Who is Smarter? Essays -- Gender Equality Intelligence Education Essay

Who is Smarter? Who's smarter? There have been several tests given to young boys and girls to test their intelligence, the turnout has been that girls' overall average intelligence is higher than that of boys. Are girls just naturally born smarter or do the teachers have something to do with it? In David Thoma's article, The Mind of Man, he writes about how he believes that women teachers are the reason why boys score lower on tests and don't do as well as girls in school. "At kindergarten and primary school level, in which little girls out-perform the boys, the vast majority of teachers are female."(121) He focuses on the fact that boys are more rebellious and outgoing than girls. Thomas believes that becasue most boys have behavior problems the teacher becomes concerned with their social and not their academic life. Since girls tend to be more diligent and less rebellious, the boys are usually the ones that speak up more forcefully and are spoken to more often by teachers. "Surveys showed that woman teachers consistently praised girls more than boys, and equally consistently criticized the boys' behavior, often regarding it as a serious problem requiring remedial treatment."(121) He adds how women teachers always seem to find boys to be loud and aggressive. In a classroom setting little girls will usually be playing or working in a quiet orderly manner while boys would be doing the same thing in a noisy and disorderly way requiring more supervision. Thomas believes that because a female teacher has to constantly keep calling the boys' attention the teacher ends up having favorite, usually being girls because they are going through a process they have already been through. Although Thomas believes that traditional male... ...ects in their head. Females prove better at reading the emotions of people in photographs."(121) Overall, I don't agree with Thomas' statement that boys do bad in school due to female teachers. If this is the case then can we say that girls do badly with male teachers? What does Thomas mean by saying that boys need to behave in ways that are not natural to them? Does he mean that they need to behave in a disciplined manner? I believe Thomas kind of contradicts himself because he does say that "boys whose lives are led without structure and discipline do not find themselves liberated. Instead they become bored, frustrated and maladaptive. They fight. They misbehave and they perform badly, both at school and thereafter."(124) Works Cited Lunsford, A. Andrea, Ruszkiewicz, J. John. The Prescence of Others. Bedford/St. Martins: Boston, New York. Copyright 2000.