Rites of Passage

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I just got back from the Boys’ Schools conference and that always gives me lots of new topics to share with you all. The theme for the conference this year was Building Boys into Good Men and there were lots of speakers talking about how to do just that. One of the sessions I attended … Read more

Handwriting: Still critical to learning

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I’m in the middle of revising my first book – Teaching the Male Brain – and I’m coming up with LOTS of new information that I’ll be sharing with you in the months to come. In the meantime, I have a topic I want to bring up because it has been something most of the boys’ … Read more

Early School – Good Idea, or Not?

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I was in England last week working with some schools there – a real mixed group, coed, girls’ and boys’ schools. While I was there a news item caught my attention. Someone in the UK has suggested that school start when children are 2 years old. I was flabbergasted. If you have been paying attention … Read more

What is normal?

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There is a new book that parents of boys might be interested in: Back to Normal: Why Ordinary Childhood Behavior is Mistaken for ADHD, Bipolar Disorder, and Autism Spectrum Disorder by Enrico Gnaulati. I learned about this book from a NPR interview in which Dr. Gnaulati said that many of the problems that he saw … Read more

On boys, video games, and violence: A teacher’s perspective

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An article by Christina Hoff Sommers in TIME may be of interest to parents of boys – click here to read it. Even if you are not in favor of single gender education, you probably are concerned that coed schools seem to find that normal boy behavior creates problems. I myself might be concerned if … Read more

Back to school: Ready, set … GO

For those of you in the US, school is about to start again. If you are in the UK, there’s a bit of time before school starts, but it’s still coming up soon. This post is for you all. For those of you in the Southern Hemisphere, you’re in the middle of the school year … Read more

Lessons from the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman case

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For those of us who are parenting boys, the outcome in the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman case in Florida is very concerning. Just being a boy seems to put a young man at risk in this world. Boys are more likely to be identified as autistic or having learning disabilities, more likely to commit suicide or … Read more

A watershed of insight, courtesy of Doc Hendley

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At the end of June, the International Boys’ Schools Coalition had their annual meeting. It’s always a pleasure to be with a large group of people whose focus is on educating boys, especially since those schools are both state and independent schools, and they are from all over the world. Attendees came from the USA, … Read more

Happy Father’s Day!

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The prevailing stereotype is that men are not very emotional, but that isn’t true. More and more studies are indicating that while men may not be comfortable verbalizing their emotions, they certainly are emotional.  Now, research shows that men who are fathers actually secrete oxytocin the more time they spend with their own infant children. … Read more