Head covering - Page 2

[Suzukimom]

In the 2nd grade class where I work, one of the little girls is Muslim and just this week started covering. She is seven years old. Is there a certain age when girls start to cover?

This little girl wore her hair with lots of braids, buns, in a variety of ways until this week. She would always say to me - "I want to wear my hair down." I took that to mean just straight, nothing done to it, like most of the other girls in the class.

[Liquesce]

Originally Posted by Suzukimom

In the 2nd grade class where I work, one of the little girls is Muslim and just this week started covering. She is seven years old. Is there a certain age when girls start to cover?

Traditionally at puberty. In reality at any time depending on either personal choice or, with regard to minors, sometimes the preferences of the parents, be it anywhere from towards covering as very young children to discouraging covering at all.

[Turkish Kate]

Or sometimes girls get to the point that they want to imitate the women in their lives--moms, aunties, older sisters.

[AutumnSunshine]

Originally Posted by Turkish Kate

Or sometimes girls get to the point that they want to imitate the women in their lives--moms, aunties, older sisters.

This describes my daughters. They are very fashion-y about it and love to experiment with styles, colors, pins, etc. My oldest decided to start when she was about 6. So the other two decided to copy her (and me) and start too. When they play outside or run across the street they don't wear hijab but when we actually go out to the library or shopping they all wear it.

On one hand I'm : because they love hijab and think it's cool. But on the other hand, sometimes I wish they didn't wear it yet because I know people are judging us, going home and saying "ooh, they even make their babies wear it!" But I certainly don't want to discourage them from doing something good and allowing them to get used to doing something they'll do eventually anyway, so it's a double-edged-sword.

My youngest daughter thus started wearing hijab on outings when she was 2. She is a VERY spirited child and would not hear of not wearing something. But she was very particular about how it felt, what her hair was doing, how tight/loose it was, (actually she still is) and would often have a 2-year old (or 3-year-old or 4-year-old) meltdown in Wal-Mart (here in the Bible Belt!) about her scarf and I would find myself making sure to loudly say "If you don't want to wear it, I'll just keep it in my purse for you" and of course she would cry "I WANT TO WEAAAAARRRR IT!!!!!"

They also insisted (particularly the oldest) to not uncover even for swimming lessons. For suits they wear the LLBean one-pieces (which I'm panicking about, as they don't seem have them this year--I put those on my son too) and they ended up all wearing swimming caps over their hair.