Juggling with gender. How gender promotes and prevents the learning of a specific movement activity among secondary school students

Abstract

Research on motor learning frequently reports gender differences. However, there seems to be limited tools in the research with which to make use of these insights in educationally relevant ways. Movement learning and gender are intensely researched in movement education research, but the issues rarely intersect in the literature. The purpose of this article is to shed light on how movement learning and gender norms intersect when students learn to juggle. A pedagogical intervention in two secondary school classes (15–16 year olds) was explored ethnographically. Two composite narratives illustrate how gender norms affected the juggling practise to a different extent in the two classes, indicating that these norms are highly contextual. Learning to juggle seems to include aspects of both ‘doing boy’ and ‘doing girl’, i.e. regarding respectively controlling objects in space and persistent practising. The findings indicate some ways in which teachers can help students transcend traditional gender norms.