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Post by Tanya Doll
Week 1 Choice...Gender Differences
There are a number of gender differences to consider. Different parts of the brain function differently between the sexes and therefore impact men and women differently. For example, the cerebellum contains neurons that connect to other parts of the brain and spinal cord and facilitate movement, balance and speech. There is a much stronger connecting pathway in the female brain between the brain parts therefore females have superior language and fine-motor skills while males tend to be less intuitive. another example of gender differences is in the cerebrum. The cerebrum is the upper or main part of the brain controlling conscious and voluntary processes. Females use more volume than males therefore resulting in females being greater at multitasking. Lastly, neurotransmitters which are biochemical substances that transmit nerve impulses at the synapses clearly affect differences in how males and females brains process data.
Given these biological brain differences one could assume that learning differences will occur between the genders. With Females being more verbal and males more spatial, a need to consider how to train the combined genders so effective learning can take place is imperative. Most studies have shown that there is little differences in how men and women learn yet there is still many other studies that can show marked differences in the brain and behavior that contribute to the differences in how the learning takes place within the brain.
If females tend to better at verbal abilities and rely heavily on verbal communication then the need for web 2.0 communication technologies is imperative to the communication necessary for learning to take place. Whereas males tend to be heavily right brained and show better spatial abilities such as measuring, mechanical design and geography. These spatial cues can be brought forward to the learning table to allow the male learner the opportunity to learn successfully.
My Response:
It is very interesting to read about how the brains of men and women are wired differently and therefore, causes them to learn and understand differently. It adds another wrinkle (pun intentional) to the ideas of Brain Based Learning and Multiple Intelligences. As we have learned in our courses, people have many different styles of learning and may prefer one area of the brain to another. This fact has added great responsibility to educators to make sure that their lessons suited these learning styles. Now add to this the gender difference and you can see why many educators get frustrated at trying to teach. I think you are on the right track to solve this by incorporating technology into the classes that is based on your research for gender learning abilities. It also seems clear to me that this is why there needs to be a greater emphasis on getting more educators to use a constructivist approach to learning. In doing so, there is a greater chance to use multiple sources or ways to gain the needed knowledge. Also if the learning is more student-centered the more intuitive women will naturally gravitate to the sources that allow them the best understanding. It does make me wonder though, as to whether the differences between males and females are going to increase of decrease over the next few years. As we have also been told in our courses, technology is re-wiring the brains of today’s students. They perceive communication, literacy and other forms of daily life very differently than of just a few generations ago. Will this change in the brain add to the difference in how we learn, or will it allow us to view the information we need in so many styles that we will be sure to find the data we are looking for? I hope it is the latter. Good luck with your project, it sounds very interesting.
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