Gender and Teaching (Reflective Teaching and the Social Conditions of Schooling)

Gender and Teaching provides a vivid, focused, and interactive overview of the important gender issues in education today. This is accomplished through conversations among experts, practitioners, and readers that are informed by representative case studies and by a range of theoretical approaches to the issues. Gender and Teaching is the third volume in the "Reflective Teaching and the Social Conditions of Schooling" series edited by Daniel P. Liston and Kenneth M. Zeichner. It follows the same format as previous volumes in the series.

Part I includes four cases dealing with related aspects of gendered experiences in schools (nonsexist elementary school curricula, gender and race implications of special education assignment practices, homophobia in high schools and classrooms, and teaching as a woman's profession), followed by a set of teachers', administrators', and professors' reactions to each case.

Part II is an elaboration of four "public arguments"--conservative, liberal, women-centered, and radical multicultural--pertaining to the issues raised in the cases in Part I. These arguments exemplify clusters of orientations, organized around general values rather than hard and fast principles.

Part III presents the authors' own interpretations of the issues raised throughout the work and provides activities and topics for reflection and an annotated bibliography of additional resources.

Content and Pedagogical Features:
*Readers are encouraged throughout to interact with the text. They can respond to each case and compare their responses to those of others in the field.
*The cases and discussions that follow help students begin to evolve their own "practical theories"; explore and perhaps modify some of their basic beliefs and assumptions; become acquainted with other points of view; and look further into the connections and intersections of gender with other structural dynamics and practices--those of race, class, and culture--as intrinsic to their explorations into the social conditions of schooling.
*The major strands in feminist theory about women and education are presented so that students can analyze the differences among them, come up with positions of their own, and learn to defend them.
*Although the authors draw on historical and sociological frameworks that show how women have historically been discriminated against in our schools and in our society, their goal is an education that is equally fair to everyone, boys as well as girls.

Gender and Teaching is pertinent for all prospective and practicing teachers at any stage of their training. It can be used in any undergraduate or graduate course that addresses issues of gender and teaching.

Frances A. Maher, Janie Victoria Ward