Brave Boy: A Parent's Guide to Boy Education (Import Edition)

Author: (German) Jan-Uwe Rogge, Bettina Meier / Country: Mainland China
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-01-01
Features:
The fighting and noise of boys
The Becker family has two daughters, Mario and Selina, and two sons, one named Paul and the other Klaus. The youngest is five years old, and the oldest is nineteen. Petra Becker, the mother of seven, observed the development of her children's play behavior and consciously avoided influencing their actions. She said, "Before the age of two, my son Paul still let the dolls be sent to him because he liked playing. At this age, all children are the same—whether Paul, Selina, or Klaus—they all enjoy accompanying adults in cooking, baking bread, and hanging clothes. They are interested in everything their mother does. But as they approach preschool age, the children start looking for other toys. The daughters' games still revolve around the roles of mother and housewife—dolls, plush animals, and a little bit of everything else. The sons, on the other hand, stop playing with toys altogether. They just run around, fight, and love all kinds of physical games. Ball games like soccer and badminton are their favorites. When Selina plays the game of treating dolls for an hour, Klaus has already been riding his bicycle for an hour. All day long, it's just movement, movement, movement. As soon as the two sons are together, they start fighting. Mostly, Paul picks on Klaus, because Paul is older and usually initiates the conflict."
The two boys in the Becker family are relatively restrained when they are outside and can avoid conflicts. However, they love "war" games. "Anything—a gun or other weapons, or if they don't have any, they'll just grab a stick. This cop-and-robber game goes on forever. They are completely obsessed with weapons. Not letting them play can really make them sad. The daughters also play along, but when they are only with girls, they play something else. The house has a playroom where the daughters can play house or just rough around; but the boys? They never play inside. Either they're lying in a corner saying, 'I've been shot,' or if a daughter falls to the ground, it's because she fell off her horse during a game."
P5-6