Swedish Education
Boys and girls are treated the same way in Swedish education and have the same possibilities. Pre- school starts (can) starts at 12 months and endures till the age of five. In Sweden gender equality is something they want to pay attention to, at an early age. More and more pre- schools use gender pedagogy. Swedish pre- schools got their first curriculum many years ago in the year 1998 and wanted to create an environment which allowed children to develop themselves as an own individual with own interests and way of living. They wanted make sure there was a climate where every child is on equal footing and want to convey the message that boys and girls should have the same opportunities in life. To do this they want to avoid creating stereotypes and assigned roles. This is the reason why there are no gender specific toys in pre- school (Hasbar, 2010).
Why do they start so early?
Child psychologist Karin Graff says:
Children are extremely receptive and they learn how to act from adults. If you wait with gender pedagogy until they start school, boys and girls will already be assigned different roles.”
But how do they want to do this in practice? Something that should change is the way teachers behave towards children or the way they treat children. It seems that teachers and adults often are not aware of their different behavior towards boys and girls. Boys often get more space, while girls are spoken to in a conversational way, while boys get orders.
Some pre- schools wanted to break this pattern and divided boys and girls in groups, while they were practicing new things they did not do before or wouldn’t do normally. This way of dealing with gender equality led to more confidence for the girls and boys were able to improve language skills and created more feeling for the needs of other people (Hasbar, 2010).
How do boys and girls experience this gender pedagogy?
Two children of the Trödje pre- school told Svenska Dagbladet, from Swedish daily, that they had positive ideas about the gender pedagogy but did not really notice any difference with other children from other schools. Teachers, however, did notice a difference with children how had gender pedagogy. They said that the boys were more calm and had more social competence, whereas girls showed more confidence and ensured they would be heard (Hasbar, 2010).
Numbers!
Gender pedagogy is increasing in the Swedish school system the last couple of years. In the year 2004, only 7 percent of Swedish pre- schools used gender pedagogy. Nowadays this number is higher. It is still something that is mainly used outside the Nordic region, which could be due to the idea that parents and family are responsible for the upbringing of the children (Hasbar, 2010).
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