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Grade 9 students at Parkland Middle School will be able to choose their learning environment for the next school year.
Principal Brent Reimer said the school will trial segregated Math and English classes for Grade 9 students in the 2011/2012 school year.
"We will have classes that are mixed in Math and English 9, and then we are offering one class if we have enough interest to go male only and female only," said Principal Reimer.
He presented the idea to the Parent Advisory Committee last week, and the group was enthusiastic about the idea.
"I think they enjoyed hearing what I had to say about how males learn versus how females learn," said Principal Reimer. "I was giving them insight into how boys and girls take in information and learn differently."
Teaching strategies differ depending on the student's gender, research shows.
"Males are more visual. They like to have hands-on activities. They tend to gravitate towards non-verbal forms of communication," said Principal Reimer. "Females like to be more fluent in social interactions and they like cooperative learning situations."
The classroom can be tailored by gender, as well.
"Girls like a classroom that is comfortable or welcoming - soft chairs versus hard plastic. They tend to find that type of atmosphere gives the teacher better results. Whereas with the boys, they say keep the hard plastic chairs, keep the teacher moving at all times, and keep the boys on their toes, so to speak," said Principal Reimer.
If the pilot program goes ahead, a male teacher will be chosen to lead the male class, and a female teacher to lead the female class. They would be given training specific to the gender they will teach.
"If you have a male teacher speaking in a tone that they would deem to be normal, a girl in front of them may feel they are practically yelling. Females interpret sounds four times louder than males do," Reimer said of the research he has read.
Parkland has run gender-separate physical education classes before, but it is a first for academic classes.
"We will try it and see if it has an impact on learning. We just want our boys and girls to have the most beneficial learning environment possible," said Principal Reimer.
