4Real Forums: Boys need to be highly structured??

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Topic: Boys need to be highly structured??

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pumpkinmom
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Posted: May 22 2014 at 12:44pm \| IP Logged

I was reading this and I was surprised to hear that (typically) boys need to be highly structured. I guess I assumed that this would depend more on the kids personality and not gender and honestly I thought girls would be more inclined to this than boys.

What do you think? The author has referenced resources, but I don't have time to look those over.

I wanted to see what you all thought!

I had to really stop and think this through and I do see my boys (at least one of them) that would benefit from being highly structured. I'm not sure what the author means by highly structured, but I'm thinking having a detailed schedule, not a routine. I'm not sure if I'm capable of such a thing!

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Cassie
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Martha
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Posted: May 22 2014 at 1:13pm \| IP Logged

Boys tend to need their energy directed.

Girls tend to naturally be more project directed, so their energy is often self directing.

Extremely abbreviated paraphrasing and generalization.

Of course, there are exception and degrees to everything.

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Martha
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SallyT
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Posted: May 22 2014 at 9:20pm \| IP Logged

This is something I've been realizing lately. One thing I've been thinking is that boy self-motivation looks really different from girl self-motivation (also a sweeping generalization, but anyway) and still benefits from some deliberate structuring on my part. My teenaged son is very motivated -- he gets his stuff done, is a good kid, all that -- but after two years of high school with weekly reading assignments, I've realized that what he really needs to stay on track in terms of school is a *daily* checklist. So my school planning has become a lot more detailed than it's ever been, and that's trickled down to the younger kids. Checklists for everyone!

Overall I'm not a super-structured-day kind of person. We have routines, but they're pretty fluid and flexible. I do notice that I have to stay on top of the boys a lot more about smaller details: a stack of someone's laundry could potentially stay on the stairs where I put it for days (and its owner would start to treat the stairs as his personal dresser) if I didn't basically lead that person to the stack of clothes and say, "Take this upstairs right now," and watch him do it. The girls, on the other hand, want their clothes.

I don't know that days need to be super-structured, but having man-jobs for boys to do daily is a very good thing. Or any jobs. They don't even have to be that manly. My teenager has an actual, outside job which defines his schedule a great deal -- and the thought of not having it soon, because his boss is set to retire, makes him feel all disoriented. My 11-year-old needs to be given constructive things to do, or he just starts annoying everyone else. And if both of them are idle, they annoy each other -- they're not going to go off and write a story or paint a picture or cook fudge cake, as girls seem to do when there's nothing else to do.

Sally

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CrunchyMom
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Posted: May 23 2014 at 5:48am \| IP Logged

Yes! I don't think you have to turn your home into a military school. A boy might thrive there because that is how to provide direction for a slew of boys all at once.

I find boys need to be told explicitly what to do. Whether it is "put these clothes in your drawer neatly" instead of "put these away" or a daily checklist for school (which works very well here).

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pumpkinmom
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Posted: May 23 2014 at 8:27am \| IP Logged

CrunchyMom wrote:

I find boys need to be told explicitly what to do. Whether it is "put these clothes in your drawer neatly" instead of "put these away" or a daily checklist for school (which works very well here).

I would ask who left their dirty dishes on the table and expect that person to come and put them by the sink. My husband tends to jump in afterwards and interpret what I said to the boys and tell them that means to take care of the dishes immediately. We both learned you have to add the immediately or they think anytime in the next month is a reasonable time.

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Cassie
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