In The Press
Girls Win By a Few Degrees
From The Sunday Times Sun 30 Jan, 2011
How do you help a girl to do better at school? Turn the heating up by three degrees. Researchers found that girls learn best if their classroom is warmed to 24C, compared with the 21C that is ideal for a boy to learn most effectively. Because of differences in how temperature affects the nervous system, the warmth that makes a girl ready to learn can turn a boy slothful. The finding is among tips on how to educate girls being compiled by the Girls' Day School Trust, a chain of 26 schools in England and Wales. Other ideas, gathered from scientific studies and the schools' experience, include: - Buldings should have nooks and crannies with soft surfaces and outdoor mini-amphitheatres rather than big atriums, as girls thive when they have small spaces for initimate groups to talk. The GDST is incorporating girl-friendly features in new buldings in Nottingham, Sheffield and London. - For girls, the ideal lesson is an hour long. For boys, 30 minutes is better. - In mixed classes, avoid qeustions for which pupils put up hands, when boys take 75% of the time, demoralising girls. Kevin Stannard, GDST director of learning said: "Merely separating girls from boys has little impact. Benefits flow only if this goes in step with sustained attention to girls' learning needs."
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