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Inspired by UK Parliament debate secured by @karlmccartney MP - Click here to read tweets from the debate - the #UKEdChat poll this week established that the discussion will focus on the Educational Performance of Boys.

"With 20 years' teaching experience in a wide variety of schools, I've frequently encountered staff who despair at the behaviour of boys in their classes. Frankly, I love teaching boys, and perhaps my experiences as a P.E. teacher, often teaching single-sex groups, prepared me well for managing the classroom behaviours of boys. Perhaps being (at the very least) a cheeky student myself, frequently preferring attention-seeking behaviours to concentrating in class, I am able to relate to much of what is seen in classes every day. Or maybe I was just under-stimulated and over-confident. Regardless of the circumstances, I certainly have some successful strategies for teaching boys and am happy to share them. So here are my tips on improving behaviour, engagement and outcomes for boys."

"In our school this year, we are focusing on raising the attainment of boys in relation to their female peers. This is by no means anything new; the gender gap is an entity that has plagued school results for as long as I can remember (and probably long before that). I should say that our boys perform better than national averages, but do not perform as well as the girls. You might be sat there in the same position. You've got an interesting situation in your school, where girls are outperforming boys, it features prominently on your School Improvement Plan (SIP), and you've read all the new books on the subject etc."

"Children often seek answers from parents, friends and media to better understand their racial identity. Middle school boys who feel secure about their race during this ongoing information gathering will likely befriend diverse people, according to a new University of Michigan study."

In reading tests at school, girls tend to be ahead of boys, in all age groups and in all countries. But in young adults, there is suddenly no longer any difference between men's and women's reading skills. Why is that? Could the answer be in the way the tests are designed?

Research, reported by the BBC, has indicated that boys are much more likely than girls to be influenced by where they stand in ability in school.

"A major study into maths attainment has found that boys and girls perform equally in the subject, dispelling long-held myths around gender and education. The first UK-wide research of its kind for 13 years was carried out by Keith Topping, Professor of Educational and Social Research at the University of Dundee, and education assessment company Renaissance found differences in maths attainment between girls and boys to be almost negligible. The study also found that regular and high-quality maths practice improves outcomes across the board and that primary pupils outperformed secondary students, with better attainment scores."

"As early as the fourth grade, girls perform better than boys on standardised tests in reading and writing, and as they get older that achievement gap widens even more, according to research published by the American Psychological Association."

"Children's positive perception of moving is an important supporter for natural physical activity and developing motor skills. A study at the University of Jyväskylä suggests that children had high perceptions of motor skills. Some gender differences were identified, however: girls were better in locomotor skills and boys had higher perception and actual skills in ball skills. "Because ball skills are typically utilized in versatile surroundings and good ball skills are a predictor for more frequent physical activity levels in adolescence, we should encourage girls to play more with balls already in early education," says PhD student Donna Niemistö from Faculty of Sport and Health Sciences. "In boys, there could be more locomotor skills like galloping and hopping involved. Niemistö concludes, "All children regardless of gender have a right to have positive and encouraging experiences of movement.""

"Girls are more often bullied than boys and are more likely to consider, plan, or attempt suicide, according to research led by a Rutgers University-Camden nursing scholar. "Bullying is significantly associated with depressive symptoms, suicidal ideation, suicide planning, and suicide attempts," says Nancy Pontes, an assistant professor at the Rutgers School of Nursing-Camden. "We wanted to look at this link between bullying victimization, depressive symptoms, and suicidality by gender." In an examination of data from the Centers for Disease Control's nationally representative Youth Risk Behavior Survey from 2011-2015, Pontes and her fellow researchers conducted analyses of the data and found that more females are negatively affected by bullying."

"Participation in team sports is associated with fewer depressive symptoms in children, whereas non-sport activities have no association with symptoms, according to a study in Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging, published by Elsevier. The association was found only for boys. The findings suggest that exercise could have anti-depressant effects in adolescents. "These interesting results provide important clues as to how exercise benefits mood in children and reveals the important role that gender plays in these effects," said Cameron Carter, MD, Editor of Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging."

"We often tend to think about gender as the biological differences between women and men - however, this is incorrect. Gender is what actually gets expressed - how we look, how we act and how we feel. While sex is determined by what is dictated by our biology or what is written into the chromosomes, known as genotype, it is the interaction between the genes and the environment that determines gender. The amazing thing about gender is that it is completely created by society. It is a social construct that has been accepted by many, and from the moment a child is born, they are faced with gender stereotypes from clothing to how boys and girls are treated and expectations of behaviour. The question is, how do we as educators eliminate gender stereotypes?"

In this webinar, expert in eBooks Meredith Wemhoff discusses ways to engage and support learners with special needs using eBooks and audio. Using the case-study of an independent all-boys school located in Surrey, the school provides special needs students an opportunity to succeed and thrive. Many arrive to the 80-year-old institution with low self-confidence, often due to struggles they faced in traditional educational institutions caused by learning and language difficulties. This means providing a collection that meets the individual learning needs of the school's 470 students, who range in age from 8-18. ​​​​​​​ During this eye-opening webinar, Meredith will share the story of selecting, launching and promoting a digital library service that helps address learning challenges. Attendees will come away with best practices for bringing ebooks and audiobooks to their school and real-life examples of these practices in action. Don't miss out, register today!

"A report out examined the factors that influence 'maths anxiety' among primary and secondary school students, showing that teachers and parents may inadvertently play a role in a child's development of the condition, and that girls tend to be more affected than boys."

"New research from Monash University has found that girls in single-sex schools are more likely to study chemistry, intermediate mathematics, advanced mathematics and physics in their senior years when compared to their co-ed counterparts."

Interesting. Would an analogous research conducted on boys shows a preference for disciplines predominantly associated with girls?