Welcome to Plato's Academy and ....

So this week we looked at education in Greece (Athens and Sparta) and Rome. It is funny to think of the Romans as the first to drop PE and music from the schools. Next week we will look at the Chinese Imperial Examination System.

For Tuesday's class, please read carefully the article I distributed, "Picture Yourself as a Stereotypical Male," and make purposeful annotations to it. You can also find the article on-line (with explorable links to the research discussed).Bring your written answers to the following questions: 

1. What are some hypotheses as to why men outperform women in a cluster of tests related to spatial ability?
2. What did the gender-priming experiment show?
3. What is "stereotype threat"?
4. Describe four of the experiments cited in the article that demonstrated the affects of stereotype threat.
5. What does the brain do in the ventral anterior cingulate cortex?
6. What social-psychological interventions can ameliorate the achievement gap? (N.B. look up words you aren't familiar with.)

If you look for the answers to these questions as you read and annotate, the task will be easier.