Day 1: As a hook to this mini-unit, I began by showing this video in which the vlogger, Norman, shares his ideas about some gender differences. The students then worked with a partner to complete this quiz (p.1, p. 2, p. 3) from Phosphore magazine. I insisted that they work in pairs, because I wanted to ensure lots of interpersonal communication in this lesson. I offered a prize to the pair who had the most correct answers, so that they would put a lot of thought into their responses.
Day 2: First I quickly went over the correct answers in order to award the prize. Then I assigned a short comprehension guide over these pages (p. 1, p.2, p. 3) which explain the correct responses. After the interpretive activity, I assigned the written response. This packet has all of the activities for this mini-unit.
Day 3: We started this lesson with a lengthily small group discussion about how boys and girls differ in various aspects of their lives. These topics were taken directly from the article (p. 1, p. 2, p. 3, p. 4) that they read after this discussion and completed a serious of inference-based true/false questions about. After responding individually, they discussed their responses in small groups. For homework they participated in an online discussion (on Canvas), in which they wrote about how their life would be different if they were a member of the opposite sex.
Day 4: As an additional interpersonal activity, I had the students respond to a series of controversial statements about how their lives might be different if they were the opposite sex. I gave them 3 minutes to discuss each statement, and had a scorekeeper in each group keep score based on the types of responses his/her group members made. I again gave a prize to the student with the highest score.
The students really enjoyed this mini-unit on a topic which stimulated some great conversations!