Gun play/rough play - policies?

[teenyweenytadpole]

Hi, we have a group of boys (age 4) who are currently obsessed with Ben 10 and in particular with guns and lasers and "shooting" each other with things like sticks used as props. Sometimes this play is very rough. Often they will choose to do this rather than other planned activities e.g at forest school they would rather do this than anything else. The younger ones often copy. I don't want to squash their spirit but am wondering how best to handle it - how do other preschools handle this kind of thing - ignore? discourage? encourage? We do discuss safe use of sticks so that is already covered, it's more the fact that they seem so obsessed with this type of game to the detriment of any other!

Hi, Can't work out how you share a link- but I was researching the sunject of gun and weapon role playing as my sons nursery allow this and discuss with them about SAFE play. My son wanted a toy lightsaber and a nerf gun. I was of the viewpoint that it would encourage antisocial behaviour- but he ended up making guns out of lego and sticks and toilet roll tubes- so after reading the following article and discussing with him what they actually symbolise- and that he needs to be careful- i gave him a toy nerf gun and encouraged his BEN 10 play as he is finally bonding wiht other boys and getting on well socially, where previously he hadn't.

THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE WAS ON BBC NEWS WEBSITE

Toy weapons 'help boys to learn'

Inspectors say girls outperform boys from the age of five
Boys in nursery schools should not be discouraged from playing with toy guns and other weapons, the government says.
In guidance for nurseries in England, the Department for Children, Schools and Families says staff should resist a "natural instinct" to stop such play.

It says role playing helps create the right conditions for boys' learning and could help them become more engaged in education in the future.

Teachers have condemned the advice, saying toy guns "symbolise aggression".

The trouble with weapons is that the toy gun is often accompanied by aggression

Steve Sinnott
NUT
The guidance - entitled Confident, Capable and Creative: Supporting Boys' Achievements - says "practitioners" often find boys' chosen type of play "more difficult to understand and value than that of girls".

Boys regularly use "images and ideas gleaned from the media" as starting points in play, the advice says, which "may involve characters with special powers or weapons".

"Adults can find this type of play particularly challenging and have a natural instinct to stop it," the guidance continues.

"This is not necessary as long as practitioners help the boys to understand and respect the rights of other children and to take responsibility for the resources and environment."

Fostering these "forms of play" helps to "enhance every aspect of their learning and development", it adds.

Better results

Boys' underachievement in schools has been a source of concern for teachers and ministers.

Girls are more likely to get the benchmark five good GCSEs than boys and more girls do better at A-level.

Although noisy for adults such imaginary games are good for their development as well as good fun

Beverley Hughes
Children's minister
But the National Union of Teachers (NUT) has criticised the government's advice on toy guns.

General secretary Steve Sinnott said the problem with toy weapons was that they "symbolise aggression".

"The trouble with weapons is that the toy gun is often accompanied by aggression.

"The reason why teachers often intervene when kids have toy guns is that the boy is usually being very aggressive."

Gender stereotyping

Chris Keates, general secretary of the NASUWT teachers' union, said any nursery following the government's advice risked angering parents.

"Many parents take the decision that their children won't have toy weapons," she said.

HAVE YOUR SAY
Imaginative play is a good thing and leads to imaginative adults - not violent ones

Jon Cooper, Camborne

Send us your comments
"In addition to that, I think this is a clear example of gender stereotyping.

"I do not think schools should be encouraging boys to play with toy weapons."

But children's minister Beverley Hughes said the advice took a "common-sense approach" to the fact that many young children favoured boisterous, physical activity.

Many boys liked pretending to be superheroes or playing at "Star Wars characters with their lightsabres", she said.

"Although noisy for adults such imaginary games are good for their development as well as good fun."

But she added: "The guidance also impresses upon staff the need to teach children that they must respect one another and that harming another person in the real world is not acceptable."

Hi, thanks for your reply - interesting. I did try a different approach today in asking them about their game and trying to extend it, so they were "killing" aliens and I asked them if there was anything else they could do about them, like putting them in a spaceship and sending them back to where they came from and they did agree this was an option! We also have a Superhero dressing up box with Batman, Superman, Knight, etc so I will dust that off and make it available to them as well. I will also watch Ben 10 myself to see what it is all about - as the Mum of two girls it is not something that tends to be on in our house!

My boys' preschool keeps changing its policy on this - which gets my boys really confused. Personally I think the extending play idea is the one that works best - it's worked for me at home with my two four year old boys. Also some really clear ground rules - non-negotiable - like we don't point weapons at each other, we don't say "kill", we don't make contact with each other.

Ideas like pretending to build a spaceship together so we can zoom to the moon and find aliens work well.

we pointed out that if they had killed alltheir friends who would they play with - under the climbing frame is now a jail!!!

DS is a bit too young for this at 4 months. ;)

But as a bloke, it really is part of how boys are wired. Not to put too fine a point on it, we've inherited our instincts from killer apes in which the biggest male gets things his way through physical intimidation. It's hardly coincidence that this is the way things stayed until very recently. It's much more about cultural indoctrination than it is about physical development of the brain - bear in mind that humans haven't evolved significantly in the last few thousand years, so biologically we're unchanged from the Romans who thought slaves killing each other was a fun afternoon for all the family. Only culture has changed, and that only in a minority of countries around the world. Young kids simply haven't had the time for the necessary cultural indoctrination.

Added to which, kids' play obviously echoes the cultural environment. In an environment where key cultural elements are Tom and Jerry, Power Rangers, Star Wars, the Beano, Commando comics (for older primary school kids)... well, draw your own conclusions, really.

I don't want to be sexist, but I suspect this could be a problem for "practitioners" (quoted from containher's post) because most "practitioners" are female, especially in a primary or preschool context where rocking-horse poo is more common than male staff. ;) Girls mostly (there are exceptions!) aren't wired like this. Without the practical experience of how it is being a boy, and without ever having been around other practitioners who can provide that input, this could well become an issue.

Note that none of this provides any excuse for allowing bullying. Rough play is one thing. Bullying is something else entirely, and that's where the cultural indoctrination starts, with learning "if I bully my brother, I lose my Wii".

I have a class full of boys! I go for the extended play ideas too, giving them ideas about fights in space and they are very fond of cops and robbers wearing masks and so on. I do not allow sticks though and let them play with soft noodles. I have issued gun 'licences' before - if you break the terms of the 'licence' you are banned for a week. The licence says no pointing guns at faces, no saying kill, no playing with other children if they don't want to.