What are we doing wrong with our boys?

[OhNoItsMonday]

NC for this. Mum of boys here.

I love my DC to pieces. They're too young for school yet. But I've already noticed that, whenever you hear complaints about badly behaved children in the classroom (or often outside it), it usually although not always seems to be boys who are being complained about. Just wondering why that is? What are we doing wrong with our boys?

Interesting, I work in primary 1 with 80 dc and I've never thought about it but all of the dc that need 1:1 support are boys. All of those not toilet trained are boys and all of the violent behaviour is from boys. We have a couple of girls that were slightly challenging to begin with but toed the line very quickly with routine and consistency. All the ongoing lower level behaviour issues are with boys and I'd honestly never thought about it that much til now. It's discussed that 'masking' is much more prevalent in autistic girls which makes diagnoses harder. Perhaps that's related?!

midnightstar66 I'd say that's pretty true.

The point is not to discuss whether boys and girls are different or the same but how to be fair to everyone and treat them as individuals even when there are tendencies.

All the gendered stereotypes, whether negative to boys (boys are violent, girls are innocent) or negative to girls (girls are manipulative, boys are honest) come from the same outdated assumptions.

The video upthread demonstrates how prejudiced adults are. That needs to change.

all of the dc that need 1:1 support are boys. All of those not toilet trained are boys and all of the violent behaviour is from boys. We have a couple of girls that were slightly challenging to begin with but toed the line very quickly with routine and consistency. All the ongoing lower level behaviour issues are with boys and I'd honestly never thought about it that much til now.

Interesting. How much of this would you say is due to poor parenting by parents of boys, or is it difficult to tell?

@midnightstar66

Interesting, I work in primary 1 with 80 dc and I've never thought about it but all of the dc that need 1:1 support are boys. All of those not toilet trained are boys and all of the violent behaviour is from boys. We have a couple of girls that were slightly challenging to begin with but toed the line very quickly with routine and consistency. All the ongoing lower level behaviour issues are with boys and I'd honestly never thought about it that much til now. It's discussed that 'masking' is much more prevalent in autistic girls which makes diagnoses harder. Perhaps that's related?!

Really? Not one violent girl in the whole school? We have at least one in nearly every class.

Hell, the first swearing and threat of violence I had at work was from a girl.

I’ve not RTFT (so shoot me) but in my ds age 7 school class right now the issues are mostly with the girls who are “too chatty”.
At age 5 my ds struggled with sitting still but the school had him do Kids yoga and meditation (cosmic yoga) rather than labelling him “naughty”.
Society’s expectations of girls and boys are different there’s no doubt and this affects how adults react to the behaviour.

I've had three kids in primary. Two girls and a boy. Granted the worst offender, a complete thug who bullied everyone, was a boy but there have definitely been some awfully behaved girls. Two girls (aged 9 and 10) where my friend teaches were in a lunch time detention and when the teacher went to speak to someone in the doorway, the girls gobbed in the teacher's soup. They're awful. The youngest was visited by the police once or twice for repeated shoplifting. At 8.

Interesting. How much of this would you say is due to poor parenting by parents of boys, or is it difficult to tell?

It's difficult to tell so early in to the year but it's a deprived area. Some do already have diagnosis or are on the pathway, the obviously violent children in this specific year do have chaotic home lives, the irritating lower level ones is something yet to be worked out.

Really? Not one violent girl in the whole school?
I didn't say that, I clearly stated in my year group of around 80dc. No we have no violent girls. Throughout the whole school there are a couple of girls needing extra support although only one could be described as potentially violent - she has a diagnosis of ADHD among other things and has been awarded a place at an ASN school just waiting for a space to become available. The lower level consistent poor/rough behaviour is definitely predominantly boys. We have few families where the female siblings are less problematic then the male ones which again I'd never actually thought about. I'd be interested to see if that remains the case once they hit teenage years.

I dunno, I've seen all manner of egregious behaviour from young girls ignored because people buy into that "sugar and spice" horseshit.

@midnightstar66 The children with additional adults in my year at school are girls, the one child not toilet trained is a girl and the child with the most challenging behaviour is a girl! I think it varies depending on the year group.

I think there are definite unconscious bias issues at play (myself included) whereby boys exhibiting low-level behaviour are told off more harshly than girls and then it becomes a self-perpetuating cycle. I can be particularly guilty of that when lining up. Both boys and girls muck about and I find myself just saying the girls’ names whereas the boys get sent to the back. I’m trying really hard to stop doing that!

VashtaNerada I think it is wonderful that you can admit that. I wish all adults were as honest.

@ancientgran It’s going to be my mission next week to be really horrible to the girls

Its socialisation, boys aren’t aggressive, girls aren’t manipulative, but a large number are encouraged to act in that way so it becomes part of their normal behaviour. Even fairly young babies are treated differently if they are perceived to be boys/girls.

It isn’t just boys we are failing by only allowing them to show aggressive ‘manly’ emotions, we’re failing girls by only allowing them to be ‘feminine’ and ‘gentle’.

Boys are split into two groups ‘boys with be boys’ which gives praise for negative behaviour, or ‘mummys boys’ which receives negative attention for what is actually positive behaviour.

Girls are labelled as ‘tom boys’ for completely normal behaviour and they’re discouraged from showing frustration, anger etc.

Look at careers, girls are likely to be encouraged to be nurses, boys doctors. Society often treat people poorly for their job choice, look at the threads on here where people have said they wouldn’t want/use a male childminder, nursery nurse etc. Girls who want to be plumbers, electricians etc are encouraged not to because delicate little girls couldn’t possibly work with ‘male banter’. Being encouraged into a career you will enjoy needs to be normalised, not a career that suits your genitals.

I have a rugbytots franchise and we have girls making around 1/3 of the classes. Girls and boys have the same behaviour expectations, girls and boys are also treated the same when injured, none of this boys need to man up or girls need to be treated like delicate princesses rubbish. This however isn’t popular with some parents, particularly parents of boys and we have had to remind parents that crying, being upset, worried etc are normal and healthy emotions for all children, not just girls.

My siblings and I were brought up with very strict gender roles, boys weren’t ever encouraged to help in the home etc, girls weren’t pushed academically etc. The only thing that differed is that I’m from a culture where boys being sad, crying, worried etc is not seen as a negative, and girls being strong, angry etc also isn’t seen as a negative. Male family members would openly cry, hug, kiss etc. Female family members would openly express anger, frustration etc. Admittedly it is the only thing they got right.

My son is sometimes mistaken for a girl as at the moment we are following the kesh, I often hear a parent telling their son to be careful of that little girl, but when my son shouts that he is a boy the play carefully message is withdrawn. Girls don’t need to be treated with kid gloves, but at the same time boys shouldn’t be treated like punch bags. As it stands he hates rough play or people being generally boistrous, so focuses on play equipment that can only be used by one person at a time.

We all have bias, but as adults it is something we are able to put aside to make sure we’re treating people fairly.

often hear a parent telling their son to be careful of that little girl, but when my son shouts that he is a boy the play carefully message is withdrawn.

DD used to have a boy best friend when little. It was highly annoying for me,nevermind the kids when his mum would tell him off for "being rough with a girl".

"You can't play with her like you do with James, James is a boy.you need to be careful".
"She's a girl,delicate ..like a flower".

Eventually I stopped playdates as I didn't want DD get that kind of messages constantly and the boy was becoming frustrated/bored of always being told off for playing with DD the exact same way he played with his other (male) ways.

DD used to have a boy best friend when little. It was highly annoying for me,nevermind the kids when his mum would tell him off for "being rough with a girl".

"You can't play with her like you do with James, James is a boy.you need to be careful".
"She's a girl,delicate ..like a flower".

Honestly I totally get it how it’s annoying. Girls aren’t delicate little flowers and they’re allowed to rough and tumble if they want to.

But, what also annoys me is that IF a boy was playing rough with a girl (and vice versa because again, girls aren’t weak), some people would call the boy for it and certain mums of girls would be majorly pissed off. So it’s mixed messages all the time.

VashtaNerada made me think of that saying, Two wrongs don't make a right.

Seriously though I think we are all human and get stuff wrong. I have one son who is a real marmite pupil, well he was when he was a child. At primary he was either teacher's pet or the child they found difficult. I don't know what it was but the reactions were always extreme. In reception his teacher approached me one day, I got on with her and she had taught his older brother. She said she was sorry but she couldn't stand him and she knew she wasn't being fair to him and would I go to the Head with her to get him moved to the other reception class. I did, the Head agreed and he moved to the other class where predictably he rapidly became a favourite. Now some friends/family/other parents were horrified but I was so grateful she was honest and he had a fabulous 2 and a half terms with the other teacher. I thought she was very brave to be honest but she could probably have been a bit more diplomatic in how she expressed herself but I suppose that shows how difficult she found him.

He had 3 teachers at primary who seemed to hate him (including her) and 4 who thought he walked on water. He went from being extremely well behaved and high achieving in year 5 to the first parents evening in year 6 where I was told he needed remedial help and his behaviour was terrible. I was very calm (MN would have been proud of me) and I told her I was so concerned to hear that and where did she thinks he was going wrong? She was most indignant but I said that 4 months earlier I was told he was high achieving and well behaved so I assumed the issue was something happening in her class. She backtracked so fast I'm amazed she didn't fall over and ended up by saying I'd misunderstood. I'm now sure how I misunderstood excellent behaviour going to terrible or high achieving going to needing remedial help with a quick reversal to their being no issues at all. If it hadn't been for earlier experiences I'd have thought she was talking about the wrong child.

I suppose it is interesting that he went to an all boys senior school with all male teachers and just seemed to fit in, no angel child or devil child, just another pupil.

Year later I still can't quite work out what was going on.

That should have been where did she think she was going wrong.

I've known at least 3 girls who required 1:1 TAs in primary school. One was quite violent.

Toileting issues are evenly divided between girls and boys from what I've seen.

certain mums of girls would be majorly pissed off

Sorry I forgot to add to this. The DADs of the girls are even worse. Being over protective of their little princess who they think they have full ownership of until she’s 40 You know the type. The type of dad who would kick off with a young boy for just being friends with his daughter. I can’t stand men like that.

@ancientgran

Interesting...my ds when he was in year 4 also seemed to have a teacher who really disliked him and tried to make out that he was almost a problem child or very troubled. She would want to speak to me after school nearly every day. Now I'm not a completely naive mother who thinks her son is perfect but he had had no issues in year three and consequently went on to year five and had no issues then.

Formerbabe yes I think we are naive if we think teachers aren't like everyone else and have people they like and people they don't. Of course they should be professional about it but I can see with my son in reception that it was much better for him to have another teacher.

@funinthesun19

certain mums of girls would be majorly pissed off

Sorry I forgot to add to this. The DADs of the girls are even worse. Being over protective of their little princess who they think they have full ownership of until she’s 40 You know the type. The type of dad who would kick off with a young boy for just being friends with his daughter. I can’t stand men like that.

Ah yes. The dad who freaks out when he has a daughter because it suddenly occurs to him that other men might treat her like he's been treating girls and women all his life, but who rather than thinking 'gosh, maybe I shouldn't have treated them like that' thinks 'maybe I should wrap my daughter up in cotton wool and then continue treating all other women in the world abominably'. And their wives normally declare how 'cute' it is.

I’m a teacher and the children I teach are, on the whole, fairly well-behaved. I’m a language teacher, so teach kids from 8-18, and I do find that boys who are more badly behaved tend to be sillier and louder than the girls, whereas the girls are more likely to chat with each other when they should be listening. It depends on the class too. Some kids will play up in one class, but be completely different in another. Class dynamics play a big part , I find.

In my experience, kids who are full of energy and like to run around rather than sitting still and keeping clean, are constantly told off at school. There is far too much sitting still required of them. It just seems that more boys than girls find it difficult to keep still. I have been blessed with 2 diagnosed sensory-craving adrenalin-seeking girls. They have been persecuted by a couple of teachers who refused to accept that sitting on a wobble cushion, movement breaks and heavy lifting activities could could help them concentrate. Other teachers have read the diagnosis and implemented recommendations. As a result the behaviour improves.

I'm a teacher & I have witnessed unbelievable cheek and rudeness from both boys and girls towards their parents in front of me at parents' evenings. It explains a lot.
Teenage girls are often verbally abusive, but teenage boys can be more physical. 'Cheekiness' in a toddler or primary aged child is not so endearing when they're a 6 foot plus teenager, and many boys use their physicality to express themselves, especially if they're not very articulate.
You cannot laugh at bad behaviour and write things off as 'cheekiness' and then try to impose rules and say 'No' once they hit teenage - of course they'll kick off.
And yes, I'm the mum of two, well-behaved, polite teenage boys.