15.9.2007 Left Brain - Right Brain

Being a foreign language teacher is what I really enjoy doing.There are always some new challenges.Like this one: In one of my seventh grade classes all the boys sit on the left side from the center aisle ( when I face them ) and all the girls seated themselves on the right side.And there is this wide gap space - the middle aisle - which separates the two "blocks". Their seating arrangement reminds me of the attached mind-map drawing depicting the typical assumed activities of the left brain and those of our right brain.I found the drawing in a wonderful book on mind-mapping by Nancy Margulies called: Mapping Inner Space.

So on my left side I face the boys with their energies and needs and on my right side are the girls with their colors and dreams....and I guess if I somehow put up the former Berlin Wall between the two groups both sides would cheer me on - that is how far apart they are in their behaviors,needs and learning styles.

Our English text book is only of limited help. For the next lesson the authors provide us with two main texts: one about the game of rugby ( I guess to satisfy the boys' interests ) and one about a leisurely bicycling tour through Northern and Southern Wales ( catering to the girls ?).

But just as our brain has an interface to allow for a collaboration between its two parts I will try to use a third text item to stimulate the interest and cooperation of ALL class members: it is an article about fat couch potatoes and what can be done about overcoming and preventing child obesity.

Although the two topics on sports and the one on nutrition may help me to get the attention of all my seventh graders it will most likely be a fleeting one - for their gender based division is a visible and felt fact and I phantasize that it might be far more effective if the system allowed the foreign language teacher ( and other subject teachers as well ) to instruct each group individually - during this and probably the next two grades as well.I know this is being tried out with some success mostly in private Highschools in the US - we as teachers and as parents here don't have these options - as of yet.