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Productive Pedagogies and gender

Education Queensland's work on Productive Pedagogies is useful in addressing issues of gender and literacy. A key understanding is that 'knowledge is problematic'. In other words, knowledge is not a fixed body of information, but is, like gender identity, socially constructed, and hence subject to political, social and cultural influences.

Teachers can help students to understand how gender is constructed through various print and technological texts so that they can challenge narrow and restricting messages.

Good resources for developing these kinds of critical literacies include:

Alloway, Nola & Gilbert, Pam (eds) 1997, Boys and Literacy: Teaching Units, Curriculum Corporation, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra

Association of Women Educators 1997, Gender Up Front: strategies for a gender focus across the key learning areas Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra
(Teaching ideas, lesson plans, resource lists)

Dally, Shirley 1995, Gender Perspectives: how the individual, school and society shape status and identity based on sex, Department for Education and Children's Services, Adelaide.
(Teaching Program, Teacher Resource Book and Student Magazine)

Department of Employment Education and Training (DEET) 1990,
GEN Teacher's Kit, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra. (Kits for junior primary, senior primary and secondary - issues, strategies and activities on classroom interactions, physical activities and world of work.)

Department of Education, Training and Employment 2000 Social action through literacy: Early to primary years, South Australia

Education Queensland 2000, Why wait: A way into teaching critical literacies in the early years (Teaching Units), Brisbane

Salisbury, J. & Jackson, D. 1995, Challenging Macho Values: Ways of working with boys in secondary schools, Taylor and Francis Inc, Philadelphia PA

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