All children are born investigative, curious and with an innate desire to understand the world around them. You could definitely say they are born with a love of STEM.
However, women earn degrees in STEM subjects at less than half the rate of men and make up only 28% of the STEM workforce [1]. This means that women and girls are being left behind in some of the fastest-growing and highest-paid jobs of the future.
We know that gender stereotyping starts young. In fact, a toddler will begin to use gender labels and is likely to have stereotypical views linked to gender by the time they are three years old [2]. So, what can we as parents do to help inspire young girls to want to become the scientists of the future?
Science experiments are for older children, surely? Absolutely not. Young children are curious, love to solve problems and want to explore the world, which are all hugely relevant attributes of a future scientist or engineer, as well as being skills that will be of benefit far beyond studying STEM subjects at school.
Ask, and encourage your children to ask, LOTS of questions and give them time to solve problems. Let them come up with the ideas. Science is all about observations and predictions.
“Oh, you can’t reach that jumper. What could you do next?”
“What do you think might happen if we leave this ice cube out of the freezer?”
“Which car is moving the fastest? What could you do to make it go faster?”
‘What’ questions are absolutely brilliant. Depending on their age, you might want to ask some further questions to help them to expand and test out their ideas. Get into the habit of celebrating those ‘why’ questions too – even though they can drive you a bit mad!
The language that we use makes a difference. You don’t have to have studied advanced maths yourself to introduce STEM-based concepts. Ask your child to describe the features of the wiggly worm that you find in the garden. Is it long or short? What colour is it? Describe the tower you build as ‘stable’ or ‘wobbly’, and the car as moving ‘fast’ or ‘slow’.
You could even ask a four-year-old, “What do you predict will happen?” Explain what you mean, such as “What do you guess or think will happen?” After you do this a few times, they will begin to feel more comfortable with the term and understand what you are asking. You never know, they might even start to use it themselves in the coming years.
With slightly older girls, it can also be helpful to make the connection for them that THIS is science, or THIS is maths when they are enjoying building with Lego or playing a game of shop using pretend coins.
Another suggestion is to challenge the language that you might hear around men and women doing certain jobs or taking on certain roles. For example, while playing a game or drawing a picture, you might notice that all the characters in the rocket are male and discuss this. Likewise, challenging any gender bias in front of your child, such as “Daddy fixes things”.
If young girls don’t see examples of women in STEM, it can be hard for them to imagine themselves having a future career in it. Make an effort to point out when you visit a female doctor or see a female mechanic on an advertisement.
Books are also brilliant for this. As well as helping to spark the imagination, they can provide some wonderful talking points. Books are also great for celebrating the achievements of women in STEM. Here are just a few of our favourites.
And don’t forget television too. Bitz and Bob and Maddie’s Do You Know?, both on CBeebies, are great for promoting girls in STEM as well as making STEM topics accessible and fun.
“How can you play with what you are not given to play with?” This could be another helpful prompt. Gender stereotyping goes well beyond our individual households and our children will face numerous influences throughout their lives that we can’t always control. But as parents we can be aware of the range of toys and activities that we provide for our children at home. Notably, we ensure that all of the activities within the My First Five Years app are gender-neutral.
Providing a wide range of play opportunities means that young girls not only gain valuable skills but crucially see these types of toys (and in future, careers) as ‘for them’.
And don’t forget that STEM skills and inspiration do not always need to come from shop-bought toys. A den can be constructed with pillows and bed sheets, they can count with peas on their plate, and you could even measure yourself using socks! If you have a reluctant STEM enthusiast, consider ways to link in their current interests. Building a castle might be more exciting if it is Elsa’s ice palace!
Finally, we can encourage our girls, and boys, to fall in love with STEM within everyday life. Experiments and specific activities are brilliant, but you can teach plenty of maths though a regular trip to the supermarket, and lots of day-to-day occurrences invite curiosity and what and why questions. For example, if something is broken, can we fix it together? If something is too heavy to carry, how can you make it lighter?
So many of our activities in the My First Five Years app are STEM-related because STEM is quite literally everywhere.
If you are struggling for ideas, here are a few of our favourite examples of quick, easy and cheap activities that promote STEM in the everyday:
Perhaps if as parents, particularly women, we were not given the opportunity to embrace STEM when we were younger, we might not feel as confident promoting these things with our girls.
However, we like to think that every child is born a scientist. STEM play is exciting, intriguing and constantly interesting. All things that children naturally love. So, you can be reassured that rather than having to teach young girls to like STEM subjects, it is more about helping to maintain their natural desire to explore. We can embrace their innate desire to make sense of the world and come up with new solutions for problems. We can be aware of the messaging outside and inside of our homes and do what we can to navigate it. We can provide role models, tell stories and use inclusive language.
Because our girls deserve to have their ideas heard and their contributions included. In fact, our future planet requires it!
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Further reading:
Inspiring The Future - Redraw The Balance - This powerful video demonstrates how young children already define career opportunities as male or female.
https://www.unesco.org/en/days/women-girls-science
https://www.un.org/en/observances/women-and-girls-in-science-day/
References
[1]. https://www.aauw.org/resources/research/the-stem-gap/
[2]. Mesman, J. & Groeneveld, M.G. (2018). Gendered parenting in early childhood: Subtle but unmistakable if you know where to look. Child Development Perspectives, 12 (1), 22-27.