To think primary schools now days are more misogynistic amongst the boys, than in the past?

It's not all boys, I suspect it is the same ones who are coming out with the misogynistic phrases - it is all coming from the parents - so it is the ones whose parents have taught them entitlement and superiority. My daughter has 2 close friends from nursery who are boys and they are lovely and not at all like that. Their parents would not let them be. But there are a loud dominating set of them who are. I suspect the boys who are not like that are also being pushed out of spaces. I feel for the ones in my daughter's class who are not into football as the ones who are are very dominant and their culture presides over the playground. For some reason her class has a lot of these type of boys, only a couple of the more what I might call geeky ones, for want of a better description. Her class is also boy-heavy so it may also be more noticeable.

Curriculum does not seem to have been decolonised but has been diversified (village in the home counties) eg they studied both Florence Nightingale and Mary Seacole when they did nurses. Books do tend to be more 'boy-friendly' as they have moved up the years. Key texts always have male main characters

Just to add that I think diversifying the curriculum is a very good thing - offering up different significant figures and role models alongside each other, taking a more internationalist approach to History etc. That's what was going on in most schools I taught in until about five years ago. But what DD's school has done is not this - they have literally stripped white men out of the curriculum.

I’m a secondary school teacher and on a previous thread I mentioned the issue of space. Boys taking up more desk room, spreading their legs out so girls sitting next to them had hardly any room, boys standing too close to female staff as they’re taller and often use this to try intimidate. I was routinely shot down by posters calling me ridiculous and “boy bashing”. It becomes more and more of an issue as they get older, the idea that it’s a male world and the space belongs to them primarily.

Our grandson is 4 and has started this year. His best friend there is a girl in his class and his two best friends outside of school are both girls, one a year older and they were the only children the other saw during Covid, and another little girl 18 months younger.

He obviously holds no negative feelings towards girls.

If a 6 year old is saying things like that, it’s coming from home/family. Our family doesn’t hold such views.

I have noticed this in my daughter's primary school. She is in Y5. She does not watch Youtube or go on social media, but has come home with phrases copied from other children that have clearly come from there eg talking about sigmas, roasts, cut-g etc etc. I don't think the children using it actually know what these things mean as they are said completely in the wrong context. But it does show the misogyny filtering down via osmosis. It is not just that, there is SO much more 'these are boy things, these are girl things' than there was when I was at primary. I noticed it in toy shops and clothes when she was a baby/ toddler also. I am Gen X, and as discussed above, things were very different back then. Loads of girls at primary with short hair, lego was just lego, none of this ninjago for boys, lego friends for girls stuff etc. Every single girl at my daughter's school has long hair. Lots of posing like influencers. But there is a girls football team. So a lot of backwards movement in what is considered 'feminine', but some progress in other ways. The boys take up SO much more space in the playground - she is always complaining of being crashed into by boys playing football. That I have noticed everywhere we go though, not just at school. Boys take up/ are given so much space eg in swimming pools, on campsites, playgrounds. The entitlement starts so young. Girls need space too but they are squeezed out. On PE, they have it twice a week. It is currently hockey and football. Last half term was gymnastics and tag rugby. They occasionally do dance (one half term a year).
Curriculum does not seem to have been decolonised but has been diversified (village in the home counties) eg they studied both Florence Nightingale and Mary Seacole when they did nurses. Books do tend to be more 'boy-friendly' as they have moved up the years. Key texts always have male main characters.

Whether people like to admit it or not most of the greatest inventions were invented by white men so to completely ignore this and only focus on inventors because they're not white or they're woman well the kids are going to see this as the steaming pile of shit it is as they get older. Don't get me wrong nothing wrong with teaching about non white and women inventors but no white male ones at all?

I have to check myself constantly on this, as a white middle-class woman, especially as our Head is a woman of colour. But I'm very familiar with DD's school, as a parent, governor and volunteer, and I can confidently say that under its newly decolonised curriculum it would be entirely possible to reach the end of Year 6 never having heard of Shakespeare, Newton, Mozart, Neil Armstrong or Stephen Hawking. Pretty much every white male role model has been stripped out of the curriculum and replaced with a woman and/or POC. David Attenborough seems to be the only one who gets a pass, due to his environmental campaigning. Most of the role models are also African American rather than Black British - I'm assuming because our decolonised curriculum has been lifted directly from the American model - there's lots of content about segregation, Jim Crow Laws etc.

Not sure how typical this is, though, or whether our school is an outlier. I'm in a demographically very mixed but majority white school in a London suburb.

Apologies for the horrendous image of RB featured with the link. Should come with a warning. 😳

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-14055317/bizarre-things-Russell-Brand-dated-huge-red-flags-BRYONY-GORDON.html

This seems to fit right in with the theme of this thread.

I don't have children at school so I can't comment on any rise in misogyny. What I have noticed through youth work is a rise in girls who want to be models/influencers and such like. We had a recent session where we were discussing role models and people we admire, they were told about this before hand so they had time to think about it and the following week we were discussing what makes a good role model and the girls could tell us who theirs was. We had made sure to say a role model doesn't have to be someone famous it could be a relative a teacher a friend even a fictional character. It was really disappointing how many girls came back with male role models or female influencers. This is girls age 7 -10.

Luddite26 · Today 11:11

She got into trouble ? Wow just wow!

There was a lot of shouting and bad language!

I'm GenX with teens (wish I'd had them earlier so they didn't have to deal with all this tech crap). I raise my daughters to be independent, competent, not just academically but in practical things, not to take shit from boys or girls, have an excellent work ethic and strive towards being able to work and maintain their own independent lifestyles. I also teach them not to act superior but nonetheless confident in themselves and their abilities. One of them got a bit into social media, we have allowed some of it but discuss privacy, not sharing identifying or personal images at all. We talk about feminism, self worth and the value of work and money earned in a manner that is sustainable and promotes self respect. We were appalled to see that Youtube has a donate / pay function where viewers can transfer monetary gifts to a popular YT channel. Slippery slope and fast track to only fans. They know about this and how people can come to rely on likes = money = having to come up with more and more daring content.

In terms of role models, their dad and granddad are amazing cooks, they iron their own clothes and do household chores with pride. Family finances are shared fairly. It's about mutual respect and self respect.

They'll have to look very, very carefully to find likeminded friends and partners in the future. The climate out there is rough and selfish, and it's a lot due to brain rotting social media. It brings out the very worst in people.

She got into trouble @SinnerBoy ? Wow just wow!

Thatcastlethere

My son for example uses all this language 'sigma' 'alpha' etc... well he did until I explained to him that it was harmful macho nonsense.

I haven't come across that - can you explain? My 11 year old daughter says sigma constantly, as do her (female) friends - meaning cool. She knows who Andrew Tate is and despises him. She got in trouble for having a row with a boy who was praising him.

100% this.

Whether people like to admit it or not most of the greatest inventions were invented by white men so to completely ignore this and only focus on inventors because they're not white or they're woman well the kids are going to see this as the steaming pile of shit it is as they get older. Don't get me wrong nothing wrong with teaching about non white and women inventors but no white male ones at all?
Plus most kids just instinctively know you can't change gender so if they have a teacher telling them they can the they will start wondering what else is bullshit.

This kind of stuff is why a lot of kids are going the complete opposite way which we really don't want because the opposite of this is racist and homophobic kids. Schools should go back to teaching a more balanced approach

Just to add that, yes, I think it's a 'child problem' rather than a 'boy problem'. We too are having to arrange a lot of active extra-curriculars for DD7 because there's so little physical activity happening at school. We also make sure we walk to school and back every day, partly because we're aware that once she's there she's basically sitting down all day. She's never remotely tired out after her school day because they just don't move around enough.

The upper KS2 class I volunteer in are essentially behaving like caged animals by the time they go home, largely because other than break and lunch times they've been staring at 40-odd slide PowerPoints all day.

@Ablondiebutagoody It's such a fine line to tread, but I agree with you that some (many?) schools are getting this wrong at the moment.

Yes playground games have become much tamer than when I was at school (I remember Bulldog well!). I think schools need to strike a balance between allowing the more physical kids to let off steam, and not intimidating the less boisterous ones. I made a point about girls' football upthread, and issues around this often arise because both boys and girls want to play, but the boys (to generalise) do so in a more physical way than the girls, and the girls end up being squeezed out (or the boys refuse point blank to play with them, which happens a lot IME). It's not that girls don't need to move too, but they tend to use the space differently from boys, and schools somehow need to accommodate both.

Unfortunately many schools have limited playground space and staffing resources, which means they generally err on the side of caution - I'm aware of several local schools, primary and secondary, where there's a 'no running' rule in the playground due to lack of space. And there are parents who will take legal action at the drop of a hat - there have been several recent injuries (breakages) resulting from use of the trim trail at our school, and guess what - it has now been closed off as one set of parents has threatened to sue over their child's broken wrist.

None of this would be so much of an issue, though, if the rest of the curriculum outside break times wasn't so dull and sedentary. There are so few opportunities to move around in lessons now that by play time the children are climbing the walls. We need to look at the primary curriculum again and design one that leaves room for kids to be kids.

Its the fact that it is in the Oxford Reading scheme which annoys me. I feel it quite unthinking.
My dd1 had a friend who went to Pakistan in the summer hols and never returned as did her sister the following year. I know laws have changed now. But this book and many others need binning.

childness

My DS is 10. He and his peers really enjoy manhandling and grabbing each other. Also rugby tackling and rolling around on the floor 🤷🏻‍♂️ But they would settle for being allowed to decide for themselves if the risk of a graze or a bruise is worth it for a game of bulldog. Even tag and football seem to be heavily discouraged atm. Hugely risky on a wet playground apparently.

It's annoying for me because we have to actively seek this stuff out for him outside school.

But yes, I agree with you, maybe it's childless rather than boyness. They all need to be a bit more free to play as they see fit.

Definitely this.

This is exactly why these kids are going the other way imo they're at school being taught you can change gender and other bullshit so they rebel by going the complete opposite way. I'm 23 and I saw this starting to happen when I left school in 2017

I very much agree about the gender ideology, which I think damages both young boys' and girls' perceptions of themselves at a crucial stage of development.

I also think the rush to decolonise the curriculum at primary level needs to be looked at again as, rightly or wrongly, white working class boys in particular are interpreting this messaging as being told that they and their ilk are the 'baddies' in everything. I don't think DD's school has ever promoted a white male figure as a positive role model since she's been there (she's currently Year 2). All scientists and political and historical figures have been people of colour, often women and frequently activists. From what I'm seeing, I do think some of the boys are feeling disenfranchised from a very early age.

*Are you kidding me? Primary schools are the most namby pampby, kind hands, that's not ok, no bulldog at break times, gymnastics and dance for PE environment on earth. Totally unrewarding for most young boys in my opinion.

Maybe if you are seeing those things, they are a reaction to normal boyness being supressed like it*

I partly agree with this. I would say that the primary school environment is now way too static and screen-based (it's death by PowerPoint in many lessons I see) and is squashing the natural urge of all children - not just boys - to move around and explore. This needs to change IMO - more things like Forest School and outdoor learning would be great for everyone, and reflects the kind of experiences I had as a kid.

Conversely, boys, in my experience, are still allowed to take up more space in playground than girls at break times, and are often pandered to in things like class reading choices - so much hand-wringing about how we can only choose books with a male protagonist, or with football/war themes because the boys will disengage from anything else. The girls are expected to suck this up.

And what is 'normal boyness'? As I can't see any way in which using 'kind hands' (which generally just means not manhandling, grabbing or assaulting your peers) or being told certain behaviours aren't OK would contravene 'boyhood'.

My DD's school has one PE lesson each week based around ball skills/team games and one based around dance, gym and movement - a fair balance I think.

To be fair all fairy tales are pretty horrifying!! I do wonder about this; as a secondary English teacher a large part of my curriculum has some fairly awful stuff but we deal with it very differently. On other hand a good knowledge of fairytales really unlocks a lot of cultural background in literature. I don’t have primary kids so guess there’s not a lot of discussion about these tropes in R and what happens with books just sent home to be read?

I have Gen Z teenagers and in their circles at least they don't post photos and obsess over social media, they laugh at influencers, it is a rejection of the Millennial's approach, who were/are prolific users of the digital landscape in this way. Access to the internet at primary age maybe less of a dilemma if you yourself have existed like that.

This is exactly why these kids are going the other way imo they're at school being taught you can change gender and other bullshit so they rebel by going the complete opposite way. I'm 23 and I saw this starting to happen when I left school in 2017.