by Amber Hilton

Created on: January 17, 2008

Do children learn better in single-sex schools? If we're talking about facts and figures, I will admit, I can't give you the answer. It is true that several studies have suggested that males and females learn in different ways and at different paces. Some have interpreted this data to mean that males and females would be better off in a single-sex school system. While I'm not an expert and I can't argue that such a system wouldn't have its benefits, I strongly believe that single-sex schooling is not the answer.

As we all know, children learn much more in school than things like algebra, history and literature. Schools are one of the primary socializing agents for our children. It is in school where children learn to interact with others and to deal with conflict. And it is important that children learn to healthily interact with members of both genders, not just their own. After all, unless you are also suggesting single-sex universities and single-sex workplaces, then our girls and boys are going to need to learn these skills eventually. And, in this instance, I think that sooner is definitely better than later, for all parties involved.

By separating our children into different schools based on gender, we are not just hindering their development, but we are supporting the idea that males and females are entirely different creatures. Yes, we all know that we look and function differently and tend to have different strengths and weaknesses, but in the end, we are more similar than we'd like to admit. We all know the dangers of separating humans into different categories and creating labels. Inevitably, one group will decide that they are superior. It's happened with race, it's happened with religion and it's most definitely happened with gender. In my opinion, single-sex schools just ad fuel to the fire.

Should schools completely ignore these studies? Of course not. School faculty and those responsible for developing curriculum should take these studies into consideration and keep in mind males and females may have different ways of learning. But to base a child's education off of these ideas alone is problematic to say the least. What about the little girl who learns more like her male peers or the little boy who learns more like his female peers? And within each gender children are still going to learn at vastly different rates. Ahh, yet another way for us to categorize our children. Soon there would be the school for slow white males and another for accelerated black females. I won't even begin to address how problematic this idea is for children who are struggling with their gender identity!

Let's face it, children benefit from variety, whether it's within the food pyramid or the classroom. If there is one thing that this world has to offer, it is a variety of human life. And sheltering our children by separating them into groups based on gender is not encouraging them to embrace this variety.

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