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Snakes and snails and puppy dog tails? Sugar and spice and everything nice?

What are little boys and girls made of, after all? Before the sixties, this question sparked little controversy. You had a daughter, you raised a girl. You had a son, you raised a boy. But then along came the feminist movement, poking holes in all our preconceived notions of "girlness" and "boyness." "We need to raise boys like we raise girls," said Gloria Steinem—thus blessing "girl" behavior as the norm, and boy behavior as aberrant.

This philosophy, quickly embraced in academic circles, filtered down into the schools and throughout our culture, and finally to parents. According to a 1997 Newsweek poll, 61 percent of parents believe that differences in behavior between girls and boys are not inborn, but a result of the way they're raised. But are they?

As a teacher and mother of 11, I've been riding the nature versus nurture pendulum for years. In fact, I gave it a good push myself, prompted by the birth of my daughter Samantha in 1969. My feminist period began with our first trip to the library, when I noted with alarm the absence of girls in kid's books (thankfully, this has changed). Ever the conscientious mother, I spent hours replacing pronouns and feminizing male critters of every species (think curled and beribboned bird in Are You My Mother?). I firmly believed that boys and girls were different only because of parental programming. Fourteen years later, I had to admit I was wrong. Not because anyone persuaded me, but because I ran into evidence I couldn't resist.

I gave birth to a son.

The moment 9-month-old Josh scooted his spoon across his high chair tray making engine noises, I met my feminist Waterloo. When he purposely ran headlong into danger, wrestled with his sisters' dolls, and sidestepped my domestic disarmament policy by turning every stick and sausage link into a gun, I had to concede there must be something to this innate difference thing.

My experience reflects, in a small way, twenty years of confusion in theoretical circles where concepts like gender differences and sex role stereotypes are researched and debated. These debates grind on slowly. But those of us in the trenches—real parents raising real children—need answers that work today. Even with seven sons and four daughters I still don't have all the answers, nor do I feel qualified to end an age-old discussion on maleness and femaleness. But I do know this: God created our children and calls us to faithfully nurture them as they become men and women. Here's how.

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