Diversity in Education-July 29th

Banks & Banks-Multicultural Education
Part III discusses gender inquality and bias. I always balk at my lack of experience with this. I wonder if because of my nature, I'm just blind to it, or if I've actually been luck enough to be a part of classes that fought the bias, and pointed it out. I was flabbergast to read some of the research and statistics in chapter 6, specifically some of the facts about the boys. The things about girls, I'd always heard before, girls make less money, graduate less from high school or college, perform less well in math in science. But to hear that in some areas a black male is more likely to be killed then a US soldier in Vietname totally shocked me. I was also surprised to read that there is a documentable increase in anxiey in boys that conform to the male sterotype.

For once (so often the strategies outlined in our text books are empty recommendations without any true directions for implementation) I think the strategies at the end of the book our sound. Mixing boys and girls in your seating chart and acknowledging gender sterotypes when you come across them in books is key. More difficult is censoring ourselves as teachers to remove gender bias (as much as possible) from our own language, or to acknowledge it when we do use it. It is so ingrained in us, so deep rooted that we can't see it, despite the fact that in my opinion it is one of the most widly recognized and generally accepted (as wrong) biases that exist.