Two new resources about transgender children have appeared in the past week—one from a source I would not have guessed.
For the past week, a series of posts about gender and gender identity has appeared at Science News for Students, a publication of the Society for Science & the Public, a 94-year-old nonprofit dedicated to public engagement in scientific research and education. I’ve been following them for a few years, since my son likes things science-y. The pieces are:
- “Male-female flexibility in animals,” which explains that some animals behave like the opposite sex, while others can change sex and still produce offspring;
- “Sometimes the body mixes up male and female,” which discusses what it means to be intersex, and how one can’t always predict gender identity from genitals.
- “Gender: When the body and brain disagree,” which explains the difference between sex and gender and what it means to be transgender, while also giving insight into the lives of some trans kids.
- “Identifying as a different gender,” the second part of the above piece, with the encouraging subtitle, “As children make gender transitions at younger ages, the real difference is growing public acceptance.”
All of the articles include a glossary and links to related scientific articles; the last piece also lists a variety of transgender resources on social, political, and legal topics. There’s also a set of study questions that include both scientific questions and social ones, such as “Imagine a friend is undergoing a social transition. How could you make your friend feel more accepted?” and “Should driver licenses, passports and other documents list the gender of a person’s birth or, if transgender, the person’s new gender identity? What difference, if any, might it make? Support your argument.”
I’m thrilled to see materials like this that show being transgender or intersex is not odd, but natural, and that blend scientific explanation with a sense of the social issues and implications. Animus and bias often come from fear, and fear often comes from a lack of understanding. Bravo to Science for Students for helping young people to understand.
Also just out and very worthwhile (although less surprising, given its origin) is Schools In Transition: A Guide for Supporting Transgender Students in K-12 Schools “a first-of-its-kind publication” from the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR), Gender Spectrum, the National Education Association (NEA), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Foundation. The guide itself is aimed helping administrators, teachers, and parents “provide safe and supportive school environments for transgender students,” and “highlights best practices while offering strategies for building upon and aligning them with each school’s culture.” Good stuff, which I hope gets the attention from schools that it deserves.