School Experience and the Issue of Gender

Abstract

This study used an interpretive paradigm to understand the world of the student teacher through their own experience. The purpose of the study was to investigate whether there were any areas of concern involving gender issues that manifested themselves during their school experience (SE). A sample of students was interviewed following their last SE. These students were in their last year of a four-year Bachelor of Education degree at a university in southern England. The interviews were semi-structured and focused on categories that originated from inspection of weekly reflection sheets written by the participants while on student teaching. It became clear during the data analysis of the transcripts that there were gender issues that had not previously been recorded in the reflection sheets or in the literature. First, the student teachers still held firm perceptions of what activities were gender appropriate, e.g. rugby for boys, hockey for girls, in spite of the influence of their four-year course. Second, the student teachers much preferred to be placed in schools in mixed pairs, thus providing each other with mutual support. Even so, some males felt that they were the ones who supported the females instead of the support being mutual. Third, there was a definite feeling that physical education departments, and schools in general, had a strong male orientation in terms of responsibility and authority. The course these students had followed was particularly careful to identify gender equity as a factor in the effective teaching of physical education. These findings indicate that in spite of this attempt to promote gender equity, there are powerful socialising forces at work that mitigate against such an egalitarian approach.