I can remember being in geometry and trying my best to make those perfect squares, circles and triangles. Maybe it is part of being 14 and male, but that was (maybe is) a bigger challenge than at first glance appears. I know I tried to match that very neat and sharp point style of the female in the class that I admired from a distance. The point of the compass tore the paper - yes it was the compass. It had nothing to do with my small motor skills (or lack thereof). As I tried to pivot the compass around the paper it would wrinkle, move, change direction and do all type of other activities that would lead me to believe that the lords of math really hated me.
The protractor at least, with sufficient pressure, stayed in one stop. That was fine but once in a while you have to reposition it to produce the square or rectangle that was displayed on the chalkboard. Then there were triangles and I always drew wrong ones not those titled right triangles. On top of that you had to measure them!
My math assignment paper probably could be entered as a smudge and pencil art piece but frequently was not the math paper that was tacked to the bulletin board. The erasers and starts and restarts demonstrated effort but not necessarily mastery of the skills.
From what I am observing right now, a few things have changed but the females in the class seem to have very neat papers and the guys have papers that are evidence of struggle. Now, I know that is a generality but that is the way I remember it.
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