Value of playing with dolls

[Ilkleymoor]

Interesting article on how playing with dolls builds abilities to value feelings of other people and how we don't place as much value on this type of.play as Lego etc.

Also supports idea that boys are taught or not encouraged to care as much, rather than it just being boys.

www.theguardian.com/society/2022/feb/06/playing-dolls-helps-children-talk-about-how-others-feel-study

I still remember the damn nursery.

it had two sides one for boys one for girls, the boys had a water table, duplo and a car mat thing with toy cars. the girls side was a big wooden kitchen with ironing board and washing machine covered in plastercine and a bunch of baby dolls with baths and cotts.

Every day I would try to play in the boys side when the staff were not looking and would get picked up and told thats not for me and dumped on the girls side, I refused to have anything to do with the girls toys I hated dolls I still do and I hated the plastercine it stinks, I would just sit in a corner and wait for my mother to come back.

What date was that @VelvetChairGirl? And was that in the U.K.?
I wonder when my series stopped that?

I don’t think the Montessori approach for nurseries ever had separate zones for the sexes.

Nurseries, not my series

@ScrollingLeaves

What date was that *@VelvetChairGirl*? And was that in the U.K.? I wonder when my series stopped that?

I don’t think the Montessori approach for nurseries ever had separate zones for the sexes.

UK probably around 1982, to be exact it was "the 1 o clock club" in ravens court park in hammersmith.

for some reason I didnt tell my mother until I was in my 30s, she said she wouldnt have taken me there if she knew.

It is now Ravens court park Montessori.

@VelvetChairGirl
That does seem extreme for 1982. Poor little you being refused those other more interesting toys, and you just sitting waiting to be collected everyday.

my personal experience was that i was more likely to play with Lego, Meccao or cars, or do woodworking things with my dad. I didn't really play with baby dolls (which was a problem when i had babies because i really had no idea how to hold, dress or change them) although i did use to go out for long walks with my dad. I'd be in my pedal car (like a racing car) with either a teddy, or my tiny tears strapped on the back. They took it in turns. But i never really played with the doll.

I did have a dolls house, though, but it was mostly about arranging furniture and wallpapering it. Later it was Action Girl and Action Man. Action Girl used to get to dress up as a soldier and drive my brother's tank. His action man used to ride Action girl's horse. I won a Barbie (you had to design an outfit) and the only thing I did with that (and a ken someone gave me) was design and make clothes.

It depends on a lot of things but toys aren't gendered.

While I am totally for all toys being for all children, and totally accept that social conditioning contributes to what children are expected to play with and therefore the sense from a very young age that certain toys are for boys or girls, I do think there is some innate nature at play too.

I had two girls, my house was full of dolls and fairies and pink stuff. (i was a lot less aware then of trying not to have gendered stuff). My son came along into this house full of "female" toys and from the moment he could choose, made a beeline for anything with wheels. As a result we bought him more things with wheels. Over the years he has never been interested in dolls or small world play, despite it being all around him, and nobody ever telling him not to play with it. Whereas that is all my daughter was ever interested in. Even when she was obsessed with Thomas the tank engine for a while, she played with the trains like people and made them talk to each other. I do think there are some innate characteristics that tend to be more prominent in one or other sex, not that that means a child is wrong, bad, or trans if they don't fit the stereotypes. But stereotypes are based in reality and females are generally biologically conditioned to want to look after the young of a species. It's how species survive, and humans are only animals really.