Trans Teacher

There are numerous differences between Dyslexia and trans issues, not least is the fact that adult dyslexics don't try to force themselves onto others, or threaten people with cancellation, rape or murder.
Actually over 50% of the prison population in the UK is estimated to be dyslexic, and over 80% have some form of speech and language impairment.. Some of those may be murderers and rapists.

That should be 36 months!

How would it be breaking confidentiality to say what had been said about an anonymous child who is loosely connected to an anonymous username? If it is, then that has already been broken by mentioning him at all.

I am not saying you're lying (I don't do personal attacks) but I do wonder whether you may have got the wrong end of the stick, or misremembered some of the details, as they don't hang together.

A child might begin to develop gender awareness between 24 and 26 months, but that is different from being aware enough at 2 to fully understand the concept and know that they want to be the other sex, never mind insist on it to their parents, and know which things the parents are doing that contradict that desire.

I've been looking at playgroup photos from when mine were that sort of age, and most of the children are in tracksuit bottoms and tops, so clothing isn't much of a determiner. The favourite toys were those red and yellow pedal cars (Tonka?) and the large plastic kitchen - again, unisex. There were no boys' and girls' activities, it was all communal. I'm not sure how being one or the other would be a big deal, but who knows?

There are numerous differences between Dyslexia and trans issues, not least is the fact that adult dyslexics don't try to force themselves onto others, or threaten people with cancellation, rape or murder.

But it's not making their lives easier that's why the current advice is watchful waiting. It would be brilliant if there was long term evidence based studies on the care that has been offered to transpeople but as we know that hasnt happened.

So what appears to be being said on this thread is that I am in some way lying.
I'm not.
It happened.
I haven't seen the child for several years now as he and GD go to different schools.
I saw him regularly when he was between 18 months and 2years when he was still a girl. I've seen him a few times since.
His parents are just ordinary people.
Information about any help he has been given in school would be confidential. However knowing the state of Educational Pyschology I very much doubt if he has seen anyone.

I was reflecting today on how dyslexia was dismissed at one time. 30+ years ago there were still teachers and others who questioned it. One theory was it was just a name used by middle class parents to excuse their thick kids.
Now we have evidence of the brain activity and real proof and there are more and more dyslexics.
Should we blame the Dyslexia organisation for training schools and promoting dyslexia? Did they make children dyslexic?
Or is it just a fact that as we discover more about children and their problems, we simply see the different children more and try to make their lives easier?
Children develop gender awareness between 2-3 just Google it .

It would take a superparent to have raised a toddler with that level of comprehension. If anything, it is all the more incongruous that a child still at the 'I boy' stage of linguistic ability would be able to have reached that conclusion. I know enough about child development to realise that they reach milestones at different times, but even so, there is a huge mismatch there, surely?

I assume that the child has seen psychologists or other experts if she is accepted at school as being a boy? Any idea what they had to say about it all, glorianny?

What is being omitted here is any mention of the parents’ role in the child’s development.

Ahh yes the tantrum, I remember them.

Yes, but if this child is a firstborn that seems unlikely. An incident at playgroup would be soon forgotten at that age, and it would still require an understanding that the favoured child was a boy and she was a girl, and a link being made between that and the behaviour. It's all too complex for a toddler, I think - they usually just have a tantrum )

I’m absolutely not a child development expert, but from observation only, if a 2 year old see something it wants and admires it will march straight in & snatch it away from whoever has it (remember “don’t snatch”?) and, if thwarted, will kick up a hell of a fuss, demanding that they must have it.

I can see that extended into such anger that, if a boy seems to be favoured in some way, the child wants to be a boy too, as a way of getting what it wants. Little children have very passionate emotions.

2 year olds just play with whatever is there, IME. If there is ‘gender’ differentiation it is likely to be because an adult has given a doll to a girl and pointed a boy to a car.

I’ve been thinking about this and am still struggling to know how a 2 year old can think she is a boy even if she can’t articulate it. Children imitate ‘gendered’ behaviour, or say ‘I’m a dinosaur’ and so on; but even then, at 2 they’d probably have to be asked first - ‘What does a dinosaur say?’ - that sort of thing.

Understanding that boys and girls are treated differently, the (often very subtle) nuances of gender, working out how to tell the difference and then extrapolating that to themselves and deciding that their own sex is ‘wrong’ seems too intellectually demanding for a toddler. To my untrained eye, at least.

Is there a child development expert in the house?

Yes Smileless2012, so what exactly did the screaming child mean? What was her understanding of what being a boy would mean?

I can't imagine that in this day and age parents buy girls and boys toys as opposed to simply getting within reason of course, toys their children want to play with.

35 years ago my best friend's 4 year old son got a 'kitchen' for Christmas because that's what he wanted and all 4 boys had hours of enjoyment playing with it.

Smileless2012

Yes Doodledog she'd need to know what a girl is and what a boy is to know she was a boy and a 2 years of age!!!

Good point.
We don’t know the circumstances, although the screaming and tantrums do fit well with some two year old behaviour.
I want to be a boy - At two they might want to play with cars or other “boy” toys and if they’re not allowed to do that, it’s a problem that rests with the parents.
The shouting “I want to be a boy” doesn’t IMO mean the child wants to have a penis and testicles -at that age the main identifier of the child’s sex. Where would she have seen those, especially if the baby sister was a girl.
Wants to wear ‘boys’ clothes?
Where’s the problem.
There is some research going on at the moment into whether suporting (encouraging) young children to take quite drastic steps to change gender can be construed as child abuse.

Smileless2012

Yes Doodledog she'd need to know what a girl is and what a boy is to know she was a boy and a 2 years of age!!!

Plus she's have to know what a girl and a boy aren't, which is even more unlikely, surely? How can you know what you are, without knowing what you aren't? And how many 2 year olds could do that?

I am getting philosophical now

Yes Doodledog she'd need to know what a girl is and what a boy is to know she was a boy and a 2 years of age!!!

Pretending that there are simple answers to such a complex problem is why it's all such a mess. Actually that's the case in a lot of issues nothing to do with trans.
It's why earlier in the thread I was trying to explore what I thought on a subject. Its important to actually think rather than say the mantras. And all 'sides' can get sucked into that.

Not a lot of language requirement. I boy! or more usually xxx(girls name) boy!!!
She would still need a sophisticated level of understanding of concepts, if not the vocabulary to express them (unusual in itself). Presumably she was too young to explain her reasoning?

The fact that I don't know how I would respond simply means that I don't know how I would respond. It is beyond my experience or understanding, so why would I know? If I needed to, then I would consider it over longer than the few minutes we've had since you first introduced the concept.

Not everyone feels that they have to pretend to know everything, and it's not 'strange' that we have opinions on things we do understand yet are also able to admit that some things are beyond our experience.

"so questions will have to wait" well they do anyway Glorianny and that doesn't include the ones that never get answered.

Children's perception of themselves often changes over time,so the watchful waiting approach makes perfect sense.

Have a good night. I am eating a take away from my favourite Indian restaurant.

If it's OK with all the examiners I'm now leaving GN for the night. Not sure I'll have much time tomorrow, so questions will have to wait.

Because the figures suggest this is the best approach to children who are expressing these issues.

Galaxy

Transgender trend provide a range of resources based on the watchful waiting approach.

So why would they bother if as has been alleged trans gender is an issue being imposed on children ?

Transgender trend provide a range of resources based on the watchful waiting approach.