>>I have a question, which I wonder about, but have no insight into >>due to
>>my luck growing up in an excellent environment for fostering >>geekiness
>>;)
>>Have any of you ever felt excluded or neglected in tech classes >>because
>>of your gender? The classes I had in grade school were >>available to
>>anyone, but it seemed like once I got to high school >>the number of women
>>in any given class was definitely a minority. >>At least in 3-6 grade we
>>had LOGO lab and every got to
>>participate. However, I never gave much thought to the issue of >>teacher
>>interaction. I could see how a teacher who favors, or gives >>the
>>impression of favoring male students over female would be a big >>turn
>>off. I never say anything like this happen at my
>>schools, but I thought about it either.
>>Do you feel somewhat apprehensive or uncomfortable in a male majority
>>learning environment?
>>I know that one of the biggest factors for me and learning new >>skills is
>>a setting where i am free to tinker, ask any question that >>comes to
>>mind, and in general, intereact freely
>>with the other people there.
I don't care about being in all male majority environments now but that was
very intimidating at in Jr. High and high school. I was a member of a
computer club and a math thing in elementary school but when it came to Jr.
High I was out of there! I would have to say that interacting with boys in
general got pretty hard around that time and that made it hard to continue
to learn in those environments. A teacher mediating and controlling the
environment more would certainly have made that better for me but most
likely less fun for those boys who were experiencing something else. I
remember those guys giving me a pretty hard time when there wasn't a teacher
around to control the environment. I think their immaturity came from not
knowing how to interact with girls and not from a conspiracy to keep me
down. Know what I mean? Part of it was me too - I mean a couple of times I
had a crush or something and that messed things up between me and my
computer nerd buddy...
I think we need more teachers mediating in those computer club thingie's
after school.
Helaine
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