Primary school headteacher - sexist?

[Octoberrat]

We went to look round a primary school today, as our DD will be starting school in September.

The headteacher was showing us their outdoor space and he said, "It's great because boys - and some girls - like to play robustly outdoors."

Do you think this is sexist? It really set my teeth on edge. They asked for feedback at the end of the visit, and I wrote down that I was disappointed to hear such gendered language from a leader, but now I'm second-guessing myself and wondering if I was overreacting.

OP I didn't use the word bossy though. I said bossed about. As in the verb. I could have used 'ordered' or 'instructed' and it would have meant the same.
You are really going to struggle with your child going through school if you have time and inclination to analyse every word a teacher says in general conversation.

yonic

You are absolutely right

Your wish for your child to be tolerant of all religions are really admirable btw.

Is there any thread that you are on where you aren't defending sexism Pizanfan? So bored of reading your posts. Fwiw, no, you aren't a feminist.

My primary school was a girls' school and we did plenty of robust play. I wonder if girls feel inhibited doing so around boys in any way due to socialisation or expectations of them, but feel more free around only girls. Nothing to base that on though. I don't think you're being unreasonable, either, he wasn't being sexist in terms of commenting on what he sees but in a position of leadership he should be questioning why only "some girls" apparently like robust play but all boys do. Seems he expects boys to want to play in such a way when many may well not. I don't think he should be terming it like that even if it is the case, why not just say "some children like to play robustly outdoors"?

Enforced prayer? That's another matter.

YANBU. That wording implies he has a gendered way of thinking which is particularly inappropriate for small children. Not sure whether that 'boys -and some girls ' is worse for the girls (who, from the way you punctuated, I infer sounded like an afterthought) or those boys who don't like 'robust play' one little bit. Sexist thinking applied to little kids is bad for all, 'menists' shouldn't like it any more than feminists I'd have thought.

The enforced prayer corner (wtf? How on earth do you enforce prayer?) and those guilt-trip posters sound grim. I do hope you get the choice of a non-faith school, it sucks that theres an overprovision of faith school places in some areas (where I live is ridiculous) and then people get snippy if younhave the temerity to complain.

If not sexist, then at least holding an unconscious bias. Good for you for raising it, it might make him think.
What is wrong with "this area is for children who want to play robustly outside"?

Not many boys really want to be bossed around by girls

Whereas girls just love being 'bossed' around' by boys...

YANBU, by the way (I see the under-thinkers are out in force on this thread),

What's wrong with just saying 'children like to play robustly'? Because they do.

"Enforced prayer corner" might be a bit exaggerated. They have a prayer corner in the fricking library (which bothers me as it seems to be mixing factual learning with ideology, but that's a separate topic). The prayer corner is visited by each class and at the moment they're taking a line from the Lord's Prayer to understand what it means and how it applies to them.

This however, is the lesser of two evils, as another school we looked at prays FOUR times a day (before school, during the lighting of the prayer candle - I shit you not - in assembly, before lunch and before the end of the day).

In addition to the plethora of schools overseen by imaginary friends, there's an amazing non-faith local village primary which is massively oversubscribed and we don't stand a chance of getting into, and a brand new non-faith school which hasn't opened yet, but will be taking kids in September. This will be our first choice, despite reservations about being in temporary classrooms for at least the first year.

There's a thesis somewhere about patriarchal teachings in religion and the gendered language it spawns in faith schools (being thankful to a father, mothers being pious and devout etc.).

Cuntess but that wasn't the question I was answering though. I was pointing out that I hadn't said bossy girls but had used bossed as a verb. If you refer to my original post it has a 'sad but true' comment indicating that I am on the OP's wavelength but just think that they will struggle if they stress every time a teacher says something like that. I am a teacher and a feminist and have often said things in the moment that would probably offend someone somewhere ... we are human. Yes he should have said children but he didn't - it doesn't mean he thinks girls should not play outside. He just made a comment Based on what he sees ...

Pieceofpurplesky other than parsing the sentence into its component grammatical parts, in your mind what is the difference of meaning between "bossy" and "bossed"?

I very rarely hear "bossy" or"bossed" applied to boys and I think its application is almost always sexist.

Yes, of course people make slips of the tongue, but this was an open day and my only chance to gauge the school. As I mentioned previously, linguistic slip ups can be indicative of a prejudice.

I wouldn't be too happy if any of my teachers felt "not many boys really want to be bossed around by girls", without considering why that might be or that girls don't exactly want to be "bossed around" by boys. Also, I've only ever been in all girls' schools, where as I said there's plenty of "playing robustly", be that in general breaks at primary school or competitive sport now. The idea that it's pretty much boys who want to engage in this as default and not many girls do is ridiculous and bad for both girls and boys.

I probably would not have noticed the comment. The faith aspect bothers me far more. I would not choose this school for that reason.

To be quite honest it sounded to me although he knew the children and had in his mind the girls who would rather play with the boys outside in a robust manner than less robust games.

I know the girls in DS's class who would rather play football and action games with the boys than playing more gentle games or in the nature area.

I too am atheist but I think that a lot of Christian values are positive ones and having the school be a church one not only promotes these, but I feel, also makes the children more part of the local community. DS and I have had several chats over the years about what various religions believe and it's very important to me that he grows up knowing that different doesn't mean wrong.

I don't really care if you used the word as a verb, a noun or an adjective. And besides, I was referring to your original post.

I'm sure girls don't like getting bossed around by boys either. What's gender got to do with it?

Primary school seems to be where a lot of children imbibe highly gendered rules. Much of it comes from other children, but I think a fair bit comes from teachers too.

I'm not sure I could cope with sending my children to a school with guilt posters all over the walls. I went to a catholic primary school so got plenty of that sort of thing (like the time when someone pooed during a swimming class and we all got hauled in to see the head who told us that Mary would be very disappointed in us if we didn't fess up). It's terrible that parents are forced into sending their children to schools like this.

Reminds me of the kind of parent who thinks they're oh so non sexist because they don't mind their daughter wearing a bit of blue, but wouldn't dream of using any pink hand me downs for their son. Hey it's OK we are gracious and progressive enough not to mind girls borrowing the spaces and doing activities that we have mentally labelled as "owned by the boys". Not so keen on emphasising the boys who might like to do girl activities, which are a bit inferior because they are to do with girls. Plus, don't want any of our nice robust boys growing up to be woofters eh?

You are not being unreasonable. That would have set my teeth on edge too. I'd have been thinking

• what if girls want to play 'robustly'
• why should outside spaces just be about 'robust' play?
• does this mean that boys who play robustly dominate the outside space to the exclusion of children who prefer quieter play?
• what does 'robust' mean?
• is this the tip of the iceberg with regard to sexist attitudes?

The prayer corner sounds awful.

I assume that you have studied the mission / values of the school and the particular religious organisation behind it? Have you googled the name of the Head Teacher to see if they have written anything public that may give you more insight into their views?

Most of all, I hope that you find a secular school where girls are encouraged to flourish :)

If you think that comment was sexist, then brace yourself for the whole primary years.

Ime, teachers have a very sexist view of pupils. Girls are good at english, boys are good at maths. Boys are rough and always misbehaving and punishments given out to 'all boys' (very rarely all girls are they are never rough in the playground) etc....

Ive had plenty of discussions with teachers who looked at me astonished when Im saying that there is no reason for girls to not be good at maths and that actually in my home country, there are more girls doing maths/science A levels than boys (and they do better too). Then they usually don't believe and go back to 'you don't know what you are talking about. If you look at numbers you will see that ...'

So yes, compare to that, i would say its pretty tame. At least, he acknowledged that some girls like 'rough' play he hasnt acknowledged that some boys dont though

I have to say that the headmaster's observations were a statement of fact based on years of observation.

My children (b/g) are at a mixed primary. Having watched several play times over the years, it is most definitely the case that lots of boys will charge around and engage in more physical play. Some girls will do the same but a significant number of girls choose to chat, devise games or make things with leaves or daisies. Significantly fewer boys will choose this.

I have a boy and a girl and I can see the inherent stereotypical differences in them. They are close in age and they wore similar/shared clothes and played with the same toys. Whereas they might both start a game of cars pushing cars around, my dd would end the game by making a bed for the car (out of a box lid and a tissue) and tucking the car into bed, my ds's game would end up with the cars racing and crashing. Conforming to the gender stereotypes as toddlers (who had not yet been to nursery).

I do think that men and women, boys and girls are different. I don't know why this is a problem and why people want to pretend it isn't the case. Just because they are different, there is no impact on their ability to perform the same job. Eg a doctor will do the same job, regardless of gender. To me, saying that men and women are the same is like saying a person who is 5foot4 is the same height as a person who is 6foot2. It's just not true.

Completely agree about the maths thing Hummus it infuriates me about the education system in this country. It is a purely Brirish thing.girls are really being let down here,
It's very interesting that girls seem to do better at maths and sciences at single sex schools.

As regards to the OP. I would not be happy with a comment like that either.
Years ago, I volunteered in my DD's school for a while. One very memorable incident at playtime left me completely gobsmacked,- not to mention furious.
It was playtime, and the teacher on duty took the bikes and pushchairs out for the children to play with. The boys immediately claimed the bikes, and when one little girl asked if she could have a turn, the teacher told her that the pushchairs were there for her to play with, as the boys only liked the bikes.
I spoke to the the head teacher at the end of the day.
I was staggered

Hummus - seriously, you're still getting that shit from teachers? The only time my DD ever reported anything like that was when aged 6 they were asked what they wanted to do when they grew up and the (year off retirement) teacher told her 'oh no, girls cant be builders'. Well, fortunately she knew that was rot, yesterday she went to a uni interview for an engineering degree.
You might want to dig out the gcse stats which show that girls certainly can do maths and beat them over the head with a rolled up copy. Also, recommend they read 'Delusions of Gender' for why stereotyping can be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

A PP mentioned barriers to robust play for girls, but the head didn't seem to indicate there were barriers, wuite the opposite.
The "some girls" comment was probably based on the reality of the situation, but it seems some posters are reading it as they only allow some girls to use the space.