Activity 1: Vignette - Gender Bias in Physical Education (Primary 1 Pupils)
It is time for Physical Education (PE) lesson and the pupils of Primary 1E are getting excited as they will be having a friendly soccer match. There are thirty pupils in this class, comprising of fifteen boys and fifteen girls. Their PE teacher, Miss Toh, has taken three weeks to teach them the basic skills of handling the ball using their foot. They are now able to dribble, kick and pass the ball using the various parts of their feet. Both the boys and the girls are looking forward to this friendly match. The pupils gather in front of Miss Toh for further instructions.
“Today we shall form a girls’ team and a boys’ team for the friendly match,” said Miss Toh.
Both the girls and boys cheered in delight.
“Finally the boys can play together without the girls!” Jayden said to his good friend, Favian.
Favian replied, “Yes! The girls are always so slow and they can’t kick the ball properly. We can have a good match today.”
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Gender and education, from a sociological perspective, refers to the idea that the educational system does not offer the same type of opportunities for upward mobility to both genders equally. (Raina) Gender bias occurs when people make assumptions regarding behaviours, abilities or preferences of others based upon their gender. (Scantlebury, 2009) In this vignette, Miss Toh’s construction of boys as sporty, energetic and active supports a standard norm of the males, which is differentiated from the gentle and slow females.
Physical Development
According to Berk, girls remain ahead in fine motor area, including handwriting and drawing. They maintain an edge in skipping, jumping and hopping, which depend on balance and agility. (Berk, Exploring Lifespan Development, 2003) But boys outperform girls on all other gross motor skills, and in throwing and kicking, the gender gap is large. (Haywood,