Boarding Schools for Girls

Teachers of young children who believe that girls are not talented at math tend to communicate that stereotype to their female students. These students, in turn, do more poorly at math than students of teachers who do not have such stereotypes, according to a new study from the University of Chicago.

Professors Sian Beilock and Susan Levine studied 17 first and second grade female teachers at the beginning and end of a school year. Some of them expressed a lack of confidence in their own abilities in mathematics.

"The more anxious the teachers were about math, the more likely it was that girls believed, 'Boys are good at math and girls are good at reading,'" the authors said in a report presented before the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science.

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Labels: school, math, teachers

Posted By: Aspen/CRC