I’m a primary school teacher. I have 18 beautiful little souls in my classroom, each whose existence I cherish, but what I see play out in the classroom and the playground worries me.

From the lips of young boys I frequently hear: “I hate girls.” “I don’t want to sit next to her, because she’s a girl.” “Girls suck.” “Girls are bad.” “Ewwwww, girls.” “She has girl germs.” These words are spoken regularly, without regard for who may be listening and often without cause or reason.

Extremely rarely, in my short career, have I ever heard similar words regarding boys from the mouth of a similarly aged girl, and generally not in the same context. If ever I hear it, it is said amongst the confidence of same-sex friends or spoken quietly into the ear of an adult. I’m not saying it doesn’t happen, only that in my experience the cases are rare.

With that in mind, I wish I had paid more attention when learning about child development in college. Perhaps if I had been more attentive I would be able to say with some sort of academic credibility that this is just a ‘phase’ that boys go through. Maybe I would be able to say that it is normal and I should be more understanding and lenient on my young charges.

The thing is, even if I had heard that in a lecture theatre, I don’t think I would have been able to accept it. I recoil from the idea that one should tolerate boys talking to and about girls or anyone, regardless of gender, no matter how ‘developmentally’ normal the behaviour be.

Words have power, and words can start a war that begins to play out inside a girl’s mind when those words are spoken in her hearing.

If a girl is lucky, she will be surrounded by family and friends who love her and tell her how important she is. Hopefully they will reassure her that those words are untruthful and that she is not defined by those words.

If a girl is not lucky, those will be the words that will begin to shape her. She will see herself as being something less, and for no other reason than the fact that she’s a girl.

I do not want that to be the reality for any girl who passes under my watch.

I know what it is like to have that quiet, nagging feeling that I am somehow less just because I’m a woman. But I also know what it feels like to be empowered by the people around me, people who tell me often that I am important and valuable because I am a woman, helping to silence my doubts.

So, let’s teach our girls that the negative words they hear about themselves are nothing but cheap lies and let’s teach our boys that building people up makes you more of a man than your muscles.