Can you please help me articulate the issues with this? Jigsaw

[LimeLemonBergamot]

Have NC for this.

This is an excerpt of a lesson aimed at 6-7 year olds under the 'Celebrating Difference' topic. It's a lesson on gender diversity.

There is a character, 'B'- where it is unclear if they are male or female. Jigsaw states that 'the lesson looks at whether being a boy or girl makes a difference when choosing friends and toys'. I'm not seeing this- surely a lesson that wanted to show this would explicitly show Billy playing with toys that are stereotypically girls toys and vice versa with Bella- and make the point that this is absolutely fine and normal because toys are toys for anyone. Why is it necessary to have a character whose sex is unclear, to stimulate a discussion on 'whether being a boy or girl makes a difference when choosing friends and toys?'

I think this is reinforcing gender stereotypes- Billy and Bella throughout this conform to stereotypes based on toys, who they think boys and girls should be playing with, and at the end we are told that they are happy being a boy or girl, and B is happy being B. Why are boys and girls shown to be so rigidly conforming- that children must have to be B to not conform to stereotypes- and what is a 6 or 7 yr old supposed to think about who B is?

Please help me articulate this a bit better. I need to go back to my children's school and wonder if I've explained the issues properly.

Enjoying playing with stereotypically male toys (or as an adult, pursuing a career in a male-dominated field) does not make a woman identify as a man.

What does it mean to identify as a gender?

If we make it about what toys we play with, or what stereotypical roles we adhere to (or don't), then we are reducing gender to some very lazy and limiting stereotypes.

I swear gender roles are much more rigidly enforced now than in the 80s. What rubbish this ‘learning’ resource is.

Correlation is not causation, I know, but I do think we should ask whether this new reinforcement of sex stereotypes and sex role stereotypes has had any bearing on the observed rise in self-harm and suicides amongst young women.

We are experiencing record high numbers of both. This is happening at the same time as a rise in male violence, especially sexual violence against women and girls, and the growing prevalence of violent and degrading porn (the vast majority of porn now involves hurting, humiliating or forcing women).

So, on the one hand, we once again force girls into a straitjacket of stereotypes that so many don't want to wear, that harms those who comply and those who reject it, and on the other hand they see a world where men not only continue to dominate, but where sexual predators assault and rape women and girls almost without consequence.

CEDAW btw, the international human rights agreement that the UK is a signatory to, emphasises that stereotypes must be tackled to achieve equality for women.

Article 5
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures:
(a) To modify the social and cultural patterns of conduct of men and women, with a view to achieving the elimination of prejudices and customary and all other practices which are based on the idea of the inferiority or the superiority of either of the sexes or on stereotyped roles for men and women

Article 10
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in order to ensure to them equal rights with men in the field of education and in particular to ensure, on a basis of equality of men and women:
(c) The elimination of any stereotyped concept of the roles of men and women at all levels and in all forms of education by encouraging coeducation and other types of education which will help to achieve this aim and, in particular, by the revision of textbooks and school programmes and the adaptation of teaching methods

Stereotypes are recognised as an impediment to the full equality of women, both in feminist analysis and international human rights law. We really cannot accept our children being indoctrinated like this. Especially with lesson materials derived from the doctrine of gender identity .

This absolutely enrages me.

What I don't get is : why does each school get to pick a set of any old random materials for this stuff? Why isn't there just one textbook/pack that is properly vetted and that can then be rolled out without needing to worry? When I was at school each teacher/school just used standard textbooks.

I'd have no faith that a centralised resource would be any better to be honest Grellbunt. So many arms of the Government have been captured.

True

But right now it is whack a mole

I've just emailed dd's school about this, plus asking when they're going to get back to me about the Rse consultation, which was months ago. Looking back at my submission I specifically requested more info on the Yr2 Jigsaw 'Gender Diversity' unit, as I suspected it would be this kind of harmful nonsense. Plus I also chased them up on getting the Equality Policy corrected to state sex and not gender. I'm on a roll this morning!

Right, I got so carried away by the lesson aimed at 6-7 year olds that I didn't even spend much time looking at the rest of it. Have had a chance to sit down and look at it all and I'm fuming.

I'm attaching info of what's included in the overall 'jigsaw approach to gender identity' leaflet to begin with.

I'll post separately with the lesson for 10-11 year olds.

@ValancyRedfern heads up, I think you'll want to see this!

'Birth-body'. Is that appropriate? I really don't think it is.

The whole thing revolves around an assumption that the girl and the boy conform to their gender role all the time and bully any child who does not.

That behaviour is not inherent it is learned. And yes plenty of children have ideas about this is for boys and this is for girls but don't enforce it constantly in s rigid and bullying manner.

IME when mine were at primary the fact that some girls wore shorts and loved sport while some boys had long tied back hair and did not enjoy sport for example, was not counted on it was just normal.

The subtext here is that what they would call "cis' children are unfailing horrible.

Thanks for the heads up Limelemon. Interesting to see that the ks1 lesson is very much planned with gender identity in mind. Billy and Bella are very much the props to the narrative of B's identity. I have already emailed school but this is useful follow up. Is there any chance you could private message me with the images @LimeLemonBergamot?

@ValancyRedfern of course- I'm on the app atm so can't PM on here but once I've finished drafting my email I'll PM you the images

What the heck is a "birth-body"? Does ymit mean the body you were born with (i.e. the only one you'll ever have!) or does it mean a body that can give birth to a baby (i.e. an adult female body)? Or am I missing something obvious?

It sounds mealy-mouthed and confusing at the same time. Not helpful qualities in education settings!

Does jigsaw provide a glossary? I'd love to see it.

Does jigsaw p

Newlygranny I was wondering the same thing tbh! I don't whether it meant the body you are born with or giving birth- I think it would have been 'birthing body' if it were the latter maybe?

My birth body was such that about 10 days after having a baby a neighbour asked when I was due

This makes me furious. I can't imagine my reaction if my girls had been presented with this crap in the 1980s ( 2 girls, both entirely different, different personalities, different interests. Oh, perhaps one or both was actually non-binary?) My Granddaughter now has they/them pronouns, though she hasn't mentioned it to me or her mother (Instagram).....

“Billy wants to play with boys toys.
Bella wants to play with girls toys
Are there toys just for girls and toys just for boys?”

Well they’ve just been told there are, it’s not even a subliminal message.
I think 6/7 years olds are too young to interpret this any other way.

The starting assumption that children pretty much all are bullies wed to stereotype so strongly is straight off s damaging message.

They aren't. Some more than others. Usually about only a couple of things, not everything.

They are being told this behaviour is expected and normal.

That's a terrible approach.

I've also noticed this sentence in the accompanying document for (I guess) teachers/parents:

''This means our Jigsaw approach is one we feel will fit most schools and most children, valuing children from all types of families, including those with family members who do not fit typical gender stereotypes, and those children who may struggle with their own sense of how they fit in'.

This isn't on is it. So if children have family members who don't fit typical gender stereotypes and if those children themselves are struggling with how they fit in, is the answer not to tear up these stupid stereotypes? Which this lesson has completely failed to do?

I'm a woman because I'm an adult human female. I like makeup and wearing nice dresses, I've always had long hair because I like my hair that way. I also love football and formula one, and used to love WWE wrestling when I was younger. Probably at the same time as I was listening to Britney and trying to dress like her. I enjoyed hanging around with the lads at school and the first drink I used to regularly drink as a teenager was pints of lager at the footy. So where do I fit in with their 'stereotypes'? What is the obsession with putting everyone in boxes? I remember in sociology at GCSE discussing gender stereotypes and how regressive they were. That was 2003, how have we gone so backwards from then?

Can someone please help me articulate what I'm trying to say about the above sentence? As I feel like that warrants commenting on to but I'm really struggling to sound intelligent. Spending a long time reading threads on FWR is exhausting

Well this

'including those with family members who do not fit typical gender stereotypes,'

How many people on the planet adhere to stereotypes all the time?

What stereotypes are they thinking of? Is there a list? They vary between areas countries religions etc etc. There is no approved list.

EG some areas are much more dressy than others. Which norms are the ones to judge conformity by?

They are introducing / confirming that

There are girls things
There are boys things.
It is normal to bully children who do not conform
Children who do not conform will naturally not fit in with girls or boys (great message!)
They also burst into tears and are unable to stand up for themselves so the other children must be careful with them

In the follow up. Children with parents who don't adhere to stereotypes may make them feel confused and out of place.

Great messages.

Let's try it with race/ religion.

Lesson for 6yo.

Children who are white/ Christian.

Have strong views about those who are not.

They will make comments and laugh at them about their race/ religion.

They naturally will exclude them and bully them.

...

What messages does that give a class with different races/ religions?

It tells the white/ Christian children that these behaviours are expected and normal.

It tells the other children that again, it's normal to be treated like that. And the only thing to be done is burst into tears. And hope the other children have consumed the message that they have to go against their natural bigotry and be kind.

I mean. What? How is that s good way to go about any of this?

NiceGerbil thankyou so much for this- it's helped me clarify what I was trying to say!

Ah, so you don't fit in our boxes?
No, I can't make them a different shape, sorry. I need to make a new box for you.

'Jigsaw are aware of the challenge of a binary-focused English language'- surely the English language is just based on reality? Is this not painting 'binary' as they would term it in a negative light- is this the promotion of non-binary? But none of us 'binary' if we just believe in the reality of biological sex. I'm a woman because I'm female, not because I put lipstick on this morning.

I feel like I'm going mad trying to get my head about this and articulate it all.