Observation #5: Communication Diversity

After watching the film, The Pinks and the Blues, I began to wonder if any of the

differences in gender interaction had altered much in the two decades since the

documentary was filmed. So, for the purposes of this observation, I opted to analyze the

interactions between elementary school teachers and their students, and, as a result of this

interaction, monitor the behaviors of elementary school students within a social context

to see how this relationship may have affected gender differences. Having spent the better

part of the semester volunteering at Bret Harte Elementary School in the Bayview

district, I observed and compared the way two teachers, Mr. Ben and Mr. Michael

communicated to both boys and girls in their respective classrooms. While it may have

been more interesting to examine the differences between a male and female teacher, I

unfortunately did not have much opportunity to observe female teachers in the course of

my volunteering duties.

In Mr. Ben’s 3rd grade class, Mr. Ben makes efforts to treat male and female

students equally. When addressing students, Mr. Ben employs the same tone and manner

when dealing with both genders, ranging from soft in individual circumstances, to more

pronounced and commanding when handling the classroom en masse. Differences,

however, slowly emerge through the syntax he employs for specific genders. With

females, Mr. Ben uses more sensitive words like sweetie, sweetheart, and honey; words

that connote a softened, more endearing characterization. Alternatively, he uses more

commanding words—words requiring a demand for respect such as son and use of title

(Mr. ________ )—when dealing with the 3rd grade boys.

 Mr. Michael, Bret Harte’s art teacher, uses a varied tact, which seems almost a

polar opposite to Mr. Ben’s approach. During art class, Mr. Michael tends to change his

tone when addressing either boys or girls. Similar to the findings noted in The Pinks and

the Blues, when a boy would disrupt the class Mr. Michael would stop his lesson and

immediately reprimand the student. One such example took place when a student named

Dawon tried to preempt Mr. Michael’s lesson with instruction of his own. Mr. Michael

stepped to the rear of the room and insisted that Dawon instruct the class since he seemed

to know so much about what they were covering, instantly embarrassing the boy before

the entire class. Inversely, when dealing with interruption from girls, Mr. Michael took it

as complimentary suggestion and responded constructively to their attempts to interact.

First names were always used when addressing students, though similar to Mr. Ben,

individual interaction also resorted to endearing terms for girls and authoritarian terms for

boys.

When observing the girls interacting, particularly at recess, I recognized instantly

that, similar to observations made in the film, their social relationships tended to gravitate

toward more close-knit groups, reminiscent of cliques seen during high school years, with

little interaction occurring between these groups. The only exceptions noted were during

actual class time, in which groups were forced to interact either by groups or pairs

assigned by their teacher. Socially, age did not play a factor in determining group status;

interests and cultural identity, however, played a larger role. For example, girls who

played soccer together after school did not usually associate with other girls during recess

periods, while girls from adjacent neighborhoods also stuck to their own groups. It should

also be noted that girls within the soccer group were also clustered into smaller subgroups
based on cultural identity (the African-American girls rarely interacted with the Mexican-

American girls beyond their after school games), thus reinforcing those findings

discussed in the The Pinks and the Blues stating that females form more intimate

relationships with fewer members of the same gender. Just the same, however, not all

areas of the documentary mirrored the current state of gender differences.

Though some elements discussed in the film were still prevalent among modern

gender roles, some aspects identified have greatly shifted. For example, the film stated

that girls have a less asserted concept of self than boys. Nowadays, this role concept is no

longer isolated to menial homemaking or child rearing, but has evolved into more

instrumental roles. One such example is young 2nd grader named Jaishanae Lee, who

insisted that she would go to college and become a pediatrician when she became older.

In a class-wide inquiry of Bret Harte’s 3rd grade class, most students, girls and boys alike,

asserted that they would take on important successful positions in society rather than

presume that their place was merely in the home.

The roles of boys, in comparison to those roles observed in The Pinks and the

Blues has interestingly changed only marginally. Rough-and-tumble play is still

prevalent, resulting in far more accidental injuries than females, and boys would typically

explore more of their surroundings than girls would, often resulting in scolding outside of

class and disruption inside.