Why are boys falling behind?

In The Sunday Times on June 28, there is a report which states that by the time boys arrive at school, aged 5, they are already falling behind. This is particularly the case with poorer boys. Researchers say that 'boys' education is already blighted before they arrive in school'. So why is that and what can be done?

Some suggest that nursery schools, where the staff is mainly women, are responsible in part. The report claims that women teachers feel more comfortable with girls. This 'fact' is outrageous. Why would you prefer one gender to another? Is that acceptable for professional people? Of course not. If you want to work with only girls or only boys, then find a job in a single sex school.

It is said that girls are easier to deal with than boys, more accommodating, keener to be liked, maybe not as physical as boys. They sit nicely, too. It is the keener to be liked, that is the crucial point. Survey after survey tells us that it matters enormously to girls to be liked by their friends and their teachers. I have witnessed this wish of girls to be popular, especially at the end of the school year. In they trail towards the teacher's desk bearing gifts and cards. Generally the girls will hang around a while until their present is  opened and suitably appreciated. On the other hand, boys are likely to plonk the present on the desk, move away, thinking no more of it.

Boys bear no animosity, in general to a telling off by their teachers. They take it on the chin and there is no lingering resentment. It is a fair cop. Girls, in my experience bear resentment towards a telling off. They give dirty looks, they mutter about your choice of clothing, they whisper to their friends and laugh with them, all the while looking at you. Sneery, pouty and spiteful. Too strong? I have taught for 30 years and I know. This criticism does not mean that there aren't some really lovely girls. There are - and I remember them fondly. But when I think back, it is the boys who have touched my heart in the main. Those boys were witty, kind and loyal to their mates. Some were struggling with the burden of masculinity that society places on their shoulders. Mostly, boys want to be sensitive, they want to speak not grunt and yet if they show emotion, some people deem them feeble and unmanly.

Schools need to help boys more. See through the bravado and instead of tutting, make every effort to engage them in their learning. So many schools write boys off, say they are unteachable, too noisy and too boisterous. That does not give anyone an excuse to ignore the boys, let them play cards at the back of the class, which I have seen for myself on several occasions. It is a waste of taxpayers' money and a waste of those young people's lives. Boys cannot be changed to fit the school, so clearly schools must make themselves more suitable for boys. Bring in more male teachers, provide opportunities for more physical exercise to burn off excess energy. Above all be respectful and see what boys have to give.

Pushy Parents - Beware

They are everywhere. Thankfully I no longer have to deal with them, but at one time I did – a lot. I was a teacher and I had three of my own children. So they were coming at me from two sides for quite some time.

As regards my own children, the parents of the cohorts of my two oldest children were the worst. Or at least I believed so, but then I hadn’t yet had any real experience of the pushy parent, only the competition some people engaged in about how long they had breast fed their babies.

My own parents, particularly my mum, just expected me to do what I had to do and to do it as well as I could. ‘’No one can do any more than their best, so just do your best.’  Recalling my mother’s advice, it seems clear to me that many contemporary parents would do well to take that stance rather than engage in the helicopter parenting that is so prevalent today.

In addition, contemporary parents are continually praising the slightest barely virtuous thing that the child does. The child says thank you and the parent is in rhapsodies. The child puts some rubbish in a bin, that it had initially dropped on the ground, and the praise is fulsome, ‘Well done Hugo, well done Cordelia,’ and so it goes.

It is no surprise then that it is the middle classes who are the pushiest of pushy parents. As a parent I wanted my children to do their best, and, naturally, to do well. My eldest child was not academically interested. He was intelligent enough but interested in other things. Because of this I worried about him and misguidedly tried to force him to be academic. I was foolish – in the extreme. To excuse myself to some slight degree, it felt as if everyone else was pushing their child to academic success and a great university, followed by a brilliant career. So I pushed too. I should not have done.

My other two children were academically inclined and also I was much more relaxed. They did not need pushing, because they pushed themselves. Their teachers must have liked me, for the simple reason that I never complained, demanded more homework or harder homework, or asked for my children to be paid more attention. There was just one moment of awkwardness at a parents’ evening for my second son, when his teacher said to me, ‘Your son has got long hair!’ My response was, ‘And you’ve got short hair. Can we talk about my son’s progress in science please.’

It is a commonplace to say that some parents are inclined to live out their own thwarted ambitions through their children. Never is this more evident than on the football field. Of this, I have experience. Dutifully, on Sunday mornings, I would turn up to watch football matches in which a child of mine was involved. The parents’ behaviour was shocking. The children were fine, aged between eight and twelve. Some of the parents watching would behave as if each match was a cup final and that each referee was a subhuman, happy to be abused. The referees were paid £5 to deal with as many as three matches some Sundays. They were doing it for the love of the game, not for the princely wages.

It is usually men who come to mind when you think of those yelling at football matches, but the women are every bit as bad. One freezing cold Sunday morning we headed off to Maltby, once a mining town in Yorkshire. The ground was hard, the wind was biting, but you stick around to support your child. There was an incident. One boy pushed another boy on the opposing team. There was a bit of a do between the boys, but soon attention was drawn away from them by their mothers, who were scrapping on the hard ground. One woman had said to the other, ‘You want to have a word with that lad of yours, he’s a bully.’ The other woman replied. ‘It’s not my fault love if your lad’s a puff and can’t stay on his own two feet.’ And down on the ground they went, much to the amusement of the spectators, but what about these women’s sons? They must have been truly embarrassed. What’s more, the boys had been made to shake hands by the pitiably paid referee, and as a result they were fine with each other.

It is often the case that pushing your child too hard or in a direction they do not want to go, will result in rebellion or burn-out. One woman I know who boasted continually about what a genius her child was and whose child was involved in  some worthy activity after school every day, rebelled aged 14 and did poorly in her GCSE’s. I often wonder what effect seeing her mother weeping because she had not got into the Maths Challenge team, aged 10, had on her. It could only have been detrimental. Life is full of knocks, so it would have been so much better to have said, ‘Oh well, you win a few you lose a few. You’ll be fine. Let’s go home and have tea.’

My Dad - much missed

It is thirteen years now since my dad died. This afternoon I was driving back home and Canon in D by Pachelbel came on the radio. Within seconds of hearing it, I had to pull over as my eyes were full of tears. That was the music we had at my dad's funeral  - it was music that he loved, hence why we chose it. My tears this afternoon surprised me. Maybe they shouldn't have done. As I have heard people say so many times, you never get over it but you do learn to live with it.

My dad never once told me that he loved me. For a long time I didn't think he did love me. When I was  a small child, he was absent most of the time. He was working - working hard. Long hours were how it was for a proud working class man, with a wife and two small children to feed. Not only did he work hard, he also spent the time he did have at home making furniture. There was no sitting and playing with the children, no quality time, no story reading. Your children were fine if they were fed,  clean and had a roof over their head. No helicopter parenting in those days.

We fought, my father and I, argued viciously, during my teenage years. He railed at me for not spending every waking minute doing homework. He told me I was wasting my place at grammar school by wanting to go out with friends and by listening to 'that bloody pop music' with my brother. Then there were boyfriends who he loathed. He couldn't use their names - it was always 'laddo' or 'that bloody rogue' despite the fact that most of these teen romances were with really decent boys.

Despite his objection to my friendships with the 'laddos' he never realised quite the amount of anxiety and sorrow he caused by his affair with a woman who lived about a half mile away. My mum and brother never broached the topic - but I did. I called him a hypocrite, a liar and worst of all an absolute bastard for upsetting my beloved mother.

At eighteen, I went to university. I worried about my mum. She told me she was fine. What struck me though was that if I hadn't been home for the weekend for a while, my dad would ring me up. 'Now then,' he would begin. 'Time to get yourself home and to see your mother.' The phone would go down. That was it. Message delivered.

When I started working, things between my father and I began to change - for the better. I had begun teaching and was finding it hard-going. I mentioned this to him and he said, with utter conviction, words I will never forget. 'It might be hard, but I can think of no one better placed to do that job than you. So get stuck in and prove that you can.' So rare were my dad's words of praise, that these words were enough to equip me to keep going. I am so glad I did.

The relationship between my dad and me improved enormously when I had my first child. Then my second and finally my third.  He was a doting granddad and with my children; he would play, read and entertain them by dropping his false teeth down over his top lip. They loved this and would demand he did it again and again. For each birth he gave me ten pounds. He regarded labour as hard work, which it undeniably is. He gave me wages for hard work.

Towards the end of his life, i lived in fear of him dying. By now we had reached the point where we were very close. I could talk to him about most things. His wisdom, his suffering as a Prisoner of War for three and a half years, the family in general, my mum and brother in particular, his mum, his sister and all manner of politics and current affairs.

The end was approaching. My dad was in hospital, annoyed with himself for not getting any better. The fact was that with a sixty a day habit, which admittedly he had kicked several years ago, there was always going to be some serious damage to his respiratory system. His heart too was struggling and despite powerful steroids, my dad was getting worse; savage asthma attacks were  becoming more frequent.

The call came from the hospital. My mum, brother and I headed off. He died that night. The memory of his laboured breathing as he departed this life, is seared into my brain. I told him I loved him and though he never said it, I know he loved me.

I miss you dad.