Children,
normally, like to make believe. They pretend to be doing ordinary
things that adults do, like cooking, fixing imaginary broken
things, discovering new territories, and many others. Such
mimicking is quite important in the cognitive development
of the child, thus the parent should very well consider in
providing ample toys for this.
Dollhouse
furniture kit is most girls’ all-time favorite toy.
When was a time that a girl has not wished for a dollhouse
furniture kit for Christmas? Perhaps it is safe to say then
that the train has become the epitome of boyhood as the dollhouse
miniatures are for girlhood. Although such would be called
stereotyping, one can pretty much observe the difference between
girls and boys: the former tend to have a liking for toys
and objects that they can interact with while the latter like
things that they have control over and do things to.
This partly explains why girls like to play with dollhouses
and all its furniture while boys like to play with toy garages
or toy construction. If a parent is a keen observer, he or
she may notice the distinct differences between the two sexes.
The way the child interacts with her toys, for example, when
a girl tries to play teatime with all her toys spread out
and the dolls sitting around a play table, you may see that
the girl actually talks to the dolls and acts as if the dolls
are participants to the play themselves. While with a boy,
a parent may notice that the boy tends to do some thing to
a toy, even break it apart and try putting it all back together.
Children also tend to identify with
either of the parents: the mother figure or the father figure.
Although this is such, it is not also wise to impose such
stereotyping to the child, for example, a mother would say
to her daughter that boys tend to do well in math rather than
girls do. Studies have been found that if girls who excel
in math are told that a test is “neutral in gender,”
they are more likely to get high scores from that test whereas
if they are told otherwise that boys have performed better
in the past, the girls will do worse. This may seem strange
but we can clearly see now how socialization and encouragement
plays a somewhat significant role in the achievement of the
child.
Gender identity has already become a trivial issue for most
people nowadays. In sports, where males used to dominate the
basketball arena, girls have found their way to the sport
as well.
Gender is not an issue anymore
these days, but quality time given to the child is steadily
becoming a concern what with all the time work demands from
a striving parent. With the rising cost of living, parents
focus more on providing the child the basic necessities in
life although overlooking his emotional development. Today,
with the growing intricacies of the outside world that may
eventually influence the child, a parent should weight carefully
what the child’s needs are and participate more actively
as he or she grows up.
|
