The Trouble with Boys
May 28, 2010
I wrote this for my old blog, Tiny Apples, in December of 2008. Henry and Wingman have grown and matured a bit, but they are still energetic boys. I understand them better now and I love them even more. I just remembered these books about boys because they helped me decide that public school is not for us. I need to make sure I get enough Mother Culture to avoid burnout so we can continue to homeschool.
From Tiny Apples, December 2008:
The trouble with boys…hmm. Do we have trouble with boys? I think boys are misunderstood now. A few decades ago, there was much more acceptance of normal boy behavior. When I was grooming Henry to go to school, I felt pressure to teach him to sit still and be mild-mannered so that he would fit in without trouble. That word again: Trouble. Even Kelly and I view some of their energy as negative.For example, with Kelly’s work schedule, he sleeps during the day sometimes. Letting the boys jump off couches and run and bang the wood floors is not always acceptable at our house. I like to let them run off their energy and build forts with the couches. It drives Kelly crazy. He wants to teach them not to do it at all so that it is not a problem when he is trying to sleep during the day. He also wants the couch to last longer. It is not exactly civilized, polite behavior either. If it didn’t rain so much, we would just go outside. (ETA: Now we go outside more!) As it is, our house needs to be turned into a gym. What I am reading suggests that trying to completely change their nature will have consequences in the future.
As a mother of boys, I can relate to what I read in these books. Some boys are energetic and competitive and not always empathetic to others because they are so task oriented. Some boys do not do well in preschool because of small classrooms, not enough free play, pre-made crafts, long waiting in lines and not enough recess. Bingo! Boys think about good guys and bad guys and work out those scenarios in their play. They need to do this. It’s normal and healthy. And mostly misunderstood by female educators. So what’s a Mom to do?The Trouble with Boys and Raising Cain highlight school-related issues for boys and most of it will not apply to our boys because we plan to homeschool. The author of The Wonder of Boys suggests that boys need a tribe to feel good about themselves. How do we form a tribe and when should we do that? Perhaps our boys are too young for a peer tribe. Our family can serve as the tribe for a few more years and I hope that any good friends they make will join our tribe. Other families come and go in our lives for a variety of reasons. I feel like we need to teach our boys to rely on each other and view friendships as a nice bonus.
Forming a tribe of friends is not always easy. What our boys need most is to feel loved and accepted by their parents. We also need to find positive outlets for all that boy energy. Boys can be boys as long as they do not hurt other people physically or emotionally. In our family, we will also encourage activities that are traditionally enjoyed by girls or women. I see some good tips in these books for teaching boys in a way that helps them feel good about their unique qualities.This book review can do a better job explaining the book: The Trouble with Boys by Peg Tyre. Here is the Amazon link for Raising Cain by Dan Kindlon and The Wonder of Boys by Michael Gurian
Cori, I’ve been reading your posts, but unable to comment, so I’ll do it in one.
Seriously, if you hs, they’ll always miss school, if you school, they’ll miss being hs’ed. I rather have them missing school, but that’s the word, MISSING, and there’s always things to miss.
First, I feel like you, lonely and wanting to ‘send’ the girls to school every other week,
Herny looks GORGEOUS at the pottery wheel. I’m so glad that’s going great with you all.
And third, you are a fantastic momma of boys. I, as a mom of two girls and former teacher, can attest to the differences that exist. They don’t bother me, I don’t think they are points of weakness or discrimination, I just think we are beautifully different, and it’s my joy and my job to learn about raising girls, as it’s yours learning about boys. I love all the books we have these days that give us insight on this.
And last word, my girls have played mainly with six boys this last year in our pre school informal play dates in our hs group. Their ages from 8 to 3, and they have had the BEST imaginable time. I don’t know, there is something great about boys playing outdoors with girls, they surely brought the explorer inside my daughters…and they have far less hormonal meltdowns, ha ha ha.
Thank you for this Silvia! You are such a wonderful friend. With regards to wanting to put our kids in school every other week, I guess as long as we don’t act on it without being 100% sure, it is fine to *think* it or write about it. LOL I appreciate your perspective with your classroom experience. I’m still curious about our local public school and might visit but for now we are doing the right thing with homeschooling. All these books need to be compared with other books to get a more balanced perspective, don’t you think?
Thank you for the nice comment on the pottery wheel picture. It does show a part of his personality. When I look at it again without thinking of his reluctance to get his picture taken, it makes me smile. My independent son who is not always set on pleasing others (which can be a good thing). A mind of his own, that one. But he has a heart of gold and is considerate to others when it really matters. Spontaneous with his affection too. I really see the fruit of our efforts in our playdates lately. For this I thank God.
We have to be open to reasess and maybe change, it’s not right to say I’ll ONLY hs or they’ll ALWAYS go to school. I know hs’ing so far is right for us, but I look at some school days (more my own childhood than today’s classroom experience) with nostalgia, and my daughters, if we continue this route, will never have that experience. They’ll have OTHERS, nice too, I hope, but that’s when I think about ‘sending them to school’, LOL, I meant it more like I’m in constat evaluation of what our choices are. And I won’t look bad on any who has been there or comes from there any more (schools, I mean) (it’s easy to fall in the judging trap).