Shopping for toys for our daughter is a bit of a Pepto Bismol pink nightmare. The packaging is pink. There are Disney princesses all over the place. All the housekeeping-themed toys are in attractive pink packaging. The last time I was at Toys R Us, I decided I had had it when I came across a girly pink maid's cart such as used by hotel housekeeping staff, only this one was plastered with Disney princesses. (I guess it was a "before" shot of Cinderella.) What is going on here?
Yes, boys and girls play differently. That much is obvious. In the 18-month to 3 years Sunday School class I taught yesterday, the girls used the blocks to build stables for the My Little Ponies while the boys made the blocks into guns. As expected, right? Except when the girls saw how much fun the boys were having, they built their own arsenals as well and joined in the fight.
I really liked what Professor Trawick-Smith said in the article "What the Research Says: Impact of Specific Toys on Play." He states, "We have found some surprising gender differences in our study. Many of the toys nominated by parents and teachers were used most often and in the most complex ways by boys. This included items that seemed gender-neutral from an adult perspective. What set the highest-scoring toys apart was that they prompted problem solving, social interaction, and creative expression in both boys and girls. Interestingly, toys that have traditionally been viewed as male oriented—construction toys and toy vehicles, for example—elicited the highest quality play among girls. So, try to set aside previous conceptions about what inspires male and female play and objectively observe toy effects to be sure boys and girls equally benefit from play materials."
So yes, there are differences, but there's also a need to let boys play with "girl" toys and girls play with "boy" toys. They might get different things out of them, but they all are benefitted by playing.
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