Boys' attitudes to reading and writing have been the focus of much Government and media attention. Girls started outperforming boys at GCSE when the exams were introduced in 1988. Then, in 2000, girls scored better at A-level than boys for the first time. In 2001 women achieved more first-class degrees than men. In 2007, Government figures showed that 76% of 11-year-old boys reached the expected level 4 in English, compared with 85% of 11-year-old girls.

In March 2005, the then Department for Children, Schools and Families released the following information:

• Boys' performance is lower than girls' in all literacy related tasks and tests in England. 
• Four decades ago, girls were doing better than boys in the 11-plus examination, requiring education administrators to set a lower cut off point for boys to ensure equal numbers of each gender went on to grammar schools.
• Three-quarters of mothers read with their children but only half of fathers do so.
• Girls do better in every area of learning before they are five.
  
  The National Literacy Trust has attempted to pull together a range of viewpoints relating to this as well as girls' attitudes to reading, useful statistics, resources and suggested ways forward.