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"Educators and parents hoping to inspire boys to excel at school now have a new tool at their disposal; Boy Smarts - Mentoring Boys for Success at School. In this book, you will find 100 imaginative and practical guidelines for authentic engagement in meeting boys' varied learning needs. The guidance offered here can help parents and teachers in the challenging task of understanding each boy as an individual while also working toward a community plan to raise boys' school achievement. The common sense approach offers to lay the groundwork for an action plan to mentor boys for school success - a manual for kick-starting boys integrity."

"Luckily, I realized (sooner rather than later) that I was part of their reading problem, not the change in their reading lives I hoped to be. This aha! moment led me to dig deep, talk to my boys about their reading experiences and help them unpack what was really going on underneath the surface. My ultimate goal was to figure out what was blocking boys from reading for pleasure and most importantly, how to open them up and let it into their lives. After lots of conversations with 9- to 14-year-old boys, here's what I discovered."

"Being a boy can be a serious liability in today's classroom. As a group, boys are noisy, rowdy and hard to manage. Many are messy, disorganized and won't sit still. Young male rambunctiousness, according to a recent study, leads teachers to underestimate their intellectual and academic abilities. "Girl behavior is the gold standard in schools," says psychologist Michael Thompson. "Boys are treated like defective girls.""

"As the new school year ramps up, teachers and parents need to be reminded of a well-kept secret: Across all grade levels and academic subjects, girls earn higher grades than boys. Not just in the United States, but across the globe, in countries as far afield as Norway and Hong Kong. This finding is reflected in a recent study by psychology professors Daniel and Susan Voyer at the University of New Brunswick. The Voyers based their results on a meta-analysis of 369 studies involving the academic grades of over one million boys and girls from 30 different nations. The findings are unquestionably robust: Girls earn higher grades in every subject, including the science-related fields where boys are thought to surpass them."

"This year's end-of-year paper purge in my middle school office revealed a startling pattern in my teaching practices: I discipline boys far more often than I discipline girls. Flipping through the pink and yellow slips--my school's system for communicating errant behavior to students, advisors, and parents--I found that I gave out nearly twice as many of these warnings to boys than I did to girls, and of the slips I handed out to boys, all but one was for disruptive classroom behavior. "

"It's no secret that state and national assessments continue to indicate that boys lag behind girls in the area of reading. The gap tends to grow larger as students enter adolescence. It's also no secret that many teenage boys dislike reading - in class or at home. Just ask a high school teacher…or a teenage boy. While it's not true that all teenage boys dislike reading, there is a growing trend of many becoming unmotivated readers. Obviously, students who are resistant to reading are unlikely to get better at it. Here are four ideas for motivating adolescent male readers."

"Anyhoo… just last week I had the opportunity to try something with a group of kids who attend a school that caters for those for whom the mainstream education system simply doesn't work. Some of these students (currently all boys in Years 6-8) have severe behavioural issues, some have wellbeing issues and most have a combination of the two. I'm fortunate that I get to spend time with these boys on a semi-regular basis and so have been able to establish a bit of rapport with them. I determined that it might be interesting to play Minecraft with them… and just see what happens. I hypothesised that many behaviours that Dweck describes as being Growth Mindset behaviours would be evident whilst the boys played Minecraft: seeking out and embracing challenge persisting in the face of setbacks revelling in the struggle taking on feedback and being inspired by the success of others I then wanted the boys to reflect on this after playing… but first the set up!"

"There's a lot of effort to attract women to the computer sciences at universities and the workforce. But to shift technology's gender imbalance we might need to focus on a younger crowd. Much younger - like 6-year-olds. For the first time, research from the University of Washington shows that by first grade, children are already embracing the stereotype that boys are better than girls at robotics and programming. At the same time, the kids believe that girls and boys are equally good or their own gender is better at math and other sciences. And girls with the strongest negative stereotypes about their genders' tech abilities also reported the least interest and personal skill in programming and robotics."

"Imagine you're babysitting two 12-year-olds, one boy and one girl. Which is more likely to be playing video games, and which one is painting a picture? Thanks to gender stereotypes, tech is often seen as boys' domain, while arts and crafts are assumed to be for girls. STEM-the acronym for science, technology, engineering, and math-doesn't exactly conjure visions of toys and games. But a recent survey by Two Bit Circus, a Los Angeles-based engineering entertainment company, shows a significant gender divide between boys' and girls' interest in STEM that experts hope can be closed by child's play: in other words, finding ways to make school more fun and engaging for kids."

"Technology is helping to boost the appeal of reading for young boys, and they're getting smarter because of it, new research has found. Primary school-aged boys with little interest in reading are finding that using iPads and netbooks in the classroom adds a touch of competition and fun. "

"Two 5-year-old boys, one with autism, were having some friendly playtime when they had a communication breakdown. One boy didn't respond to the other and walked away. The ignored kid got frustrated and pushed over a small staircase, causing the first boy to fall. Their speech therapist, Jordan Sadler, decided to address the issue by recreating it in an iPad app called Puppet Pals. She restaged the scenario as a movie, even taking photos of the room for the background and of the kids for the characters. Using the app to show an instant replay of the scuffle, Sadler and the kids identified what went wrong and then recreated the scene, this time making better decisions. Creating custom stories to help kids learn communication skills or understand complex situations is just one of the ways parents, therapists and educators have taken advantage of tablets to work with kids with autism."

"A group of children took part in a series of literacy lessons centred around the popular game Bike Baron by Qwibooand Mountain Sheep as outlined in detail athttp://mrandrewsonline.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/part-1-raising-standards-in-boys.html. The aim was to raise standards in writing. The work is based on the success of the Controllable Vehicle project which demonstrated that the iPad can significantly enhance pupil understanding and interest in a topic leading to accelerated progress in speaking, listening and writing."

"On the second floor of Morgan State University's engineering building, Jacob Walker, 12, is putting the finishing touches on a ruler he's just created. Not yet an actual ruler. One he's designing on the computer. He just needs to add his initials - then it's time to produce it on a 3-D printer. Jacob starts seventh grade in the fall and has big dreams. Building this ruler is all part of the plan. "When I was a child," he says, "I loved to play with Legos, and it inspired me to be an engineer when I get older." Jacob is one of some 50 boys in this free, four-week camp at Morgan State. It's called the Minority Male Makers Program - paid for by Verizon."

"At Cindrich elementary school in Surrey, B.C., 10-year-old boys are putting themselves to bed earlier, an enthusiastic girl in Grade 6 takes herself for a run when she's feeling hyper, and a diminutive boy who is still learning English tells his teacher he will do better work if he sits on a special cushion. It is all part of self-regulation, a philosophy of education that is moving into public schools in British Columbia."

"I often ask myself this same question. While I do work most of June, July and much of August is spent with my two boys, age 6 and 8. If you have boys, then you know that you have to keep them busy and many times plan activities and games in advance. So thinking forward to this summer… I have started curating and preparing a few resources to support those of you that are home with your little darlings too…"

"Special programs are popping up in elementary schools to teach empathy as a means of stemming relational aggression, a psychological term to describe using the threat of removing friendship as a tactical weapon. Children also are being guided in ways to stand up for themselves, and to help others, in instances of social exclusion. Though both boys and girls exhibit relational aggression, it is thought to be more common among girls because they are generally more socially developed and verbal than boys."

"Toys, games and books can support children's early development of knowledge and skills related to engineering as well as science and mathematics. Reserach has shown many of the toys, games and books that support engineering learning are more often purchased for boys than for girls. Through the Engineering Gift Guide, the INSPIRE Research Institute for Pre-College Engineering is raising public awareness of the many toys, games and books that promote engineering learning and are fun for both boys and girls."

"Our boys have just received The Lego Movie for their birthdays and absolutely love it. I think they have watched it every day since receiving it and now we all have the words "Everything is Awesome!" floating around in our heads all day every day. It could become our new family motto: Everything is Awesome!! This got me thinking about how we could use Lego in our homeschool. Since we have many boxes of the bricks and the boys enjoy playing with it, why not use it to help them learn! So I have made a massive list of how lego can be used as part of your homeschool.   I have split it up into subject areas to make it easier to navigate."

"In the days long past, kids would gather around that lucky boy whose parents could afford a Super Nintendo and patiently wait for their turn. Today, everyone can afford a gaming console. When augmented reality games finally make a grand entry into the consumer market, everyone will simply have to have them. This is the way of the future and boy, it sure looks bright. These AR apps are meant to accustom kids into using and enjoying augmented reality apps so that they can easily maneuver their way through whatever technological advances wait for them 10 or 20 years in the future."