I came across a Newsweek article that intrigued me. It said that three years ago, the principal of Foust Elementary School in Owensboro, Kentucky created a curriculum in which boys and girls were taught in seperate classrooms. The principal, Jeff Gray, did this because he learned how a boy's brain and a girl's brain was considered genetically different. As a result of the curriculum, test scores improved and disciplinary problems lessened.

Now other schools use or consider using the new curriculum. However, some people believe this is a bad idea because the curriculum will just reinforce narrow cultural stereotypes and will also deny equal opportunities in education. Others believe that basing curriculums on brain research is misguiding.

Do you think that schools should use this new curriculum?

It may improve test scores, but that's not always a good thing. Kids need to interact with one another, or else they will be more hesitant to do so later in life. Splitting kids into 2 different groups will make themselves seem superior to the others.

what celtic said

I personally think its bad Idea. Kids need to interact and have fun with one another (This is coming form a 13 year old.) If we weren't together we wouldn't make any friends with any of the girls and vice versa.

Brain organics my ass. The test scores and discipline improved 'cause they weren't getting googly-eyed at each other.

I like my classes mixed. Googly-eyes are important parts of social development. Has a habit of turning some teens into emo bitches, but learning to avoid the crazies is also important to learn, methinks.

A double-edge sword, really.

On one hand, the groups might pay more mind to their work because they don't have to compete with their same gender for "attention" with the rest of the class containing their opposite gender. They could feel more secure in knowing that the opposite gender isn't there to judge them, and might feel more free to speak, for instance.

On the other hand, social interaction is lessened, and confidence in engaging with the opposite gender might be intimidating when they're not readily in contact with one another. Splitting the two genders a part could also include some instances of arrogant nature, and this is rather counter-productive in most cases.

Weighing both sides, it's grades versus social standards, as I can see, and not to mention space when you have to have two classrooms for the same lesson, and then you need two teachers. So, instead of wasting time, effort and money to try and split up genders and try something knew when there's already unfairness, jus' leave things the way they are.

I don't agree with that curriculum, really. How are guys and girls supposed to meet in classes? They can't just meet outside or between classes. Boys and Girls gotta be Together. Always. OR there will be no peace.

In concept, the system is pretty much ok. Reason why that has been said is that scientific studies show signs of the male gender trailing the female gender from birth by 6 weeks learning wise(Don't personally believe this myself but eh).

Some schools have already done this so the 'weaker' gender can catch up to the girls without feeling pressured to have to excel at everything.

It's a good system, but poor execution.

Firstly, some of the responses here seem to imply an absolutist view in terms of gender-separate classes. I strongly doubt that boys and girls will be isolated from each other, for a number of reasons:
- I'm guessing they all share the same school; therefore, they all have the same lunch hour, recess and all that to socialise in. The main purpose of recess and lunch hour, apart from break time to eat, is to allow time for social learning.
- I reckon there would be special events, perhaps weekly or even daily where the boy and girl classes are together doing something, even if it is passively.
- Through these things happening, I doubt a superiority complex would occur because of this social interaction.

Secondly, I think it's a good idea. Apart from the whole distraction of the opposite sex during adolescence issue, boys and girls exhibit different learning behaviours throughout middle and high school. Sure, you may need two curricula, but one that specialises in male thinking and another towards female thinking would prove beneficial. Over here in Queensland, many students who receive OP1's (the highest senior exit grade) are female; the minority are male. If you look at State schools (public schools) and private co-ed schools, there tends to be a disproportion between the two genders.
Now, I went to a private all-boys school and, considering we were about the size of your average large high school, there was a higher proportion of OP1's than would be expected for males (in fact, it's somewhat traditional, now, for this to happen). Generally, everyone's marks were higher than a normal co-ed high school of similar size. Therefore, from my experience, I think gender separation has been shown to work.

I'm suprised no-ones mentioned single sex schools :\

Well, I'm going to have to mention it now. :eh:
...maybe later.

Okay, first off, something like this can't really have an overall good/bad thing on it because there are too many factors. Lemme list a few.

• The classes taught
• The teachers
• The students themselves

I'll focus mainly on the students and teachers. While, in some cases, it might work better for students to be gender divided, in other cases, it wouldn't. For example, I know a few teachers and students who, were there no females in the class, would be cracking sexist jokes left and right, enforcing that superiority complex thing discussed earlier. Hell, a few kids still crack sexist jokes, even with females in the class. :eh:
Also, some kids have to travel a great deal to get to school, such as myself, and have next to no oppurtunities outside of school to actually speak with anyone from my school, male or female.