current concerns about boys in schools to advocate the benefits of girls’ only schools. Drawing on research that suggests that boys are a problem in school, and utilising a peculiar mix of liberal feminism alongside a neo‐liberal class politics, it implicitly denigrated the education provided by government co‐educational schools. The local government high and primary school principals, incensed at this advertisement, contacted the paper to refute many of its claims and assumptions and to assert the benefits, to both boys and girls, of their particular schools. A letters to the editor debate then followed an article representing these government school principals’ views. These letters were from two private school principals. This country newspaper thus became a medium through which various school principals engaged with the current boys’ debate, and research associated with it, in order to market their schools. This paper examines this particular newspaper debate and argues that, in the absence of nuanced, research based, and thoughtful policy responses to gender issues, many school policies on gender are being shaped through and by the media in ways that elide the complexities of the issues involved.     

Including students with disabilities in Education for All: lessons from Ethiopia

This article addresses the inclusion of students with disabilities into the Education for All and Sustainable Development Goals agenda through a case study of Ethiopia, a country aiming to promote inclusive education amidst rapidly rising school enrolments. The article begins with a review of debates concerning inclusive education in the Global South and the strategy taken by Ethiopia. It then examines how inclusive education is currently being implemented drawing on recent fieldwork at rural and urban schools in Tigray province. Through interviews, participant observation, and focus groups, we found that teachers and school administrators are generally in favour of mainstreaming children with disabilities into ‘normal’ schools. However, insufficient training of teachers and itinerant teachers along with shortages of teaching materials and resources present major challenges to addressing special education needs.     

Gender Effects in Children’s Development and Education

This paper attempts to clarify several lines of research on gender in development and education, inter‐relating findings from studies on intuitive/informal knowledge with those from research on achievements and attitudes in science. It acknowledges the declining proportions of male teachers world‐wide and examination successes which indicate a reversal of educational disadvantage from female to male; as well as the recent evidence on the effects of the gender of teachers upon student success. An empirical contribution to the literature is offered, drawing from the gender‐related findings from research on children’s cosmologies in China and New Zealand with 346 boys and 340 girls (of whom 119 boys and 121 girls participated in the current study). The investigation focused on children’s concepts of the motion and shape of the Earth through observational astronomy and gave children opportunities to express their ideas in several modalities. The in‐depth interviews allowed children to share their meanings with gender differences becoming apparent (e.g. girls’ superior ability to visually represent their cosmologies and boys’ greater awareness of gravity). However, these differences were not universal across genders or cultures and marked similarities were apparent both in the content of children’s responses and in their reasoning processes. By comparing boy/girl cosmological concept categories and by tracking their developmental trends by age, statistical evidence revealed the extent of the similarities within and across these diverse cultures. The findings reinforce those from the authors’ knowledge restructuring and cultural mediation studies and provide support for the view that boys and girls have similar, holistic‐rather‐than‐fragmented, cosmologies which have features in common across cultures and ethnic groups.     

‘There is no free education nowadays’: youth explanations for school dropout in Indonesia

Indonesia has dramatically increased school enrolment at the secondary level over the past several decades, as reflected in national statistics. However, significant variation in enrolment rates remains across regions and genders. In some areas, nearly all youth complete secondary school; in others fewer than half attend. This study investigates the reasons for secondary school dropout in Banten and Aceh, two provinces of Indonesia with lower-than-average secondary school enrolment rates. We interviewed 28 out-of-school youth and conducted focus groups and observations at non-formal education programs serving dropouts. We find that high costs for secondary school were the overwhelming reason for dropout, with a subset of boys also reporting behavioural issues as a contributing factor. While costs affected adolescent boys and girls equally, the options facing them after dropout differed sharply. The findings point to the need for easier paths back into formal education for youth who have dropped out.     

Anxious girls and laid-back boys: teachers’ and study counsellors’ gendered perceptions of students

ABSTRACT

Efforts to reach gender equality in education in Finland have been extensive. Both teacher education and policy documents for schools have focused on gender equality and gender-neutral treatment of students. The aim of this study is to explore if and how these efforts are manifested in upper secondary school teachers’ and study counsellors’ perceptions of students’ self-belief, academic emotions, study habits and behaviour at school. Twenty-three interviews were conducted and analysed qualitatively through inductive content analysis. The results revealed that teachers and study counsellors perceive that girls’ low self-belief and high achievement expectations affected their academic performance, while boys’ insecurity or need for support was rarely mentioned. The teachers ascribed the students several gender-stereotypical attributes: girls were perceived as diligent and hard-working while boys were perceived as being indifferent towards school and achievements. The implications of these results for students’ self-belief and for teacher education are discussed.     

Gender differences in mathematics and science: the role of the actiotope in determining individuals’ achievements and confidence in their own abilities

Despite changes, gender differences in math and science continue to exist in some countries. We examined whether the actiotopes of boys and girls at the high school level in math and science differed and the extent to which (a) their actiotope components, (b) the progressive development of their actiotopes (dynamic perspective), and (c) the co-adaptation of their actiotopes (systems perspective) function as predictors for girls’ and boys’ achievements and confidence in one’s own abilities in math and science. To answer these questions, we examined girls and boys (N?=?361) in Canada, the Czech Republic, and Germany with a questionnaire. The results suggest that girls are less effective at progressively developing their actiotopes in the fields of math and science and that modifications in their actiotopes were less well balanced by stabilizing forces. Independent of gender, the actiotope aspects considered here are suited to predicting achievements and confidence in one’s own abilities in math and science.     

Single‐sex schooling: is it simply a ‘class act’?

The current debate about boys education risks taking us back decades in terms of understanding the significance of gender in relation to education. Of particular concern here is the tendency within such debates to rely on dichotomous understandings of gender which reinscribe essentialist understandings of both ‘girls’ and ‘boys’. In this way, the so‐called gender wars construct a climate whereby difference between the categories obfuscates difference within each. Here this issue is explored most specifically in relation to access to higher education and the possible impact of single‐sex schooling. Current debates surrounding boys' experience of schooling have refreshed interest in the possible benefits of single‐sex education, particularly for boys. Schools are establishing single‐sex classes for boys and in some cases parallel education (the provision of single‐sex facilities for girls and boys at the same campus) is being promoted as a way forward. In this paper we examine data from Australia's largest and most diverse university in order to explore the relationship between single‐sex schooling and access to higher education in ways which account for difference based primarily on school sector and socio‐economic status. In these terms, if single‐sex schooling is beneficial for boys we need to consider which boys are benefiting and at whose expense.     

中学生性别角色观的性别差异

性别角色观是指人们对男女性别角色的总的看法,是一种有关性别角色的价值观。本文采用问卷调查的方法,对430名中学生的性别角色观进行了研究,结果发现:(1)男女性别角色正价特质排在第一位的分别是勇敢和漂亮;负价特质排在第一位的分别是虚伪和自私;(2)男女生均认为勇敢、幽默、善良、浪漫、阳光帅气是男性的正价特质,但是在阳光帅气这一特质上有显著的性别差异;男女生均认为漂亮、大方、温柔、可爱、体贴、自信、细心、善良是女性的正价特质,此外,女生的正价特质中,男生认为还有纯洁和真诚,女生认为还有孝顺和亲和力;(3)男女生均认为虚伪、自负、自私、女性化强、奸诈、迂腐、自夸和斤斤计较是男性的负价特质,此外,女生的负价特质中,男生认为还有傲慢和霸道,女生认为还有懦弱和无能;男女生都认为自私、虚伪、势力、自大、斤斤计较、炫耀是女性的负价特质,且自私在男女生中均排在第一位。(4)年级对性别角色影响的卡方检验结果显示初中生和高中生的性别角色观没有显著差异,但是不同年级在性别角色特质选择的频数中可以看出:初中生与高中生皆将勇敢作为男性正价特质的第一位,但是初中生较高中生而言更不喜欢男生懦弱,高中生较初中生而言更不喜欢男生女性化强;高中生和初中生都不喜欢女生自私,但是高中生比初中生更看重女生的漂亮、大方、温柔。     

Gender Differences in Social Mastery Motivation and Its Relationships to Vocabulary Knowledge,Behavioral Self-Regulation,and Socioemotional Skills

The present study investigated gender differences in social mastery motivation, vocabulary knowledge, behavioral self-regulation, and socioemotional skills and examined the relationships among this knowledge and these skills by gender. Participants were 134 Chinese children (68 boys, M age = 3.80; 66 girls, M age = 3.89) and their parents recruited through local kindergartens’ parent groups. The children were administered measures of social mastery motivation, vocabulary knowledge, behavioral self-regulation, and nonverbal intelligence. Parents reported their education level and children’s socioemotional skills. Research Findings: Results revealed that boys exhibited more social mastery interactions than girls, and girls showed better behavioral self-regulation and socioemotional skills than boys. Girls with higher social mastery interaction frequency demonstrated better vocabulary knowledge and socioemotional skills, whereas boys with higher social mastery interaction frequency showed lower behavioral self-regulation. Boys, who showed more positive affect during social mastery interactions, tended to have better expressive vocabulary, which facilitated their behavioral self-regulation. Practice or Policy: Findings highlight social mastery motivation as a potential factor that facilitates children’s early development, but it may contribute to boys and girls in different ways.