Gender differences in boys’ and girls’ perception of teaching and learning mathematics

Abstract

ABSTRACT Gender differences between boys and girls in the perception of the classroom setting, and their relationship to achievement in mathematics and aspects of self-regulated learning skills are the focus for this article. Throughout the component analysis of answers from 6758 Swedish students we found some differences in how boys and girls perceive their classroom setting and some differences in boys’ and girls’ relationship to mathematics. According to the classroom setting, we found that boys feel that they use group work more than the girls do. Boys also feel that they have an influence over the content and are more involved during the lesson than girls. With respect to students’ relations to mathematics we found that boys perceive mathematics to be more important than girls do. One implication for teachers from the study points out how different aspects of a perceived learning environment affect students’, boys’ and girls’, achievement in mathematics.