by: posted Thursday, February 17, 2011
Category: Education

Single-gender classrooms are a growing trend in school districts across the country.

For the fourth year a row Baker Elementary School in Wayland is offering single-gender kindergarten classes. It is an option many parents are now choosing for their children.

Baker Elementary adopted the program in 2008.

"What we're trying to do is match students' needs with our offerings. So we thought a mix-gender, plus single-gender, offerings would help us be able to give students their best learning environments," says Celeste Diehm, Principle of Baker Elementary.

For Diehm, giving the option to learn in an all-boy or all-girl classroom can be beneficial for a child's development.

"If we can give the little boys space, the movement, and the time to grow up a little bit before asking them to sit at their desk, read and write, then we can give them that extra year  which is important," says Diehm.

Ben Osburn is the all-boys kindergarten teacher. He sees first-hand just how different boys and girls learn.

"If you look at the two classes, my class is louder, and that's okay. The boys learn in a loud environment, in fact, they're probably not going to to learn as much in a quiet environment because of the way their brain processes information," says Osburn.

Single-gender classrooms may not work for all students, but for many boys and girls, they do.

Baker Elementary found that children in the single-gender classes scored better in some areas of literacy while children in the mixed-gender classrooms scored better in other measures.

"Overall, 93-percent of parents we surveyed were 'very happy' with their choice of placing their child in a mixed-gender class or a single-gender class, which is great because that means parents are making the right choice for their child," says Diehm.

full source: www.wzzm13.com/news/specials/13onyourside/153748/216/Single-gender-classrooms-are-a-growing-trend