Reception intake 75% boys at DVI

[weloveboo]

Our little one starts reception at Dulwich Village Infants next week. Incredibly, 60 of the 90 children across three reception classes are boys. I'm curious whether this is a quirk of the catchment, or a wider trend. Any ideas?

Thanks!

[Mariamadeit]

My son starts at the Harris primary next week, we have met with lots of his classmates over the summer and there also seems to be lots of boys, where are all the girls going?

[Indiana]

There seem to be a lot at Heber!

[Bumpkin]

Goose Green year 2 has 18 boys vs 11 girls in my son's class and similar in the other one, was also wondering whether this was a trend or just more girls going to other nearby schools..

[Billy]

From our summer meet ups it seems there are a lot of girls going into Goose Green reception!

[njc97]

If my maths is correct, the chance of 60/90 boys is about 1 in 1000. Not cant just be a statistic quirk. How odd - more boys in Dulwich Village because of the College?

[MrsSW]

But there's JAGS and mixed schools too... Hasn't been like that in previous years at DVI! Most odd...

[northdulmum]

Wild (but fun) speculation.

It would be interesting to see the average age of the parents in DVI Reception.

I've heard that boys may be more likely if mums use ovulation sticks (possibly bollox)

So if this generation of mums left it a bit too late... and had to rely on OS, or used them for whatever reason. There may be a greater chance of having a boy.

Higher house prices = leaving it later = more boys?

:)

[LondonMix]

Whether you have a boy or a girl is down to the man's sperm. Trying to figure out how an OS would impact that. I like the theory in general though!

[crystal7]

I've heard that if baby is conceived during ovulation (so on days 14-16 or whatever) it's more likely to be a boy. Something to do with female sperm being more likely to hang around until ovulation occurs !? No idea if this is an old wives tale or not. Last year's Heber reception intake was 40 boys and 20 girls. I think I generally know more boys in the area too...

[northdulmum]

So this is the 'theory'

Male sperm has a Y chromosome, which is actually just a truncated X chromosome.

Y chromosomes are therefore ever so slightly lighter than X chromosomes.

Y sperms travel slightly faster as a result,

Y and X sperms can be separated using centrifuging (one way of sex selection in other countries) due to this difference in weight. This is all proven and true.

it goes on...

X chromosomes are slightly slower and very slightly more sluggish, and as a result, they last longer (say 4-5 days?)

Whereas Y sperm are nippier and don't live as long. This is more debatable as true imo.

SO

If you use ovulation sticks, you basically see that you're fertile and have sex as soon as it says positive.

So the sperm most likely to get to the egg in time is the male sperm.

so if you want a girl, you should try say 3-4 days prior to ovulation. That way only the female sperms will be alive when you ovulate. Opposite is true, if you want a boy, wait until the day you ovulate.

[LondonMix]

Ah, cool theory.

[jrpfinch]

Good calcs by njc97!

1 in 971 chance of 60 boys or more if picked at random and the population is 50/50.

But I think a "fairer" test is what are the odds of >=60 children of the same sex. So 1 in 486.

[ed_pete]

Whilst on the subject of Maths, 60 out of 90 is not 75% it's 66.66%.

[jrpfinch]

What types of academic researcher would be interested in this? Medics, health economists, anthropologists, geographers...

Fascinating I think.

[????]

If you mean DVI or even all local schools, none as the sample's too small. So can, and easily could, just be a statistical outlier. If you mean all woman in the UK over 30 or using OS then yes could be interesting to look at all the data (probably been done).

[stress_head]

I always thought it was fascinating that in forum baby group my son was born in, there were lots and lots of boys and just a handful of little girls. I think that the OS theory is a very interesting one, even if it is in a non proven way.

Some advocates of "gender swaying" swear by gender vs ovulation theory (shettles method or something).

[northdulmum]

jrpfinch Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> What types of academic researcher would be

> interested in this? Medics, health economists,

> anthropologists, geographers...

>

> Fascinating I think.

Ok. Here goes :)

I'm 36, I use OS to get pregnant.

I have two boys, my eldest starts at DVI in September.

N=1

[jrpfinch]

I suspect it is just an outlier, unless all the other classes show a similar imbalance.

[northdulmum]

Yes, more than likely an outlier. Unless there's some link to the credit crunch, which is when this dvi lot were conceived.

[uncleglen]

60:90 = 2:3 = 2/5 girls and 3/5 boys therefore it is 60% boys and 40% girls

[EDmummy]

Son 1 was in a class of 70-80% boys, son 2 in a minority. I tend to think its random but I think I read somewhere once that younger (much younger - 16-25year olds) have a higher % of girls.

In my experience, things tend to even out a bit more from Yr3 onwards in this area as some boys go on to Dulwich College.

[northdulmum]

It's 60 boys in 90, which is two thirds. The % is definitely 66.6%

If it was 60% there'd be 54 boys and the rest girls.

[alice]

in times of war more boys are born

[uncleglen]

Oh beg pardon- I read it as 60 girls and 90 boys- instead of 60 boys and 30 girls- so there are twice as many boys as girls- (btw 2/3 technically is 66.7% as the .66666... gets rounded up to .7)