A school leader wrote recently:  “Michael, we know boys and girls learn differently, and by teaching to the minds of boys and girls, we have closed achievement gaps and improved student safety and behavior.  This theory and the strategies work so well, we became a Gurian Model School–this has helped us to nurture the widest diversity of students.

“But there is an idea circulating in our community, garnered mainly from Facebook and other media, that not only are there few or no real differences between male and female brains, but that if you care about diversity, you have to believe an idea that doesn’t even match common sense.  A parent just emailed me this:  ‘Why do you insist boys and girls learn differently?  All children are basically the same–the transgender and gender fluidity movement prove that.’

“I see this as a kind of idea du jour, and I cautioned the parent to do more research, including the suggestion of your recent books, Saving Our Sons and The Minds of Girls (this parent happens to have children of both sexes).  The parent read those and ended up changing his stance, but then he asked if I would reach out to you for a video clip or podcast that he could circulate about this.  Please let me know if you could send us that.  Thank you.”

Today’s blog post provides these assets, and I appreciate this parent and this leader requesting them.

Believing something false because it has a popular run for a while harms the school and family systems in which we are trying to nurture all of our children in all their diversity, including our girls and our boys.

— Michael Gurian