Whitewater rafting is an experience I would recommend to anyone. It raises your adrenaline; invokes the thrill of the unknown as you face new rapids and currents; it brings out skills and dispositions you may not even have been aware that you possessed. Yet, whitewater rafting is just that – an experience that has a start and a finish. It is the thrill of the moment. This is the feeling shared by teachers in many of our schools on a daily basis.

If we, as a country, truly respect and value education as one of our pillars for economic and social prosperity, then we need to take stock of the working lives of educators.

I will look at teaching not from the perspective of a politician or a policymaker but from one who views teaching and leadership up close, who enjoys the profession with all its ups and downs, complains about it, studies it and lives it.

I will illustrate what I mean by first looking at a situation experienced while I was out on teaching practice, and then looking into one particular reform that can impact negatively if not addressed strategically.

Having been involved in teacher education since 1987, I’ve seen hundreds of student teachers on teaching practice. I have seen the landscape change right in front of my eyes. The educational reforms and the various developments that have been introduced over the years do impact on how prepared or inadequately prepared student teachers or teachers feel as they face the challenges schools today are confronted with.

We all agree that teachers work in an extremely fluid and turbulent context, one which engages them with innumerable challenges. Teaching is a stressful profession. Teachers and school leaders are responsible for many children and to many adults.

What they do or don’t do affects the well-being of many and, as we all know, educators make dozens and hundreds of unscripted decisions every day. Teachers grapple with understanding how to adapt their instructional practices to student needs; how a changing society presents school leaders and teachers alike with exhausting and psychologically draining experiences.

Exacerbating these challenges, more recent issues have chipped away at the traditional satisfactions of being or becoming a teacher, such as the testing culture Ball (2003) describes as eroding the teacher’s soul, that cut backs on creative and in-depth teaching, as well as  disempowerment. As DuFour (2016) states, teaching is an embattled profession making educators shy away from embracing their own power to influence.

However, I often get the feeling that we expect teachers to be able to handle these challenges with relative ease – ‘a bit of training will do the trick’ approach seems to be the rule of the day. A circular or an information session for school leaders will do miracles!

Today we cannot claim that our schools are homogenous – if they ever were. If abilities, backgrounds, nationalities, culture and faith are not enough, we are now facing the introduction of various reforms. One of the latest being that of co-ed secondary schools within the State sector

Around a month ago I was visiting one of our students out on teaching practice in a State primary school. She had around 20 pupils. Three in particular caught my attention. It was evidently clear that they needed some form of support but were not getting any. I will not go into an in-depth engagement with this issue; why it takes years for children to get reviewed; why a boy from war-torn Syria was not getting any psychological support yet expected to be able to handle academic subjects with other children. This picture may resonate with a lot of teachers. Teachers are expected to handle anything, as exigencies dictate.

We are expecting miracles from teachers and school leaders alike.

Today we cannot claim that our schools are homogenous – if they ever were. If abilities, backgrounds, nationalities, culture and faith are not enough, we are now facing the introduction of various reforms. One of the latest being that of co-ed secondary schools within the State sector.

Girls in their early teens often outpace boys’ language skills by a wide margin.

This has ensured that the landscape has become a more complex one, especially for those who have been teaching single-sex classes for most of their career. The process undertaken has tried to dispel concerns that teachers may have had. And yet, what preparation did our teachers and school leaders receive to address issues related with gender, development and behaviour, to mention the most obvious?

Furthermore, no one has told us that our teenage boys may actually need more help! No one, in their drive to institutionalise co-ed schooling, has spoken about the maturity gap between boys and girls, that this maturity gap looms largest in the early teen years.

In an interesting article by Sue Shellenbarger in The Wall Street Journal she does just that. She refers to new research showing that boys’ and girls’ performance on many tasks tends to converge at around the age of 15. However, early adolescence is a critical stage when children are developing a sense of personal identity and social status. The research lends insight into the kind of support early-teen boys may need.

In particular, three main gaps have been identified, namely language, attention and empathy. According to Frances Jensen from the University of Pennsylvania, girls in their early teens often outpace boys’ language skills by a wide margin. If a 13-year-old girl is given a minute to name aloud as many words as she can think of that start with one letter, she’s likely to rattle off tens of words with ease. On the other hand, a 13-year-old boy will struggle. This is so because male brain development is about two years behind girls at this stage.

According to a 2016 study of cognitive skills and brain function in 3,500 young people aged eight to 21 by researchers in Philadelphia, girls are faster and more accurate than boys in remembering words. Recalling words quickly is an indicator of language and decision-making skills.

Teachers and parents need to ensure that they do their utmost to boost the confidence of those boys who fall behind. Prof. Jansen argues that it is imperative for boys to be encouraged to focus on their personal progress rather than compare themselves to others. Everybody develops at a different rate.

Boys’ and girls’ performance on many tasks tends to converge at around the age of 15. However, early adolescence is a critical stage when children are developing a sense of personal identity and social status. Research lends insight into the kind of support early-teen boys (below) may need.

Various studies across countries and cultures bring out that girls are more accurate than boys on tests of attention; that boys are slower to develop the ability to pay close attention to whatever task is in front of them. As Shellenbarger notes, “facing a mountain of homework, early-teen boys may procrastinate or despair, while girls on average can better focus on specifics, step by step.”

Boys often like using digital organising tools. Sharing a digital calendar with a parent can help a teen remember such commitments as medical appointments. Some teens use a smartphone alarm to manage homework time, or apps such as Evernote or OneNote, to capture to-do lists and reminders.

The Philadelphia study also shows that boys are slower to sense what others are feeling by looking at facial expressions. Boys also lag behind girls in a more complex process called mentalising – figuring out what others are thinking based on context, conversation, body language and other cues. This ability begins developing steadily in girls around the age of 13, according to a study undertaken by the School of Medicine at Yale University.

The acquisition of empathy and mentalising skills is deeply rooted in home life. Parents who talk about their own and others’ feelings and thoughts give their children a better-than-average chance of learning to do the same. Inviting children/students to describe what characters in films or stories might be thinking or feeling is important.

Literature here may come in handy. Our approach to language development through literature may not only boost the ways students develop and handle feelings and thoughts but enrich language acquisition. Discussions during PSCD sessions will also help.

The critical point here is, have such issues been discussed with teachers (and parents)? How are these being studied in relation to the impact they have on teachers’ pedagogies, classroom management and overall student development – boys and girls for that matter?

This is the reality teachers are facing. This is where they need help – on the ground. It is not acceptable to hear of reform fatigue and not do anything about it.

The editorial of the Times of Malta of January 23 acknowledged the concern raised by the MUT that the education system is in crisis and argues that this is so because we tend to ignore the most important factor – a motivated and respected teaching profession.

Establishing positive working conditions makes all the difference in enticing educators not only to stay in the profession, for attrition is becoming a real phenomenon in the teaching profession, but to entice students to become educators.

I hope the forthcoming sectorial agreement does address ways and means of immediate and ongoing support to teachers where and when needed. This will lead us to the area of governance and accountability, but that is another story.

Christopher Bezzina is deputy dean and head of the Department of Leadership for Learning and Innovation, Faculty of Education, University of Malta.