Single-sex Teaching in a Co-educational Comprehensive School in England: An evaluation based upon students' performance and classroom interactions

Abstract

This article focuses on single-sex teaching in co-educational schools, through a case study of one such school where single-sex teaching has been the norm since the school was established in the early 1970s. The long-established nature of this mode of organisation gives scope to discuss the long-term effectiveness of such single-sex groupings on students' learning, through an analysis of achievement levels in the school at 16 +, and through a consideration of the nature of classroom interactions and the engagement of girls and boys in mathematics and geography lessons. Analysis of students' performance since the introduction of the General Certificate of Secondary Education examination reveals that, in most years, girls have consistently achieved better results than boys in most subjects, but that the relative improvement levels of both girls and boys over time are similar, and significantly higher than the national average. Interviews with staff and students, and analysis of patterns of classroom interactions, suggest that both girls and boys benefit from having their own learning space, although there are issues about the reintegration of students, particularly boys, when mixed lessons are provided in the foundation subjects in years 10 and 11. The evidence suggests that some teachers do explicitly adjust their teaching styles when teaching boys' classes or girls' classes, but many do not explicitly do so. It is argued that single-sex teaching has potential to raise achievement levels in some contexts, but that this potential will only be maximised when differential teaching approaches are systematically planned and explicitly implemented, monitored and evaluated.