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Apr 29, 2024
6:15:30pm
Mitty Truly Addicted User
Interesting article about men's mental health in Australia.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/29/australia/australia-women-gendered-violence-intl-hnk/index.html

This kind of crap certainly terrifies me, especially for my daughters for example. I think there's one very obvious thing we can do that no one seems willing to step up for: stop turning childhood education against boys. I've read article after article talking about how education has been customized for the way girls learn, at the expense of boys. I see it at my children's elementary school - there's not nearly enough recess time. They have a few minutes only to cram lunch in their mouths and they are rushed out the door. There is so much emphasis on de-emphasizing free play and physical activity. Boys need more sports, more competitive play, more physical learning than girls do as a general rule to be mentally engaged.

One of the big problems that causes this is the school has an absurd policy that it won't allow grades to mix at recess. So each level has to have its own private time outdoors with no other grades. Shrinks the available time. This is silly, and it wasn't that way when I was growing up. Third, fourth, fifth graders all mixed together and it worked fine. That way you could have a nice long recess period. My kids get about 1/2 maybe or less of the play time I did in elementary school. It's appalling. They come home more mentally worn out, not enough physically worn out, rambunctious, with cabin fever, argumentative, etc. ( OK all kids are like that, but all the studies show lack of free play time exacerbates this)

Things like metal shop, wood shop - all removed from high schools and middle schools beginning decades ago. I never had options for any of that stuff growing up.
We need to stop pretending every person can thrive in the exact same conditions as everyone else and open up more variety, and more hands-on/experiential learning.

This probably isn't the whole answer, but I'll bet we can make a dent with a little thought.
Mitty
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Mitty
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