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Original poster

Treating girls and boys differently at primary age

60 replies

TeWiSavesTheDay · 10/07/2014 11:29

Continuing from another thread (or a few) would anyone like to add examples of ways that girls and boys are treated differently at primary level and what they dislike (or like) about it.

I'll start with uniforms, at my child's school there are separate uniform lists for girls and boys. The boys list is very simple (trousers/shorts/shirt/jumper) the girls list is very complicated with different items allowed in different years.
I don't like it because I think it implies both that girls should have more options than boys (feeding the feminism gone too far myth that females have more choice than men) and also the need to have children differentiated by gender at this age- if girls are allowed to wear everything on the boy list why is the reverse not true? Why should a boy with additional needs struggle with a jumper when a cardigan would be more practical? Or even if they just prefer to wear something from the girl list why are we saying they can't?

OP posts:
LurcioAgain · 10/07/2014 12:32

YY kim - I too find it fascinating watching boys monopolise space in the playground when I drop DS off at school.

I have rehearsals once a week in another of the local primaries, and their staff room has a copy of "Why men can't iron", which (in its introduction) contains a sentence to the effect that "for every one outstanding female mathematician, there are thirteen outstanding male mathematicians." (I am a theoretical physicist, so not too bad at maths, and I work with a lot of outstanding female mathematicians...) I am so glad DS doesn't go to that school.

And (outside school example) recently in a park near my father's, DS and I ended up playing football with some other kids and their dad. One of the girls, aged about 10, was fantastic (I used to play Sunday league - she was, aged 10, considerably better than I was at that age). Her dad was very encouraging and (very impressively) did nothing to squash her competitive streak (I've heard way too many games disrupted by "Now, Jane, give Bob a fair turn" when the same would not have been said had it been John and Bob). I got talking to the dad - no local girls' teams, the boys' teams (and it doesn't matter at that age because pre puberty there is no difference in strength or speed) won't take her because the boys refuse to play with a girl. Sad Angry

BetterWithCheese · 10/07/2014 12:25

I'm dreading DCs starting school. I'm from Canada and we had no school uniforms and always had mixed PE classes. We also had the same sports teams for boys and girls - soccer, volleyball, basketball, track and field and rugby. We fought for a girls' rugby team but it happened quite easily and by the second year lots of other schools had teams too. That was over 20 years ago!

kim147 · 10/07/2014 12:19

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

bucketofbathtoys · 10/07/2014 12:13

Hedge that is unreal !!!

Original poster
TeWiSavesTheDay · 10/07/2014 11:51

Secondary examples definitely welcome - Hedge Shock that's so bad!

I was thinking that at lots of schools the boys are given the choice of sports that they could continue professionally, eg football, rugby, cricket - but girls are often offered sports like rounders, aerobics or dance which is much harder to make a living from.

But shipping the boys off to better facilities is a whole nother level.

OP posts:
Hedgehogsrule · 10/07/2014 11:44

My DD is in secondary, sorry, but the outside space for sports is limited. Apparently the boys are sometimes bussed off to a better sports ground elsewhere, while the girls are left "at home". Sometimes the very best of the girls are allowed to go with the boys.

bucketofbathtoys · 10/07/2014 11:43

Uniform is my pet hate. I hate it when I see schools with separate lists especially when summer shorts, trousers etc are not on the girls lists.
Two RC schools near us insist on skirts or summer dresses for girls - the attitude made me steer away from them. Private schools seem to go even further.

Some people think its a non issue but if you have a 4 year old that hates wearing skirts, whose friends are all boys, it is not.

Luckily our chosen school does not have separate lists - just unisex polo shirts, jumpers, fleeces, cardis, PE shorts for all - it up to parents what grey bits go on the bottom half !!!!

I am also delighted that all the sports are mixed - again the schools above have separate girls and boys sports.

I detested wearing hideous girls uniforms in the 80s

Original poster
TeWiSavesTheDay · 10/07/2014 11:43

Yes. I agree. It's okay for a girl to wear boys clothing because it is more practical - but girls clothing can't possibly be a more practical choice. Hmm

Teaching boys to be Chivalrous is definitely another one for me - though I've not heard of it at school yet there have been some rather heated debates about this with extended family telling the boys to they always have to be served after girl children etc

OP posts:
AskBasil · 10/07/2014 11:38

I found (and am still finding at secondary) that girls' behaviour is policed far more severely than that of boys.

My DD was and is constantly coming home with tales of how this boy did x y and z and nothing happened to him, while her friend (female) did something far less disruptive and got a detention.

It's much harder to see - because teachers are always inconsistent anyway, no matter how hard they try not to be, people can be having an off day, there may be many more incidences that she hasn't noticed or counted which balance things out etc. - but I suspect that boys are allowed to behave much worse than girls are right from the off.

grimbletart · 10/07/2014 11:37

TeWi: why are we saying they can't…?

I suspect that even in 2014 it is because girls are "allowed" to like boy stuff because they are liking something that is, even subconsciously, deemed superior or better. The reverse does not apply because why would you want to like something that is, even subconsciously, deemed inferior?

It's just the same with activities. People smile and say "tomboy" indulgently when a girl climbs a tree or shows any inkling of taking a risk, while a boy called "girly" is being sneered at.

The mistaken attitudes of thousands of years will take more than a generation or two to disappear Sad

My pet primary school hate was when the boys in kindergarten were the ones told to move the benches, because as everyone knows, even at 5 girls are weedy little specimens whose wombs might fall out in they lifted anything. Angry That was what made me a feminist at the tender age of 5.