If a few weeks ago we met a Canadian couple who had decided not to tell anyone the sex of their third child so that everyone treated him neutrally now something similar happens again in Sweden, this time being a nursery the protagonist of the decision.
This nursery has decided to implement a method hitherto unknown that is based on eliminate gender roles and male and female references in both games and toys and books.
The objective, they explain, is that children who attend this nursery feel free to choose profession and sexual orientation.
Eliminating "he" and "she"
One of the ways to eliminate gender is to avoid using the words "he" and "she" to refer to children. These words have been replaced by the Finnish pronoun hen, which is neutral and can be used to refer to both a man and a woman.
They also try to address children by name or use them to talk about them (and avoid "the boy", "the girl"), or even call them "friend", a word that is also neutral in Sweden.
Further, The pedagogical line followed in nursery school lacks references to one or another gender and avoids any sexual stereotype.
The school has a waiting list
The nursery school, whose name is Egalia, is financed with public funds and currently has about 40 children between one and six years in their care. It has been running for a year and has about 200 families on the waiting list.
Many of these families are gay couples with children who feel that they are going to treat their children well, eliminating differences.
The objective
In the words of Lotta Rajalin, director of the center:
The goal is to make children have a broad perspective on life and not be left with only one half. We do not want them to grow as if they were inside closed boxes, according to a mentality that expects them to be in a certain way, male or female. We want them to be just as they want to be, to become free human beings.
Undefined toys
In this school the toys are not defined by genres. There is not a pink zone, with kitchens, dolls and other things and a more multicolored zone, with dolls and pieces for children, but everything is mixed. To give an example, Lego's pieces share space with kitchens and dolls, so that children do not make that classification but see that everyone can and should play with everything.
With respect to stories, children can read the typical stories with families composed of men, women and children and others in which families are composed of two fathers or two mothers and their respective children. Even if the children play moms and dads, it is possible that two boys play two dads, a couple, and two girls play two moms, also a couple.
Frequent meetings with parents
As this methodology is opposite to the usual one of the society the meetings with the parents are frequent, because they must continue with her at home. Thus, as they comment, everyone will be involved in getting children free to decide who they want to be.
I do not see it
And I, well, I don't see it. I defend the equality of people as the most, but for me treating people with equality does not mean treating them as if they were equal, but to place them on the same step: "You are not less for being a girl and you are no more for being white", "you are not more for being heterosexual and you are not less for having less money".
Boys are boys and girls, girls. All human beings, but unequivocally different. That a man is homosexual does not make him the same as women, he will like men, just like many women, but that does not make him a woman. Wealth is not knowing each other totally the same, but accepting the difference and respecting it.
I don't like this educational model because of this, because does not respect the difference, but is the root load. For me, a good educational model would be one that, like them, treated toys interchangeably (this part is not bad), allowing boys to play what they want and girls also play what they want, without stereotyping activities according to sexes ("no Juanito, children do not play with babies", "not Maria, football is a child thing"), something that I think many schools have already overcome, allowing everyone to play everything, but talking about children , of men and women, of fathers and mothers, that both can work and that both can decide not to do so to take care of the children, but making it clear who the mother is, who is gestating a baby and who is breastfeeding, which is the mother and not hen.
