DS teacher told him boys can be girls

[TotallyKerplunked]

DS is 9 and I know the rule is you should take what kids tell you happened at school with a pinch of salt but he seems pretty certain and even made notes because he wanted to check with me because he thought it was silly but when he questioned the teacher was told to stop being rude.

They have been covering puberty recently and today were discussing the stonewall riots and the lesson went on to say that people are now free to be whatever they want to be and that the sex they are is not fixed and they can be happy being something else.

I need some help drafting an e-mail to the school / directing towards the threads that have discussed this previously please, I'm rubbish at getting points across coherently.

Well done your DS taking notes. Very mature.

When teachers don't allow questions it's a good sign they don't actually understand the stuff themselves. Or even it's been handed down by management and teacher doesn't agree with it.
Maybe start off by saying your DS was confused by content on gender and sex, he thought they were saying you can change sex, please can you see the lesson material that was used so that you can discuss it with him.
(Then take it from there.)
If there's an age where they need to know what sex they are, this is it. They're about to hit puberty and its effects will be different depending on sex. They need clarity on what to expect, not "people who menstruate" BS.

Safe Schools Alliance might have some guidance for you.

safeschoolsallianceuk.net

Some template letters here - does one of them meet your needs?

safeschoolsallianceuk.net/resources-2/letter-templates/

Just ask them to change the word ‘sex’ to ‘gender’ surely? Job done

@Holly60

Just ask them to change the word ‘sex’ to ‘gender’ surely? Job done

Do you think 9 year olds understand what "gender" is? Given most adults don't?

Changing gender still results in major operations and life long medication on an otherwise healthy body.

Or the gaslighting of women and children when a wearing clothes of the opposite sex means you "identify as" and therefore can access women's spaces.

The job's been done too often.

Although I am gender critical, I would not be writing to the school over this.

It is a good opportunity to discuss what is a fact and what is an opinion and to say that it is OK to not agree with the school on this one.

It is definitely not OK, as a parent, to demand ‘lesson material’. The teacher reports to the head, not to the parents. And the head is governed by a board of governors.

The idea that any parent will be in agreement with the school about 100% of teaching is unrealistic. And a child taking notes in order to get a teacher in trouble is not commendable.

The message to the child is teachers are human and, if they are in general doing a good job, they need to be forgiven mistakes, in the same way as they forgive pupils ‘mistakes’ in behaviour.

06:39TheReluctantPhoenix
I admire you committment to #bekind but the teacher has not made a mistake. She's jumped on a woke bandwagon that has lead to 'Karen' White assaulting women inmates. The correct use of sex and gender is important. No one can change sex and no teacher should say it. Would it be OK for the science teacher to say God created the earth in 7 days? Or the geography teacher to insist the earth is flat?

@TheReluctantPhoenix schools regularly share PSHE material with parents, it's good practice to enable parents to answer questions from children at home.

And in this case it sounds like the school has not complied with the DfE guidelines issued in September last year.

I would 100% ask for the teaching materials and why the children were not allowed to ask questions.

@Whinginadeville,

The teacher has not necessarily jumped on to any bandwagon. She probably has not given it much though and is probably trying to ‘be kind’.

It might come as a surprise to you that junior school teachers are not all Oxbridge phds (being paid about 30k per annum…).

It is not a Science lesson either. Science has particular standards it should uphold. This is not the case for a chat/English/PSHE.

Schools are package deals. Plenty of non religious parents choose to send their children to religious schools where they will be regularly told that Christ is the Risen Lord. Guess what.. they just tune that message out in return for the rest of the education.

If I taught something that was incorrect and potentially harmful, I would expect to be pulled up on it. Parents complain to teachers all the time. We don't necessarily have to do what they say, but a parent has the right to complain. Also, RSE is the only subject where schools are legally obliged to consult with parents, so definitely write in OP.

i would approach the school if they were teaching flat-earth theory and i would if they were teaching gender ideology (and have...)

keep it light with some open questions and send it to the head. bollocks like this needs challenging.

Believing that Christ is risen doesn't our children on harmful medical pathways though, does it?

*put

In what context was DS told this? It doesn't sound like it fits with the recent guidance.

www.gov.uk/guidance/plan-your-relationships-sex-and-health-curriculum

Excerpt that may be relevant: "We are aware that topics involving gender and biological sex can be complex and sensitive matters to navigate. You should not reinforce harmful stereotypes, for instance by suggesting that children might be a different gender based on their personality and interests or the clothes they prefer to wear. Resources used in teaching about this topic must always be age-appropriate and evidence based. Materials which suggest that non-conformity to gender stereotypes should be seen as synonymous with having a different gender identity should not be used and you should not work with external agencies or organisations that produce such material. While teachers should not suggest to a child that their non-compliance with gender stereotypes means that either their personality or their body is wrong and in need of changing, teachers should always seek to treat individual students with sympathy and support."

It definitely is entirely ok to ask to see lesson material that is being taught to your child, especially if your child has been told not to ask questions. Schools have a responsibility to work in partnership with parents. The culture of handing over all responsibility to schools/doctors etc and not wanting to rock the boat does untold harm.

Could you contact the teacher directly first to make sure you have got the whole picture? It is a good opportunity for them to show you materials etc. It's also a good opportunity to show that gender teaching ends up with misconceptions, because whether or not they taught that girls can become boys etc. That's what your child has understood it as. At the very least the lesson needs clarity for the children.

@TheReluctantPhoenix I don't think you are as GC as you think you are, or you don't/haven't had children in primary school yet? This is not at all the same as an atheist sending their kid to a church school.

junior school teachers are not all Oxbridge phds
All teachers require Qts which requires a degree + a teaching qualification. Many have masters and PhDs. It's insulting that we're low paid despite this, but it certainly doesn't make it the sort of job you are not expected to have intellectual responsibility. We're held to a much higher standard than many civil servants.

Nothing wrong with asking for Rse material which they are required to share anyway. Grab the teacher at the end of the day and ask if you can chat on another day about the lesson. Specify which lesson it was as that gives the teacher the opportunity to print off any resources (you could even suggest this) saying that D's came away with some misconceptions and you're trying to work out how to support him.
Teachers are well used to parents coming in and not picking lessons and whilst it isn't always pleasant, in this case it's necessary.

@WarriorN

Changing gender still results in major operations and life long medication on an otherwise healthy body.

Or the gaslighting of women and children when a wearing clothes of the opposite sex means you "identify as" and therefore can access women's spaces.

The job's been done too often.

This.

@TheReluctantPhoenix

Although I am gender critical, I would not be writing to the school over this.

It is a good opportunity to discuss what is a fact and what is an opinion and to say that it is OK to not agree with the school on this one.

It is definitely not OK, as a parent, to demand ‘lesson material’. The teacher reports to the head, not to the parents. And the head is governed by a board of governors.

The idea that any parent will be in agreement with the school about 100% of teaching is unrealistic. And a child taking notes in order to get a teacher in trouble is not commendable.

The message to the child is teachers are human and, if they are in general doing a good job, they need to be forgiven mistakes, in the same way as they forgive pupils ‘mistakes’ in behaviour.

Totally disagree with you.

What the teacher has said is scientifically incorrect. Boys can’t be girls and vice versa. She’s been captured by the gender ideology and is now brainwashing the pupils.

Boys can do anything, girls can do anything, but biology is fixed.

I would absolutely be writing to the school ASAP. I’ve done the same myself. The head was conflating sex and gender. They won’t be using any more brainwashing claptrap produced by Stonewall any more.

This insidious creep of gender ideology into the minds of young children is very concerning, as is your reaction as a teacher.

I would approach a teacher if they tried to say that 1 was a prime number.
I would definitely approach a teacher if they tried to say you can change sex.
I would start with checking that's what they said and go from there.
Approach teacher 'DS has come home with the impression people can change sex ' listen to the answer. Then either say 'please could you clarify to the class as DS clearly didn't understand so others might not have understood too', or go away and word an urgent email to teacher and HT.

TheReluctantPhoenix
It is not a Science lesson either. Science has particular standards it should uphold. This is not the case for a chat/English/PSHE.

I disagree. PSHE is where children are taught about the physical changes that their bodies will go through during puberty. It's very important that that is taught in a fact-based, scientific way.

That could include teaching about trans / gender dysphoria. But it needs to be made very clear that, whilst you can choose to live in a gender non-conforming way, you cannot literally change your biological sex. It's a very easy narrative to tell that you can take puberty blockers to stop your puberty and can take cross-sex hormones to go through the other puberty. The problem is that:

• children are likely to believe that doing this will literally make them change their biological sex
• it's not true

If you're going to introduce the idea of being trans, it needs to be made very clear that hormones and surgeries can give someone the superficial appearance of being of the opposite sex - but at the cost of not being able to have children; potentially not being able to enjoy sexual/romantic feelings; and with major long-term physical health risks. And (as in the Bell judgement) with the added caveat that these are decisions that you can make when you are older.

The bit I think you can teach like religion is that some people believe that we have an inner sense of gender identity, which tells us what gender we are, and that this is more important than biology. However, it still needs to be made clear that gender identity does not change biological development. You could add that some people have a gender identity that doesn't match their biological sex, which is called gender dysphoria. People with gender dysphoria may choose to have medical treatments to make their bodies look more like the sex that matches their sense of gender identity. But again, that this will not literally change them into the other sex.

One of the huge difficulties however, is that using gender identity terminology makes it very difficult to say all this plainly. If you want it to be that someone with a female gender identity is literally male (because gender identity is more important than biology) then it becomes difficult to say they they have a male body or will go through a male puberty - because some girls have a penis etc. Which is all semantic fun and games until you have children literally believing that they are the opposite sex and that doctors will help them to grow up to be a woman, and then slowly, horribly realising that they have been sold a lie.

The teacher has not necessarily jumped on to any bandwagon. She probably has not given it much though and is probably trying to ‘be kind’.

But this isn’t a trivial mistake. This is crucial. Children believe teachers. They should not give false information on something so potentially harmful to the child.

I’d speak to the teacher in a neutral way (ie not go in all guns blazing) and ask for copies of the lesson first. I’d then decide my way forward, depending on what those plans said.

But I wouldn’t let my child to taught things that aren’t true. I wouldn’t accept the swapping of the word ‘sex’ for ‘gender’. Not only because gender is undefined but because it promotes sexist stereotypes that are completely contrary to equality of the sexes. I would be expecting ‘gender’ to be taught as a belief, just as religions are.

To=be