Elementary School Teacher Explains Why A 'Great' Male Student Is Often 'Just Doing What An Average Girl Is Expected To Do Every Day'
There is definitely a bias present in what is expected from boys and girls in the classroom.
kapinon.stuio | Shutterstock It’s just a fact that girls are treated differently from boys. So much is expected of girls, and the pressure to be perfect falls on them at a very young age. Meanwhile, boys are really asked to do the bare minimum. As long as they can mostly stay out of trouble, they’re considered successful.
Nowhere is this more evident than in the classroom. If a boy displays good behavior, he is praised for it. The same doesn’t happen for girls because it’s what’s expected of them. This isn’t just a commonly repeated argument or a casual observation. It’s something that elementary school teachers are noticing in their classrooms and calling out.
Two male elementary school teachers shared that they felt there was an unfair bias in the way boys and girls are treated.
One TikToker and teacher, Jordan Scott, shared his thoughts on the differences between boys and girls in a video. “My female students are always leaps and bounds ahead of the boys,” he noted. “They usually learn quicker, they work harder, and they’re always more mature.” Another teacher, known as Mr. Trayvon, made a direct reply to Scott and one of the comments left on his video. The commenter said, “A great boy in school is often just doing what an average girl is expected to do every day.”
“This video is straight facts,” Trayvon argued. But he doesn’t just see it today as a teacher; he actually experienced it firsthand as a student. “I vividly remember growing up, I would get complimented all the time for my handwriting,” he explained. “Like, teachers are saying, ‘You have such nice handwriting. Who taught you how to write? Thank your grandma. Thank your mom.’”
However, the girls in his classes displayed the exact same skills and didn’t get any shoutouts. “But if you were to compare my handwriting to the girls in the class, there were at least seven, eight girls in any given class that their handwriting was practically the equivalent of mine,” he said. “But I never heard any girls getting complimented for their handwriting.”
The teacher concluded that this was evidence of a bias between boys and girls.
“So right there, that’s something that you could probably call a bias between boys and girls,” he continued. “Especially when it comes to, like, handwriting, behavior, the way certain boys might act, and then how girls are expected to act in class as well.”
Trayvon said that while teachers don’t mean to do it, they would react differently to boys and girls in their class. “Another thing that you’d notice if you’re a teacher is, let’s say you have a class of 30 students and you have 21 boys,” he said hypothetically. “If you had 21 boys, you’re going to be worried because you know how boys act. You know their maturity, right?”
“But if it was 21 girls, you would give a sigh of relief,” he pointed out. “You would think, ‘Okay, good. I’m not gonna have barely any problems in this class.’” He went on to say, “If you look at the data, girls typically are higher achieving, girls typically are more prepared, and girls typically are more mature than boys at any given age.”
This bias is negatively affecting both boys and girls.
A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology concluded that middle school teachers were more likely to give female students higher grades than males. This is because teachers just naturally expect girls to do better in school because they are more mature and better behaved.
Yaroslav Shuraev | Pexels
This suggests that both girls and boys are at a disadvantage. Girls have higher and heavier expectations placed on their shoulders. Meanwhile, boys could be falling behind in academics because teachers don’t expect as much from them and let them slide a bit because of it. No one is benefiting from this stereotypical system.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
