The difference between boys and girls

Nov 4, 2011

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I am very fortunate to have a mixed family. By which I mean I have daughters and a son – little bit of everything going round. I try not to raise my children differently in terms of their gender, but instead individually in terms of their needs. But I’ve noticed some fairly sweeping differences in how other parents approach things, and I wonder if it’s just me…

For example, we spend every thursday evening at the leisure centre. It’s Big’s rookie lifeguard class, then half an hour gap, then Small’s swimming. Big is completely independent – at nearly 12 I’d be rather worried if she needed assistance to get herself changed and out onto poolside, or showered and dressed again afterwards. Small however is 8, and still requires some guidance, usually to make sure he keeps going – he can do everything, but has a tendency to get distracted and forget what’s supposed to happen next. As such, I go into the (women’s) changing room with him, where he changes in a cubicle, and then I remind him that he needs to get his hat/goggles out of his bag and put his clothes into it, and then to bring it all out and hang it up. I’m a bit worried about what is going to happen as he gets older – he’s really on the borderline for it being socially OK for him to be in that changing room, but the one time I sent him into the men’s alone I ended up having to find a member of staff to go in to help him find his shoes…

That’s beside the point though. So I take him out on to the side and deliver him to the teacher, and I collect him again afterwards and then stand in the corridor outside the showers, issuing shampoo as required and passing towel when he’s done. And I notice that little girls of his age are closely supervised in the shower block and have their hair washed for them, and the majority of boys his age and even younger appear to be completely unsupervised. Is it coincidence that it’s the boys who are larking about, throwing cold water on each other, and by the sounds of it, trying to detach the shower fittings? Under half of then are supervised though it seems to me the number requiring it is markedly higher. Even if there is a father in attendance, he rarely goes into the shower area, instead standing outside with the few mothers, while mothers get stuck right in with the girls, practically getting under the water with them. (Very little boys tend to have mothers with them and get taken in the womens showers, I’ve no problem with that.)

So why this difference in treatment between girls and boys? Do girls require more coddling? Are boys really independent earlier? Would girls lark about in just the same way if they were unsupervised and really there is no difference between the two? It’s problematic for me as Small can get very stressed out by bad behaviour and at that point his own deteriorates rapidly. Which is why I can be found loitering outside uttering general purpose shouts of “I hope everyone is behaving in there” even though I know perfectly well they are not, and he probably is.

Are our swimming lessons abnormal, or does this sort of pattern occur everywhere? The difference between my own children fascinates me, the differences in the way ppl treat their sons and daughters even more. But are most of those differences created by our behaviour towards the two genders and not a response to them at all?

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Comments

12 responses to “The difference between boys and girls”

Sarah
4 November 2011
It’s all about the hair washing, I think? I don’t know, I never supervised any of mine in the shower at swimming other than moaning at them to hurry up!
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1. Jax
  4 November 2011
  Yeah, I do do a bit of that too 😉
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Ruth J
4 November 2011
I think it’s to do with hair. Little girls are much more likely to have a lot of hair, which is too difficult for them to wash it properly themselves, so they end up being supervised by default. The boys have short hair, by and large, and (perhaps more significantly?) less social pressure to avoid having it resemble straw when they leave the baths, so there is no perceived need to help them wash it, hence no supervision of their actual behaviour, either. Is there also an element of that gap between when you feel can reasonably take them in the women’s, and when they’re ACTUALLY responsible enough to go in the men’s on their own? Because most of the accompanying adults will be mums, I’d guess, and the few dads involved see half a dozen similar aged boys unsupervised, and assume it’s not necessary?
Our pool has a unisex changing village – the only showers are either the ones anyone can see (so keep your cozzie on!), or the one next to them which is the same, but with a cubicle door. Presumably that would make supervision easier?
(Also, I never wash DD’s hair after swimming – more faff than I can be messed with. Not resembling straw yet, but time will tell…)
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1. Jax
  4 November 2011
  You’ve got to keep costumes on at our pool too, unless you’re happy walking through the locker area in a towel. You know I hadn’t put it down to hair, maybe because we started lessons so late that Big was independent and didn’t really need hair washing help. So effectively we’re saying boys get to behave badly because they’ve got short hair?
  Reply
  1. Ruth J
    4 November 2011
    Bizarrely, I suspect as much…
    Reply
Midlife Singlemum
4 November 2011
I’ve been to public pools where they have family changing cubicles – just cubicles big enough for a bunch of people to change in together. The showers are unisex but everyone keeps their cozzies on to shower. Makes sense that the accompanying adult can supervise their whole brood in one private changing place together.
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1. Jax
  4 November 2011
  There are a couple of family changing rooms at our pool, but on lesson evening it’s next to impossible getting in to one. We use them when we go swimming together, much easier to corral Smallest that way!
  Reply
Lucy
4 November 2011
Actually, I reckon this is more to do with the difference between mothers and fathers rather than between girls and boys. IME, mums tend to be far more heavily into ‘mothering’ (for want of a better term) – the whole intensively supervising, making sure you’ve remembered everything your child needs, and chivvying them into doing everything they need to do thing, which can occasionally with some mothers spill over into ‘fussying’ over your children. Dads tend to be a bit more laid-back over the whole thing, and unless there’s actual blood or murder, tend to let the kids get on with it (or not as the case may be). I *know* this is a sweeping generalisation, and there are lackadaisical mums and fusspot dads out there, but this is what I see in my life and the lives of the families around me. My daughters leave their bags behind in the car on Mondays, when their dad takes them to school – he just expects them to remember to take them, I actually check that they have – and dash back home to fetch anything that has forgotten. I am absolutely certain that an unsupervised bunch of girls can create mayhem, just as much as the boys do. The girls (and small boys) in the girls showers are strictly supervised by their mothers (and yes, hair washing does come into it – long hair needs a bit more help). The boys in the boys showers are very loosely supervised by their dads (or yes, not at all if their mothers have sent them in alone). (However, little girls in mensrooms do tend to be closely supervised by their dads, mainly I think because they seem to be nervous of leaving them alone.) It shouldn’t be like this, but this is what society has conditioned us to be like.
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Clare
4 November 2011
My DDs (3 and 2) seem to be much more independent than my DS (6). He also comes into the female changing rooms at swimming and wants me to wait with him until the teacher comes. He also wanted me to wait with him at Beavers for weeks. I make a deliberate effort to try and give him what he needs rather than force independence onto him. I think that’s one of the benefits of home ed – he gets to take things at his own pace, as you are helping Small to do.
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Carol
5 November 2011
This is interesting because gender differences has been the topic discussion at our HE group lately. I would agree with all that’s been said so far. I think there are differences in the genders and despite trying to parent in certain ways they just seem to need different things. Have to say I would be supervising my 8/9 yr old boy too.
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MetalSamurai
5 November 2011
I don’t recognise any of this. I take some of ours to swimming lessons every week (and have with various combinations of children for years). Sounds like a pool design fail to me.
All the pools round here have a single communal changing area that opens on to the pool. Lots of small cubicles, and around half a dozen family ones with baby changing tables and toddler seats with straps. Plenty of space for changing. And I see both male and female parents supervising both male and female swimmers.
The shower is also near the pool. You’d need to wear waterproof clothing to go in and help so all but the very youngest kids are sent in with a shampoo bottle or pop out to have a dollop rubbed into their hair. They then go back in and finish by themselves , usually with some shouted advice from the parent about bits that have been missed. You do need to ve at least 5/6yrs to reach the button for the shower…
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Tbird Anni
5 November 2011
ours has open to the poolside showers and a communal changing “village” too, I think a lot of places do these days, perhaps because it’s easier for mums to deal with small-ish boys that way? I do think there are differences between expectations with boys and girls though. Everyone expects boys to act out and so no one really does much when they do whereas they expect little girls to be sweet and nice and so quickly correct them when they don’t.
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