7 yo boy wants to wear dress and tights to school

What a crazy world.

What if he wanted to wear a pj masks outfit?

Some things are not appropriate for situations!

A simple no will suffice. He'll soon move on.

My concern, given the capture by most schools, that they would begin to encourage that perhaps he is a girl.

Imagine - the other children start saying 'you're a girl, you wear a dress'. DS hues to teacher who tells him he can be who he wants and asks if he feels he is a girl and so in ......

Schools have shown that they cannot be trusted with this. I would be telling him that boys have to wear the boys uniform.

Just say no.

Say, ‘this is the boys’ uniform, you can wear whatever you want outside of school’.

I guarantee your child’s school has got enough going on without dealing with a 7 year old boy wanting to come to school in a dress and all that entails.

Sometimes in life, we all have to conform with things. Like paying tax. Or stopping at a red light. This is a really non-harmful thing for your child to conform with.

You can support him in his clothing choices on evenings, weekends and holidays, without involving school.

Do you encourage your child to reject all societal norms if they wish?

What if they wanted to go naked to school?
What if they don't want to go to school?
What if they want to eat their school dinner sitting on the floor?
What if they don't want to bathe regularly?

All just societal norms which could be different or accepted.

Gendered clothing may be pointless or restrictive and maybe boys should be able to wear dresses but currently they can't without drawing negative attention. That may be wrong and we may move towards an acceptance of men in dresses as we did for women in trousers, but we aren't there yet.

And children outside their homes need to understand the culture they live in and not be sold the utopian lie of how their parents wish it was.

Telling a boy it's just fine to wear a dress to school is lying to him. It won't be fine it will create all sorts of potential issues.

I don't know that FWR can square the circle of their prevailing and conflicting ideologies on this one, OP.

On one hand there will be a sentiment that the sexes should be free to wear whatever they like, and on the other hand you will be told that you son, if he persists in this in adulthood, will be an AGP male.

Just tell him he's a bou and under schoolrules he can't wear a skirt. In our society dresses are for girls trousers are for boys and girls. I can see why it's not logical. But I wouldn't let him wear a skirt to school. Wearing a skirt won't make him a girl. No wonder children are confused.

There's always one, claiming "I've seen this happen and no one bats an eyelid!".
There's no way a boy in a dress isn't going to attract attention (most of it negative) no matter how many people insist on it being such a normal thing to do that nobody will even notice.

The school should keep an eye on him getting grief from bullies.

Not true unfortunately. He will be bullied if he wears a dress at school.

"You won't make him transgender whatever you do, any more than you can make him gay"

I suspect that someone who says this either doesn't have vulnerable children, or is entrenched in ideological thinking, or has ignored the many threads on here and social media where parents and detransitioners tell the story of just how susceptible they were to social media and to people who affirmed them.

An over invested teacher here questioning and making comments can have a huge impact.

'transgender' is NOT equivalent to 'gay' in this case. It is a harmful equivalence and not actually useful and it is very disputable as to how much evidence exists to support it.

You won't make him transgender whatever you do, any more than you can make him gay, so don't worry about that. It's not a social infection. Either he will be transgender or he won't. Chances are, he isn't

You don't think that a 7 year old can be 'socially influenced' into believing something is untrue?

Fascinating.

What explanation do you have for the fact that 4000% more girls are 'identifying as trans' than previously when the numbers of middle age women is much lower than that of men if not social infection? Whole friendship groups of teenage girls ALL have gender dysphoria?

You won't make him transgender whatever you do, any more than you can make him gay

Gay puts the body and its sex as 100% fact.

Transgenderism denies this has any importance at all and splits the body from the mind. Confusing for a child.

"I'm not sure exactly the PSE educational materials are, but it's an RC school so I think possibly quite conservative"
These days I wouldn't be so sure. Honestly. Especially in Scotland. All it takes is one teacher who thinks they're 'progressive', or the school to outsource the task and not preview it.

"... he is questioning why he can't wear a dress to school, if it doesn't change who he is."
I'd be wondering where this is coming from, because it doesn't sound very seven year old to me.

My response would be that whilst him wearing a dress would not change who he is, it would change other people's perception of him; and that you'd rather that didn't happen.

The most sensible thing said on here

Because due to the ridiculous world we now live in, next thing a teacher will be encouraging him to transition!

Yes, it seems that banning 'conversion therapy' only happens one way. A child who identifies as trans cannot be told or taught that they are not trans; but we all know, in the current climate, that a non-trans boy who happens to reject stereotypes can indeed be told that he is trans.

Because trans people have appropriated stereotypes for themselves, it now leaves the majority of us with far fewer choices open to us - I guess that's what 'inclusion' must mean....

Worst case scenario is that he prefers dresses and takes on board the rubbish that if he prefers dresses he must be a girl. that WCS no 1.

WCS no 2 would be that he wears a dress and a teacher and other children affirm him as trans and he begins to think they may be right.

If the school has a gendered uniform policy, you can tell him he has to follow that.

If it doesn't, tell him he can wear it, but he might get teased. Have him practice over the weekend and see if still wants to, but you can't really say "what you wear doesn't make you a boy or a girl" then tell him he can't wear a dress. You might want to discuss it with the school in advance.

You won't make him transgender whatever you do, any more than you can make him gay, so don't worry about that. It's not a social infection. Either he will be transgender or he won't. Chances are, he isn't.

^ this

TotallyAverage

Has he worn a dress before? Has he worn a dress outside the house before?

Is it more that a close friend is a girl and wears dresses?

Also he’s not a a baby just talk to him. I’d say he’s free to wear what he wants but some people won’t think that and they may laugh/ tease. This isn’t right but it might happen. If he is okay with that then he can crack on.

A boy at my daughters primary wears dresses. Kids don’t care. And he certainly doesn’t care if they do.

This, too.

Gendering clothes is ridiculous, and there are whole campaigns around trying to get away from the idea that there are boy things and girl things.

After seven years of teaching him not to gender his clothes and toys, the OP is now contemplating changing this to tell him that actually there are girl things and boy things after all and that he must conform to these stereotypes.

At the very least he's going to wonder why his mum told him one thing all his life and is now telling him something else entirely.

Worst case scenario is that he prefers dresses and takes on board the rubbish that if he prefers dresses he must be a girl.

I think this is key. As much as we like to talk about gender neutral clothing and toys the truth is that gender is written into clothing. If it wasn’t then trans people wouldn’t gravitate towards wearing clothes linked to the opposite sex.

Have you actually asked him why he wants to wear a dress ?
what is his reasoning behind it ?
If he wants to 'dress up' then thats for world book day or out of school stuff not in class

There's a boy in our school who dresses up in his older sister's hand me down fairy costumes but strictly for non uniform days only.
He loves it and the parents don't need to fork out on new batman/Spiderman fancy dress shite. It's win-win.
But no way would he go to school in a skirt. It'd draw too much attention.