The Sorting ProjectLower School Diversity Committee

2009

Mission• Create a written and visual exploration

of gender similarities and differences

• Analyze gender’s influence on student’s interests, choice of activities, feelings about family, friends and education

Process- Letter to teachers asking for help doing

survey- Survey of students- Data entered into database- Students investigated data, sorted, invented

hypotheses- TBD - bulletin boards, book, other visual

representations

Worksheet

Sorting Card

Favorite Part of School

Student Sortingresults of “Favorite Part of School”

Students were asked to divide the big yard group - how?

Of six groups of Second Graders, only one group thought of “boys and girls” as a way to divide students.

Fourth Graders, when asked the same question, thought of dividing by sex immediately.

Fourth Grade Hypothesis(after school activities)

Electronics“After school, I like

to… watch TV, play DS, play video games, etc.”

- 18 boys, 8 girls- PreK/K category

equal to 4th Grade

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are needed to see this picture.

“After school I like to… do homework.”

Homework“After school I like to…

do homework.”- 2nd Graders like

homework more than 4th Graders

- Girls are more likely to say it’s what they like to do

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“In the summer, I like to… ride my bike.”

“In the summer I like to…

go swimming.”

What We Would Change• We should have been more explicit with

survey directions– students needed to pick ONE favorite answer– teachers needed more guidance (they WERE

allowed to say “Yard” as a favorite but some teachers told them they could not).

• Phrasing of questions about family and friends made responses hard to categorize and responses may have been conditioned