ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the panic that exists around boys’ achievement within the UK education system and beyond. It asks questions around who is panicking and why. As it explores the concept of school readiness and gendered abilities to meet the Early Learning Goals, it considers how boys’ achievement in the Early Years contributes to their trajectory through the education system, making links with some key assessment points such as SATS, GCSEs and ultimately higher education entry. At the same time, it returns to the idea of intersectionality and considers whether the panic is about all boys or specific groups of boys. Furthermore, by using scripts that focus on boys’ achievement, it considers how discourses around girls’ achievement can sometimes be silenced and also how these kinds of scripts position women teachers in a deficit way such as those who have feminised education to the detriment of boys.
