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Kids, Not Teachers, Challenge Gender Roles

As early as preschool child's gender determines how he or she is treated by others. Some educational systems try to counter this by encouraging teachers to implement and discuss gender equality.

However, even in Sweden, where curriculum includes gender equality and some educators are trained to be "gender pedagogues," it can be difficult to incorporate true change into the classroom. A new study released by The University of Gothenberg shows that even with this training, teachers tend to favor boys and have stereotypical ideas about what each gender is interested in.

Researchers from the University of Gothenburg’s Department of Education 45 hours of video footage of six preschool groups to witness how boys and girls were treated in the classroom. They found teachers responded to girls' questions and comments negatively and tended to "masculinize" teaching tools. In fact, they were not able to identify even one example "where teachers consciously challenge children to engage in border crossing" in the footage.

On the other hand, they found that children tended to challenge gender boundaries on their own, for example by renaming a figure the teacher had called a "man" as "mum." The children also often played and learned together regardless of gender.