Does gender matter in science education?

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Does gender matter in science education?

• Michel Caillot
• Université René Descartes - Paris 5 (Sorbonne)

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TIMSS

• 4th grade
• 8th grade
• final year of secondary school
• Permanent features through ages
• Male students have higher mean science
  achievement in earth science and physical science
  since 4th grade.
• No gender difference in life science and
  environmental issues

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Some evolutions

• Gender differences increase from 4th-grade to
  12th-grade particularly in the physical sciences.
• Positive images of science and scientists
  decrease from 4th- grade to the final year of
  secondary school whatever the gender.

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TIMSS survey (3rd-4th grades)

• Substantial achievement differences among the 25
  participating countries on the TIMSS science
  test.
• Boys had significantly higher mean science
  achievement than girls except in 9 countries
  where the differences are not statistically
  significant.

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3rd- and 4th-grades

• Differences favouring boys in science are
  substantially more pronounced than in the TIMSS
  mathematics results
• The gender difference is much less pervasive at
  3rd and 4th grades than at 7th and 8th grades.

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Content areas (3rd- and 4th-grades)

• Advantages for boys in earth science and physical
  science.
• In life science and for the items covering
  environmental issues and the nature of science,
  girls and boys had similar performances.

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TIMSS survey (7th 8th grades)

• Statistically significant differences favouring
  boys with boys averaging 20 or more points higher
  than girls in 12 countries.
• In only seven countries there are no
  statistically significant differences in science
  achievement between boys and girls in both
  grades.

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7th and 8th grades

• Pervasive difference favouring boys in science is
  substantially more pronounced than in the TIMSS
  mathematics results for 7th and 8th grades, which
  indicates an international pattern of gender
  differences favouring males but shows few
  significant differences for individual countries

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Content areas (7th and 8th grades)

• Advantages for boys in earth science, physics,
  and chemistry
• Girls and boys had similar performances at both
  grades in life science and for the items covering
  environmental issues and the nature of science.

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Gender differences in liking a specific content
area
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7th and 8th grades

• Gender differences differ across subject areas
• Girls dislike more physical sciences than boys
  do.
• No significant gender differences about liking or
  disliking biological science.
• This corresponds with the relative performance of
  boys and girls on the life science and physical
  sciences items.

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TIMSS Final year of secondary school
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• In many countries female students report liking
  biological science more than male students do.
• The opposite was found in all countries for
  physics, where male students report liking
  physics significantly more than female students
  do.
• On average, female students report disliking
  physics to some degree in nearly all countries.

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Bias in TIMSS items?

• Items favouring boys
• items involving diagrams
• Items involving spatial relationships
• physical science items
• Items favouring girls
• health and nutrition

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8th grade
International average (correct) (statistically
significant at .05 level) Males 75 Females 78
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8th grade
International average (correct) (statistically
significant at .05 level) Males 85 Females 74
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Final year of secondary school
International average (correct) (statistically
significant at .05 level) Males 66 Females 72
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Final year of secondary school
International average (correct) (statistically
significant at .05 level) Males 20 Females 11
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Progression

• In 4th-grade more girls feel it is important to
  do well in science and mathematics.
• In 12th-grade more boys think it is important to
  do well in science and mathematics

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Attitudes towards science

• More favorable attitudes of male students than
  those of female students whatever age levels
• "masculine science" physics, computer science
• "feminine science" biology, environment
• But for girls science is not related to their
  personal lives.

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Attitudes towards scientists

• Image of scientist for young children
• "White man who carries out dangerous experiments"

Mad scientist
Scientist

• Image reproduced in textbooks and cartoons

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Male model

• Male model of practice
• Full-time devotion to his job
• Emphasis on early achievements
• Exclusive identification with science
• This stereotype is
• a general barrier for all girls
• Few positive female role models

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Who knows Dr Wu?
Chien-Shiung Wu 1912 - 1997
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• Chien-Shiung Wu was a pioneering physicist woman.
• She devised the experiment which confirmed a
  theory proposed by Lee and Yang (her former
  students).
• Wu's experiments led physicists to discard the
  concept that parity was conserved. Lee and Yang
  received the Nobel Prize for their work but not
  Chien Shiung Wu.
• In recognition of her contributions to the
  understanding of beta decay and the weak
  interactions, Wu became the first woman to
  receive the prestigious Comstock Prize from the
  National Academy of Sciences. The Comstock Prize
  is given only once every five years. She was the
  first woman to be elected president of the
  American Physical Society.
• A positive image of a scientist woman

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Interests in science

• Studying science subjects is regarded as
  difficult.
• However girls who plan to choose science are not
  interested in science per se, but because it is
  necessary to enter their desired health career
  (Miller et al., 2006)
• Studying physics and chemistry is regarded as
  more abstract and not relevant to the 'real
  world'.
• However, girls wish to study
• science for daily life such as chemistry at home
  or ecology in the city park
• in chemistry "hot" issues such as pollution
  rather than rates of chemical equations or
  chemical equilibrium.

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Stereotypes of jobs

• Studying science to get desired job
• Biology for female students who want to become
  health professionals
• Computer science and physical sciences for male
  students who want to become engineers

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Relationship to knowledge

• Issue introduced into French educational studies
  (Dr B. Charlot) as an indicator to explain
  learning development.
• Related to identity built through family, friends
  and personal experience.
• Relationship to knowing and to learning such or
  such subject
• Male experience ? female experience

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Miller et al., 2006

• Female high-school students
• More 'people-oriented' than males are
• Choice of a major, including science, in terms of
  their desire to help people or animals
• This caring orientation may be found in early
  socialization (playing with dolls, playing
  mother, .)

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Self-perception of relationship to science

• Girls perceive their academic strength to be in
  verbal areas, as early as the 4th-grade,
• whereas boys perceive theirs in mathematics and
  science.
• True even for 'gifted' students

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Gender-role socialization

• Home and family environment
• Sexualized toys
• Parental views about the importance of learning
  science
• Significantly more males than females
  internationally agree that it was important to do
  well in science to please their parents (67
  compared to 58) (TIMSS)
• Cultural capital and habitus

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• Socio-economic background.
• Societal barriers to females wishing to enter and
  remain in scientific fields difficulty of
  combining work and family life

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Achieving gender equity in science classrooms

• Shift from a competitive to a cooperative
  educational model
• Encourage active participation in labs with
  hands-on experiments
• Develop curriculum focused on "real world"
• Fight narrow stereotypes of science and
  scientists
• Select materials that promote gender equity
  through texts and illustrations

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Does gender matter in science education?

• Yes it does! and everywhere.
• But the current problem is more the general and
  universal issue of decline in the choice of
  science studies and careers
• The number of students in undergraduate or
  postgraduate science programs is decreasing but
  proportionally the number of female students and
  women scientists has been increasing for the last
  decade.

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