ELT News Think Tank

This Month's Think Tank Panel

Curtis Kelly

Marc Helgesen

Brenda Hayashi

Peter Viney

Chris Hunt

Panelists: Intro | Curtis | Marc | Brenda | Peter | Chris
Date: August 2005

Topic: "Do women learn differently? - A conversation"

Intro

Curtis: This month's column is a little different than what we usually do. It is actually a preview of a discussion that Marc, Brenda and I will be hosting at JALT2005 in Shizuoka. The discussion is on "Teaching Women."

Brenda: In particular, we are looking at teaching in Women's Colleges and Universities.

As Curtis points out in his column, women's colleges in the USA are noted for producing a lot of really strong women: a third of the women on the boards of Fortune 1000 companies, 44% of female politicians, including people like Madeline Albright and Hillary Clinton. The list of Japanese who attended women's schools is also impressive. Former United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Ogata Sadako graduated from Sacred Heart (Shishin Jogakuin). So did Empress Michiko (she was valedictorian). Hisamoto Masami, a top rated TV personality attended Kinran Women's Jr. College. Designer Mori Hanae attended a women's university as did Chibi-Maruko-san creator Sakura Momoka. Even Ono Yoko studied music at a women's school for a time.

But of course, we don't want to look only at lists of famous people. We thought it would be useful, before the conference, to share some ideas about teaching women. We hope it will encourage other teachers to think about the issues and their own experiences.

Marc: And, of course, we hope to encourage people to attend the discussion (1 pm, Sunday, Oct. 9).(Full disclosure: I am, with Rob Waring, Co-chair of the conference so, in addition to being very interested in this topic, I'm obviously also interested in having a lot of people attend JALT2005.)

These are the specific questions we'll be looking at:

1. What exactly is a "women's university"?
2. Do women's schools offer any advantages for women?
3. Do women learn differently? How? What learning styles are prevalent? What should teachers (female and male) do?
4. Do gender-based pedagogies apply in co-ed schools and after graduation?
5. Where do we go from here?

Brenda: In my section, I look at some of the different learning styles and strengths that seem to be gender-based. Go...
Marc: And in my part, I share ways I've tried to make my teaching more appropriate for female students. Go...
Peter: Unfortunately, I won't be at JALT this year, but this is an issue that I am quite interested in (I even included it in my latest book!). In my part of Think Tank, I share some of my own observations. Go...
Chris: I won't be at JALT either. My Think Tank piece relates to teaching children. Go...

Curtis, Brenda, and Marc: We hope to see a lot of you at the JALT2005 discussion and look forward to hearing your ideas and experiences.

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