PRIDE Guest Blog: Princess Dresses, Piñatas, and Potty Seats: Creating Gender Inclusive Early Childhood Environments
By: Hillary Gile
Growing up, I remember being acutely aware of and sensitive to the confines created by gendered constructs as set in a binary context. From assuming the pressure to “love” the color pink (I never really liked it), to experiencing the damaging impacts of developing an eating disorder, the result of a manifestation of internalizing societal messages of what a woman’s body “should” look like and be. Even though I think deep down I knew that some of these socially dictated gendered ideas were in contrast to who I was, I conformed. And for a long time, struggled to find, learn about, and actualize my true, dynamic, ever-evolving self.
After graduating with a degree in Anthropology and a minor in Women and Gender Studies, I accepted a job as an early childhood educator at a school that my 3-year-old son could also attend. Though my motivations for working in early childhood were largely influenced by a desire to work at a place where I could be close to my own child, I quickly realized the passion that I found in working with young children utilizing a social constructivist approach to learning, and following an emergent curriculum. This approach to early childhood education (ECE) inherently values the children’s unique voices and experiences, and places responsibility on adults to be active listeners, co-learners, and co-researchers alongside the children, as opposed to keepers, developers, and projectors of knowledge.
KK was part of my very first class of students. As the children entered the classroom on the first day, I remember being struck by the frilly, first day of school dresses that all of the girls came in wearing, all except for KK. She arrived wearing casual shorts and a t-shirt, and with my gender studies background, I remember being curious as to why KK had diverged from the clear norm of little girl fashion. Very quickly, I came to know KK as incredibly independent, competent, serious in her pursuit of knowledge, and secure in who she was in ways that I was still trying to work through for myself.
KK appeared, at the young age of 3, to possess a profound understanding and comfortability with herself, and she seemed unfazed and unbothered by any preconceived societal expectations to express herself otherwise. KK quickly made me aware of ways that I reinforced traditional binary gendered constructs. When I would occasionally address her as “girl,” she would tell me not to do so, in the most respectful and assertive 3-year-old manner possible. As KK developed a special bond with my co-teacher, one of the few male educators in the ECE field, I found myself developing an ever-growing admiration of KK and her steadfastness in simply being herself. Working with young children has enlightened me to some of the most inherent and foundational aspects of human nature, especially how from infancy each person truly possesses a self and perspective that is uniquely their own. And, I’ve also been struck by how societal influences impact understandings of the self and world at so young an age. In that first year of teaching, KK demonstrated the value and boldness in demanding the right to be in this world as herself, regardless of societally held predetermined norms and constructs.
KK when she was in Ms. Hillary’s class. It was not uncommon for her to wear her Ninja Turtles helmet to school that year!
My second year of teaching I was fortunate enough to be paired as a co-educator in a 3-year-old class with an amazingly kind, knowledgeable, and experienced teacher. I learned so much from her through our collaboration together. I also found myself keenly aware of how each of our personal conceptions of gender influenced certain behaviors and choices that we made regarding the children. Any colored items (crayons, cupcakes, etc.) were automatically distributed to the children based on traditionally gendered ideas of color, and gender was frequently a key factor when grouping the children for small group work. Remarkably creative and talented, my co-educator made beautiful birthday crowns for the children to commemorate their special day. And yet, without asking the children’s preference, “princess hats” were constructed for the girls, and “king crowns” were made for the boys.
One boy in our class was especially partial to dressing up in an elaborate purple gown. It was the first thing that he reached for upon entering the class, and he would at times wear it throughout the entire day. This dress became a point of conflict, as the boy’s grandmother expressed firmly her disapproval with him wearing a dress, while his mother said that she was fine with it. My co-educator and I had frequent conversations as to how to handle the purple dress conundrum, trying to find a solution that would uphold respect for the family, and also support the child in their important expressions of play. Ultimately, on days that the child’s grandparents picked up, we ensured that the child change into his regular school clothes prior to pick-up, and on the other days, allowed him to wear the purple princess dress until the very last minute of his school day. To this day I’m unsure of if this was the “right” way to handle the situation, but it did open up dialogue between my co-educator and me regarding conceptions of gender, and the responsibility that educators have to create and foster a learning environment that supports each child in whoever they are. Through our conversations together, we challenged our own assumptions and implicit biases regarding gender (I certainly possessed my own), and explicitly discussed tangible ways that we could work towards creating a more inclusive, open, and supportive classroom. We really began to understand that any judgements or conclusions that we, as adults, have with regards to children wearing any type of clothing is much more about our own biases than the child themselves.
Eventually, I moved into the role of Pedagogista at our Reggio Emilia inspired school, supporting educators and their classes in curriculum development. In this role, I’ve to incorporated elements of anti-bias education and critical pedagogy, centering this work around addressing “traditionally held” institutions and constructs of identity and ways of “knowing” with a sense of curiosity and questioning. This is a journey where I am constantly learning, have very little answers, and find myself questioning everything all of the time. And, I’d like to think that in small ways, as a school we are on a trajectory of creating a place of learning where each child can arrive and be accepted for who they are, as they are. That we continue to shift from assuming the role of “teaching” children who to be and how to exist in the world, to learning with and from them.
While there is infinite work to be done, we’ve made small changes in the years since KK was a part of our program. This has included consciously altering the language that we use (i.e., addressing children by the name of their classroom or individual names instead of “Boys and Girls”), actively confronting occurrences when gender biases arise, ensuring that the materials that we offer to the children foster open-ended play that isn’t confined to preconceived notions of gender or culture, and doing away with gender-designated bathrooms.
It is amazing to see what unfolds, when we intentionally consider how to make our programs gender inclusive. As an example, one of our 2/3-year-old classes, facilitated by my second year co-educator, faced a dilemma regarding their in-classroom bathrooms. In the midst of toilet training, the children who sit on the toilet seat were finding themselves sitting in urine on the toilet seats left by those who used the bathroom standing up. Rather than immediately labeling boy and girl bathrooms with classic stick-figure signs, the educators brought the issue back to the children to generate a solution together. After some conversation, the class came to a consensus to place a picture of a raised toilet seat on one of the bathroom doors and that of a lowered seat on the other, enabling the children to select which bathroom to use based on whether they needed the seat up or down. The birthday tradition for this class is yet another beautiful example of the intentional ways that the educators have provided space for each child to be seen and heard for who they are. Through the formation of birthday committees, the children work together to create a unique birthday piñata for each birthday child on their special day. The birthday child is interviewed as to what they would like their piñata to be, and the range of selections have included a cell phone, monkey, blue star, and orange dinosaur.
Beautiful birthday piñatas
I find myself wishing that KK could still be at our school to experience these conscious efforts towards creating a learning environment that is more inclusive of gender expansive children, and yet, she, along with many other children since, continue to serve as inspiration to impact the change that we wish to see in the world.
