I go to Woodend Primary School and I am in Mrs Aparicio’s class. In my class we learn about lots of interesting things like other classes but there is one major thing that makes our class a bit different to the rest of the school, that is that we are an all girls class. At Woodend we also have an all boys class. Their teacher is, my dad, Jarrod Lamshed.

I used to go to Hackham East Primary School where in year one, two and three, I was also in the all girls class for the first time. When I first came to Woodend we did not have the program and it took a lot of convincing to change that. The reason that we have these programs is to prevent stereotypes from getting to young women/girls heads and making them try to change their personality to match these stereotypes. I really feel that it’s a good match for me because I feel like I am allowed to be who I am, no matter what that might be. A bonus that comes with the program is that SHINE lessons are more comfortable with no males in the room.

I don’t know as much of the boys program as I do with the girls but what I do know is that they also try to prevent stereotypes from happening. If you wan’t to find out more on the boys program you can visit the boys class blog and click here .

I think that all schools should at least consider having at least some lessons of single gender classes each week because it’s important to change the way that people think girls and women should grow up to be and what we think about ourselves.