Talk like a girl
- Jan 4
- 5 min read
Updated: Mar 8
Grace Barron, V21 Oracy Consultant, discusses the power of girls voices and our role in amplifying them
In a slight departure from my usual topics, this blog is about girls - or rather, girls’ voices. I have a (I’d argue, important) habit of weaving oracy into almost everything I think about. Today is no different.
Because when we talk about gender, safety, and the power of speaking up, oracy isn’t a side-thought. It’s the thread that holds the whole conversation together.
Tuesday 25th November marked White Ribbon Day, and the start of 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence. This year, White Ribbon’s theme is “We Speak Up” - a call to challenge the everyday words, behaviours, and assumptions that cause harm.
This is where oracy matters. Because if speak up is the invitation, oracy is the means.
Speaking up isn’t just about having a voice; it’s about knowing how to use it - clearly, respectfully, and courageously. This White Ribbon Day calls for more men and boys to use their voices to disrupt sexist behaviour and protect those around them. But doing this in real life is difficult. There is a social cost to interrupting a joke or saying, “Actually… that’s not okay.” Many young people, and plenty of adults, stay silent not because they agree, but because they do not yet know how to intervene safely.
Speaking up is only possible when young people have seen, learned and rehearsed what speaking up sounds like. Many boys especially need permission to step outside the narrow box of performative masculinity that rewards dominance and competition, so they can recognise that listening, noticing and connecting are strengths, not weaknesses.
Here, oracy becomes more than just an academic idea or a school priority. It gives us the practical tools to speak up with clarity and care: how to disagree respectfully, interrupt safely and choose words that reduce tension rather than escalate it. It offers sentence stems that support challenge without conflict. These are learnable skills. They make speaking up feel possible rather than risky. A world where everyone is safe, equal and respected depends on people who know how to speak up.
Letting sexism slide puts women and girls at risk. Language shapes beliefs about who is capable, who is credible, and who gets to take up space. A phrase thrown out on the playground or in a classroom might not fit the legal definition of harm, but it teaches something powerful all the same: some voices matter less.
“…like a girl.”
It’s a phrase that’s been used to mock, dismiss, or diminish. But what if we reclaimed it as something powerful? What if talking like a girl meant speaking with confidence and conviction? And what if our classrooms were the place where that kind of talk was not only allowed, but expected - and taught explicitly?
Research has long shown that classroom talk is not equal. Boys are asked more complex questions, given more chances to talk and praised for their ideas, while girls are often asked closed questions and praised for being quiet. Sadker, Sadker and Zittleman (2009) found that girls are more likely to be interrupted and more time is spent prompting boys to seek deeper answers than girls.
Research by Carole Edelsky (1981) adds another layer to this. She observed two patterns of classroom talk: competitive talk, often shaped by boys, where speed and dominance win the floor; and collaborative talk, often shaped by girls, where ideas are shared and meaning is built together. In many classrooms competitive talk becomes the default. It gets praised. Collaborative talk is quietly sidelined.
Much is lost when this happens. We lose the talk that helps students think together. We lose the talk that creates psychological safety. We lose the talk that allows more people to feel confident to contribute. These losses weaken classroom culture and belonging. They weaken the very conditions in which speaking up becomes possible.
If we want more boys to speak up, we need to value the behaviours that support that goal. We need to praise careful listening, not just quick responses. We need to treat hesitation and fillers as thinking, not weakness. Oracy gives us a way to teach these things without making them gendered or moralistic. They become part of what good communication looks like.
The way we handle talk in our own classrooms signals what is valued. When we interrupt harmful comments with confidence, students see how to do it. When we highlight a student for listening deeply or for redirecting a conversation with sensitivity, others notice. When we draw attention to who is speaking and who is not, students learn to notice the patterns for themselves. When we practise disagreement in structured, supported ways, we give them a template for the unstructured moments that happen beyond the classroom.
Reframing “speak like a girl” means looking again at the collaborative strengths often associated with girls and recognising their value. Speaking like a girl might mean hesitating because you are thinking. It might mean listening because you value connection. It might mean noticing when someone has been overshadowed or excluded. These are not signs of weakness, nor are they behaviours that are exclusive to girls. They are signs of intelligence, empathy and leadership. They make classrooms more democratic and less dominated.
“Like a girl.”
Purposely small. Purposely dismissive. A phrase that still gets tossed around as if its impact is negligible. But once we recognise the complexity of speaking up, the phrase takes on a different weight. Speaking like a girl might mean noticing discomfort, thinking before responding or choosing connection over competition. It might mean speaking in a way that brings others with you rather than pushing them away.
None of this is lesser. These are the behaviours that make safe and effective intervention possible. Speaking like a girl might be one of the most powerful things any of us can learn to do.
We Speak Up is not about being loud. It is about being brave. Bravery grows when people feel supported, skilled and safe. Imagine a classroom where “like a girl” describes a way of speaking that is thoughtful, attentive and strong. Imagine boys who see collaborative talk as part of leadership. Imagine girls who see their natural ways of communicating not as something to overcome but something to be proud of. Imagine young people who know not just how to use their voices, but how to use them for each other.
Culture changes through talk. What we challenge, what we refuse to let slide and what we choose to name all matter. If we teach young people to communicate well, we teach them to speak up. And perhaps then “like a girl” will finally say what it should have said all along: a voice that speaks up and speaks for change.
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