Poetry and gender: a comparative evaluation of boys’ and girls’ responses to poetry at Key Stage 4 in Northern Ireland

Abstract

This paper presents a comparative evaluation of boys’ and girls’ responses to poetry at Key Stage 4 in a selection of schools in Northern Ireland. It is predicated on the idea of the central importance of poetry within the English curriculum and also on the assertion that the imaginative and broader educational benefits to be gained from fostering pupils’ engagement with and enjoyment of poetry ought to transcend a purely functional pursuit of enhanced grades in GCSE English and English literature examinations. The early, more theorised, part of the paper, firstly evaluates the gender debate as it impinges on English studies in general and on poetry in particular and also explores a number of ideas around the pedagogy of poetry; with regard to the latter, the ‘experience’ versus ‘analysis’ debate is touched on, as is the focus on creative writing of poetry. Against that theorised context, the paper presents the results of a mixed methods research programme, which included pupils’ answers to a questionnaire and their verbal and written responses to a selection of poems. The results from the questionnaire are evaluated as are the careful choice of poems and, in particular, the pedagogical methods which provide the context and stimulus for the pupils’ verbal and written engagement with the poems. The fascinating and surprising result was that, contrary to the prevailing perception and some previous research evidence, male pupils were at least as capable as their female peers of responding intelligently and enthusiastically to the emotional, imaginative and intellectual demands of poetry.

Keywords:

• poetry
• gender
• Key Stage 4
• Northern Ireland