On Child's Play

In my classroom today I had 4:1 boys to girl.  After the boys had raced dump trucks round the classroom and the girl had assembled herself in dress up - everyone ended up in the home living area around the table eating. They were serving up food; the girl was asking her friends if they wanted _____(food item).She's a first born girl-they tend to hover. .  The boys were laughing and dumping food on the plates.
Later, one boy was needing help, and the girl mimicked everything her mom (his auntie) said to him, in perfect pitch and tone.  It was adorable and the mom and I laughed over her innate mothering.
A quick conversation my daughter and I had last night over a commercial flashed in my mind.  I didn't see but the last few seconds, however, K. was sputtering mad as the told me how the young woman had exchanged two tickets to Paris for the opportunity to be pregnant.  Obviously, the commercial was for birth control; but the message was billboarding you need not stop having fun to join the drudging  ranks of Motherhood.  Tragic - really.

Anyway today, as I watched these little two year olds, this thought crossed my mind - exactly how long does it take to knock the nuture out of our little girls and the adventure out our of little boys.  Our society as a whole, is doing a terrific job of gettin' 'er done. One of life's loviest gifts, families, has been deemed by many archaic.

 Very often the only way to get a quality in reality is to start behaving as if you had it already. That is why children's games are so important. They are always pretending to be grown-ups-playing soldiers, playing shop. But all the time they are hardening their muscles and sharpening their wits, so that the pretense of being grown-ups helps them grow up in earnest.  - C.S. Lewis