Korean Job Discussion Forums

[crazylemongirl]

One of my pet peeves on here on Dave's is the hard time that male students get on here.

This sort of stuff really makes my bloody boil:

[Karabeara]

Would you like some scientific proof to back up what I posted?

[crazylemongirl]

[bellum99]

Hmm, lets see some science please. Just "I think its true" doesn't really prove it.

[JacktheCat]

To add to what I said in the other thread:

Yep, it's been scientifically proven that female brains are better wired for languages. (someone less lazy than me go dig up the proof and post it here)

But that is just a biological advantage. What one does with it is their own personal prerogative.

I've had some hard working, fast learning male students, and I've had some lazy, useless female students.

I treat the boys and girls in my classes the same, nobody gets any special breaks. All must bow to the love stick.

[Karabeara]

If you have some time to kill, click the link and read the entire first article, as it is ultra-fascinating.

I wonder how much of this "brain wiring" has to do with things like gay men tending to be very social (although obviously not in every case).



In Art of Language, the Brain Matters
Discovery: New techniques let researchers observe brain activity as children read.
Understanding how the mind works could reshape classroom instruction.
By ROBERT LEE HOTZ, Times Science Writer
Los Angeles Times

http://www.talkingpage.org/artic008.html

��Even when brains appear to be physically similar, they may function in quite different ways. Imaging studies that compared how men and women recognize words, sound them out and extract their meaning found striking variations in how people read, based on their gender.
Men tended to read with the left side of their brain; women tended to activate both sides of their brain. The Yale researchers who conducted the study believe that those who depend most on the left hemisphere take in text in a more global way. Those who use both hemispheres may take in text bit by bit. ��




Allan Canfield, Ph.D.
Gendered Influences on Nonverbal Communication
Making Sense of Gender
http://canfield.etext.net/Chapter5.htm


��The use of recent imaging technologies reveals the complexity of the human brain, and, to an extent shows how males and females differ. A popular belief is that males and females have significant lateral differences, each sex tending to use different sides of the brain. Early research suggested that males tended to use the left side of the brain because it is associated with linear, logical and analytic thinking, while women, who tend to have more developed right lobes, tend to be more holistic, imaginative and intuitive than are men. Recent research suggests, however, that pronounced laterality may not characterize the differences; rather, the areas of the brain associated with selected activities, such as language and spatial concepts, largely determine how the sexes use the brain, with women tending to use more of the brain (LeDoux, 1996) Some research suggests that the neuronal structure of the languaging portion of the brain is more dense in females, possibly leading to greater verbal dexterity in women. PET scan technology can trace the flow of blood in the brain as various tasks are performed, indicating that long awaited answers to questions about the localization of activities in the brain are forthcoming.��



The Trouble With Men
by Robert Gilman

http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC16/Gilman1.htm

��Starting in the 1960s, the discovery that the left and right hemispheres of the brain usually have different functions also led to the discovery that the organization of these functions is consistently different in males and females. The hemispheres of the male brain are more specialized, with language functions located in the left hemisphere and visual-spatial functions in the right. In women, these functions, while still tending toward a left/right division, are better distributed in both hemispheres, and their corpus callosum, that bundle of nerves that joins the two sides of the brain, is wider, allowing for better integration between the two hemispheres. At birth, females have better developed left hemispheres while males have better developed right ones (in direct opposition to the popular idea that females are more "right-brained"). Girls are also four to six weeks ahead of boys in physical maturation as measured by skeletal hardening. In addition, the hypothalamus, the master gland at the base of the brain, is differently structured in the two genders. It all fits very well with animal studies that have found similar gender differences in brain development controlled by the relative level of the sex hormones.

How do these innate differences show up? Females tend to be more sensitive to touch and sounds (allowing them to sing in tune better) while males tend to be more sensitive to light. Males tend to be better at visual-spatial activities while females tend to have better fine motor control. Females tend to be better at picking up multi-sensory peripheral information and they process this information faster. From very early, females tend to be better able to read the emotional content of faces. Intellectually, males tend to be innately more adept at mathematics (which is probably related to their spatial skills) while females have better verbal skills.��

[Real Reality]

How Male and Female Brains Differ
Researchers reveal sex differences in the brain's form and function.
Researchers concluded that when it comes to math, the brain of a 12-year-old girl resembles that of an 8-year-old boy. Conversely, the same researchers found that areas of the brain involved in language and fine motor skills (such as handwriting) mature about six years earlier in girls than in boys...

... male brains contain about 6.5 times more gray matter -- sometimes called 'thinking matter" -- than women. Female brains have more than 9.5 times as much white matter, the stuff that connects various parts of the brain, than male brains. That's not all. "The frontal area of the cortex and the temporal area of the cortex are more precisely organized in women, and are bigger in volume," Geary tells WebMD. This difference in form may explain a lasting functional advantage that females seem to have over males: dominant language skills.
By Elizabeth Heubeck
http://www.webmd.com/content/Article/104/107367.htm?pagenumber=2

Language-associated cortical regions are proportionally larger in the female brain.
CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that females have proportionally larger Wernicke and Broca language-associated regions compared with males. These anatomical differences may correlate with superior language skills previously demonstrated in females.
Harasty J, Double KL, Halliday GM, Kril JJ, McRitchie DA.
School of Communication Disorders, University of Sydney, Australia.
Arch Neurol. 1997 Feb;54(2):171-6.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=9041858&dopt=Citation

Gender and the Brain
Other research suggests that, on average, the female brain performs better on some skills while the male brain executes other tasks at a higher level. For example, tests show that women generally can recall lists of words or paragraphs of text better than men. On the other hand, men usually perform better on tests that require the ability to mentally rotate an image in order to solve a problem.
http://www.sfn.org/content/Publications/BrainBriefings/gender.brain.html

They just can't help it
http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/feature/story/0,13026,937913,00.html

[denverdeath]

I called one of my classes of girls "Bah-boh" and laughed in their faces today. Not very nice I know, but they are the only class that just never seems to shut up and pay attention and talk in English even when the K-teacher's there. Trust me, not all Korean girls are wonderful acquirers of the English language. A flippant "Moooooooooooh-lah!" is what earned them the extra special bah-boh cackle from me today. They seemed a bit offended. Prissy princesses. Serves them right.

[Prince Frog]

[schwa]

I teach in a girls middle school one year then a boys school the next (10 classes of about 38 students each) & I've alternated 4 times now. I also teach a smaller mixed class in a rural school. All grade 2 students. I think thats a fair sample for my observations. Their learning styles & capabilities are decidedly different.

To generalize, girls at that age are more attentive, show better retention of new material, & can produce more creative responses by the end of the year. I've learned from experience that I can use much the same material with girls or boys for the first several months, at which point the girls are ready to really use it but the boys still need coaxing & review. Of course there are exceptions.

The girls however can be deceptive, manipulative, & prone to attitudes.

Boys on the other hand are much simpler. It takes more energy (& vocal power) to engage them but they dont bear grudges & every class is a clean slate. Last week's problem kid can shine this week, if the lesson grabs him, but it can take weeks to pry a noncooperative girl out of a mood. The boys overall make satisfactory progress in their english -- they just dont get as far.

I can only speculate that boys & girls end up with similar abilities at some later age, but I suspect they do. Meanwhile, down here in the trenches with kids on different hormonal schedules its like teaching 2 different animals.

But honestly, I enjoy teaching girls or boys equally.

[Rteacher]

About the only more-or-less correct sentences that either girls or boys at my tech high school can produce on their own are the following: "I love you, ___ teacher. You are handsome, young teacher... Give me candy, please!"

[anyway]

Of course, I set the young males up for failure with inferior lessons. How, you ask? Well, differentiated education!! The young females are offered one level, the young males something a little bit easier...

What makes my blood boil? Not much, but then I'm cold-blooded. Reptile, in fact. Just like most of your male students. Only care about sun, sex, and some soju.

Some say yes, but I say no, women run the men like a puppet show...
That's right, the women are smarter...that's right, the women are smarter...

[joe_doufu]

[Pangit]

It's our responsibility as teachers to cater to how our students learn best. Saying that "oh, girls are just better at language," or "boys are just better at science" is just a cop-out. If our boys are "scientific-minded," then teach them "scientifically." Give them a theorem for learning language, or something "scientific," if that's the excuse.

If our kids aren't studying, then we're not motivating them. I have to confess, though, that there is a small handful of students that I can't connect to and I've tried hard. I have come to the conclusion that a small percentarge of children are just incorrigible.

[Manner of Speaking]