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Thanks for the warning. I scrolled back to the OP and realized it was a one post deal probably a troll.
There is so many weird things going on in schools today that it isn't that hard to believe.
There's another thread going where a mom is pissed that her son is being made to play a fairy princess in the school play... I wonder now if that's bs/a hoax, too.
You just never know these days who being true or not...
I arrived at the school this afternoon to find my 8 year old son with his hair in two ribboned pigtails. I asked him who had done that to him and he told me that his teacher had. My first reaction was that this had to be some weird punishment which got me mad enough but after taking the ribbons out of his hair I walked him back into the school to find the teacher and ask her what was going on. She calmly told me that this was all about gender awareness. They had done a class today on hair which involved discussing what the differences are between boys and girls hairstyles, hairlength, importance of hair etc. She had picked a girl and my son to use as examples because they both had similar length hair overall, albeit in different styles and she had wanted to illustrate differences and get the class to decide what made hair feminine/girlish vs masculine/boyish. This ended up with my son being given pigtails after lunch and the girl... well nothing really... a brushed off her face look held down with a little bit of hair creme. The teacher showed me a book that she had taken the lesson plan from which didn't exactly say put a boys hair in pigtails but did propose using two children as models to demonstrate differences. She said that if I wanted to complain further I would have to take it up with the principal, but she said that there was a whole set of classes based around this book coming down from the school district and that other topics would include things like clothing, reading material such as magazines, tv shows, jobs and so on.
I suppose she placated me a bit, but shouldn't the schools be getting permission to do things like this before just going ahead and using our kids for this kind of thing?
Gender awareness? WTF kind of idiocy is this? The kid is 8. Most kids his age have already done the "let's play doctor" bit and they're already well aware of gender differences.
No wonder homeschooing is becoming an increasingly popular option.
Did I hear the OP mention anything about embarrassed? I reckon that if the kid had been embarrassed, he would have pulled the ribbons straight out. Sounds like the kid may have had a bit of fun with the experience.
I do not think the school should get permission.
If gender identity is so important to you, give your kid short back and sides.
Location: The Chatterdome in La La Land, CaliFUNia
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Quote:
Originally Posted by bigcats
Good lord, where do you substitute teach? Kindergartners tell adults to **** off nowadays too. I had a 3 year old tell me "I gonna do murder on you", and that was one of the more mild ones, an example I can actually post. I guess these are good things?
I guess that's a little off topic.
But I, IF this even happened and it's not some weirdo making up stuff to rail about
"Education Today", then I agree that any 8 year old boy who left his hair in pigtails throughout the day was probably not bothered by it. Maybe he thought it was hilarious. The boys in my K class just love putting on dresses in the Pretend Area and trying to get some shock value out of it.
A three year old actually told you "I gonna do murder on you"???!!! Call me naive but I never knew our nation's children were THAT bad!
I suppose she placated me a bit, but shouldn't the schools be getting permission to do things like this before just going ahead and using our kids for this kind of thing?
Of course permission is not required. It was part of a planned lesson exercise, and couldn't have caused any physical harm. as for hurt pride, I'm sure the two kids chosen to be the models were given a chance to decline if it made them feel strangely about it. I bet she wouldn't have chosen your son, if she didn't feel that he was a very wall-adjusted kid who would have taken it in stride.
Without a consistent pattern to the contrary, my first inclination is to trust a teacher to do relatively little harm, and to trust kids to shake off inadvertent affronts.
However, I object very strongly to any parent, teacher, or anyone else using humiliation as a discipline tool (which is what came to mind when I read the title to the thread). Children (and adults) have an absolute and inviolable right to their dignity and self-esteem, and their behavior can be corrected without eroding these valuable and life-sustaining assets.
What the teacher did was extremely inappropriate. She should have had some form of parental consent before discussing gender identity issues and ESPECIALLY for forcing your son to have his hair styled like a girl.
The OP didn't say it was a discussion on gender identity, she said it was a discussion on gender awareness which is much different. That said, if the kid left his hair that way, he can't have been too upset about it. I'd say blow it off.
A three year old actually told you "I gonna do murder on you"???!!! Call me naive but I never knew our nation's children were THAT bad!
Like I said, that was just one of the PG-13 things I can post here. I've heard a lot worse. That was just basically "I'm mad at you" coming from a kid who hears the version of it he said in his daily. life.
Back to the original subject, I think it's amusing how many people are all in a huff about how this pretend teacher made this boy "be a girl" by wearing pigtails. The presence of pigtails do not make a person a particular gender, and that would have been this pretend teacher's point.
Eastern Sierra - about the latitude of Fresno but on the other side of the mountains.
There were 3 pretty moderate ones that had the house shaking and then a couple other barely-there's all within a 30 minute period. It was fun
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