Understanding and Helping Boys at School

Here is a brief summary or highlights from the book, Boy Smarts.

Guideline 1: Gender exists along a continuum from extremely feminine and extremely masculine at each end. There is more variance within a gender than between genders. Takeaway: Provide a range of activities to meet varied needs--from rambunctious, physical play to quieter activities, such as chess and reading.   

Guideline 2: Boys need movement. "Movement is central to multi-sensory stimulation and mimics real-world interactions." It also helps stimulate their brains, to process information and make sense of stressful situations. Boredom is stressful for boys. Takeaway: Provide movement activity breaks, centres or group rotations, and allow fidgeting and doodling whenever possible.  

Guideline 3: Testosterone must be channelled, as high levels account for increased irritability and impulsiveness, as well as rambunctiousness. However, if testosterone dips too low, they may become grumpy, nervous or bad-tempered. Takeaway: Boys need activities to channel their boisterousness, instead of being reprimanded or medicated. 

Guideline 4: "Men consistently outperform women on spatial tasks, including mental rotation, which is the ability to identify how a 3-D object would appear if rotated in space. A new study shows a connection between this ability and the structure of the parietal lobe." (Brain and Cognition, Nov. 5, 2008). Takeaway: Design activities that involved opportunities for spatial and abstract reasoning, such as measurement, pre-algebra and graphing in math. Also, building models, mind-mapping and using graphic organizers are great tools to analyze information.


Source: Boy Smarts, Barry McDonald, 2005