Can women be pilots? Exploring gender stereotypes in Czech Republic

The Primary school where I teach and where I piloted the measuring activity is in the Czech Republic and has approximately 500 students. Our school is for students from our own and the nearby villages; some children from Prague attend our school as well. The public services and amenities are not great in our village, but it is in a unique natural location. Our school motto is We’re making a school where students like going. This is reflected in the facilities and, above all, the approach of the teachers and the enlightened leadership of the school. Teachers are in charge of afterschool clubs and therapy groups. We also have a team of assistants available to us, which is made up of a psychologist, a child development specialist and a special needs teacher.

Initial audit of activity

 I decided to trial the Which jobs are for women and which are for men? activity in a Year 7 class (age 12–13). I have been teaching Czech and Art in this class for two years. The class has 23 students. The students like to talk, which is why I expected the discussion part of the activity to be a success here. I included the activity in the writing section of the Czech Language and Literature class, along with the topic biography. The atmosphere was welcoming, but somewhat uncertain.

Before I began the activity I was concerned with how to divide up the class into working groups. It would have certainly been interesting to have one group of boys and one of girls to see how their opinions compare. But in the end I chose to have mixed groups. While the groups sat down, I put up on the board a poster with the names of different professions. The numbers next to the names of professions corresponded to the numbers I gave to the groups. Two groups worked on each profession. On Post-it notes, each group then wrote down two characteristics and two skills that a person has to have in order to do this job.

The groups then attached the Post-its onto the poster on the board, while two students wrote down the characteristics in one column and skills in another, on a graph drawn on another blackboard.

We then switched from group to individual work. I handed out note sheets for them to use in their individual work. The subsequent discussion and the notes the students made on their work sheets revealed that some of the professions can be carried out both by men and women. Though if a woman wants to do a man’s job, she has to be really good. I then asked students to show on their fingers how many skills or characteristics they would put down for men, how many for women, and how many for both sexes. In this class, three students assigned all 12 skills and characteristics to both men and women. But they were not sure if it was the right decision. So I had to encourage the students and remind them that there are no correct answers, only their own opinions.

If I were to assess the activity again, I would change the individual work, where students assigned the skills and characteristics according to gender, to group work. During the decision-making process, there may have been more clashes of opinions and approaches among students, concerning the distribution of characteristics and skills. The conflict might have led to a discussion and maybe an understanding that there is no single solution. Which, I think, is the result that this activity aims to achieve.

 

Profession Who has the better predisposition for the job, a man or a woman? What characteristics are required?
Airplane pilot Man Self-confident, observant, psychologically balanced, agile, calm, careful, disciplined
Research Man and woman Education (2x), meticulous, smart, responsible
Health care professional Man and woman, man most often a surgeon Skilful, education (2x), smart

 

Teaching at a kindergarten Woman Communicative, sweet, energetic, responsible

 

Mechanic Man Dirty (2x), good with his hands, has appropriate training

 

 

 

Male characteristics and skills Number Characteristics and skills either male or female Number Female characteristics and skills Number
flying a plane

dirty

knows his way around a car

determined

fixing cars

energetic

staying calm

cut into people

able to focus

calm

agile

staying calm

communicative

thinking

do experiments

educated

 

12

10

6

5

5

3

3

3

3

2

2

2

1

1

1

1

 

 

All

able to communicate

able to concentrate

educated

smart

skilful

able to get on with others

observant

staying calm

thinking

create

treat

agile

do experiments

sweet

able to solve problems

able to organize

psychologically balanced

fly a plane

meticulous

search

work with kids

energetic

determined

 

5

9

7

7

5

5

5

4

4

3

3

3

2

2

2

2

2

2

1

1

1

1

1

1

 

Work with kids

meticulous

treat

organize things

working with people

sweet

observant

communicative

remember long titles

observing well

staying calm

responsible

able to get on with others

smart

can resolve problems

communicate

energetic

able to find solutions

9

7

6

4

2

2

2

2

2

2

1

1

1

1

1

1

1

1

 

 

I cannot fully explain why the students assigned some of the characteristics and skills to men and others to women. Sometimes the reasoning reflects the students’ self-evaluation: if I have this characteristics and I am a man, then most likely this characteristic should be associated with men. The students most often assigned flying planes and fixing cars to men and teaching at a school mostly to women. This is not only because this is what they most often see around them. At the same time, students named certain characteristics and skills which were necessary to do a certain profession as specifically male (for example fixing cars), or female (for example taking care of children). Concerning the profession of a nurse, students saw the potential for both women and men. Nevertheless, the students felt that a man has a greater potential to be a surgeon (can cut into people and not throw up).

Some times individual characteristics or qualities were mentioned for both men and women separately and sometimes they were in the column for both genders. For example, the ability to focus was assigned by some students to men and some considered it to be common for both genders, but no-one put it down as specifically female. This is only an interesting factoid, and we cannot assume anything from it. I chose this set-up of the work sheets in order to find out which characteristics appeared only in one of the columns (men, both genders, or women).

I found out that the students consider exclusively male skills and qualities to be the ability to fly a plane, knowing their way around a car, and the ability to cut into people. Students also added a visual characteristic for men: dirty. This notion about male qualities was most commonly shared by the students. This was the way that most students broke up the characteristics and skills. Exclusively female qualities and the skills came out to be the ability to work with children and ability to remember long titles. The majority of students think that a woman can work with children, meaning that she works well with them, and has a good approach. With their answers the students confirmed the usual stereotypical thinking of men and women. A man knows about cars and can fix them. A woman takes care and works with children.

Teaching intervention

The goal of the teaching interlude for me was to disrupt this view of gender. I wanted to get students to realise that, even though we may look at the world according to certain rules and models, those may not necessarily be functional in today’s world. There may after all be many men who do not understand anything about cars, and do not know how to fix them, while there are many women who do not know how to work with kids. Thus one should not consider the potential of an individual through the filter of his or her gender, but should really consider each individual. Each of us is talented in different ways and is interested in different things.

To achieve these goals I included the following topics in the teaching interlude: emancipation and its roots, or jobs that are done most often or exclusively by men, or by women, and the reasons for this. I also decided to ask the students questions like: Would you choose a profession that in your society is usually done by members of the opposite gender? or If you’re looking for a business partner, would you prefer a man or a woman and why?

 

Final audit of activity

The audit took place in five groups with the same assignment. This time the groups again had to think of the characteristics and skills necessary for a certain profession. The qualities and skills that both groups listed, were nevertheless practically the same for men and women. The only exception was the case of a female auto mechanic, where the students wrote tough. Students did not understand that a male healthcare professional could be a male nurse or an orderly [the Czech term provided by the teacher means nurse, but is ambiguous, so can be understood as a healthcare professional in general, hence the confusion in the initial audit]. In the course of the discussion I found out that one of the female students wants to be an auto mechanic and that the students know a male kindergarten teacher.

 

Final Audit

Male characteristics and skills Number Characteristics and skills either male or female Number Female characteristics and skills Number
Fixing cars

Kill a man

Fly a plane

Strong physically and mentally

Dirty

Accurate

Calm

Work with people

 

8

8

8

 

6

5

2

1

1

All jobs except flying a plane (male only)and teaching kindergarten (female only)

ability to focus

clam

smart

patient

drive cars

nice

observe

work with people

dirty

accurate

skilful

able to organise

 

 

 

 

 

 

7

6

7

5

4

4

3

3

2

2

2

2

 

Work with kids

patient

skilful

work with people

smart

nice

able to organise

calm

accurate

9

4

2

2

2

2

2

1

1

 

It is interesting that during the final audit, the scale of specifically male characteristics expanded.

While students imagine men to have unique characteristics like strength for example, in professions carrying responsibility (like pilots or surgeons, where a mistake costs a life) and agility and technical aptitude to fix cars, they do not consider women to have specific qualities. Students still saw as the only specifically female skill the ability to work with children.

Even though my goal during the teaching interlude was to have students stop using the categories woman and man in their perception of people’s qualities and skills, I did not want to completely destroy their habitual way of thinking. A certain amount of stability in perceiving some things provides students with a feeling of security in the surrounding world. I wanted them to recognize each person’s uniqueness and all of the features of his or her personality, but also not to forget that men really are different (mentally and physically) from women. It is also not possible to say that any person can do any job. Someone may simply have a better predisposition to do a certain job well, and these may be gender-based (for example physical strength or sensitivity). I think my students understood this. Even though the male prototype was slightly more crystallized than during the initial audit, students also realized much more this time that people of either gender can have the qualities they listed. It simply depends on the specific person.

This was a new topic for the students. It seems that they had not thought about it on their own before, and that they did not encounter the problem in their everyday life. From my experience Year 9 students (age 14–15, the last year in Czech Primary schools) who are faced with the choice of secondary school and future professions, are very often overwhelmed by the number of possibilities. When considering future professions that include ones that the society views as more suited for the opposite sex, the students need to have a lot of confidence and motivation in order to succeed.