Little Big Girls

Gr 5 Up—Three of the times in a girl's life when she's told she's a "big girl" are depicted in the animated introduction: when she learns to use the potty; then when she rides her bike without training wheels for the first time; and lastly, when she gets her first bra. The subject here is early puberty, and the candid interviews with girls who have experienced it make the film emotionally engaging. Most of these girls started puberty at nine years of age, setting them apart from their peers, making them self-conscious, and forcing them to grow up before they were emotionally prepared. This resulted in low self-esteem, loneliness, and sometimes in becoming sexually active before they were ready. The anguish these girls speak of will likely arouse empathy in viewers. Experts ranging from medical researchers, a school sexologist, a psychologist, and doctors from Canada, the United States, and Denmark offer theories and facts. Girls in developed countries are entering puberty on average 12 months earlier than they were 25 years ago, with menstruation beginning about four months earlier. Also, the order of the signs of puberty has become scrambled, appearing in different sequences. There are possibly innocuous causes, such as better nutrition and better health, and alarming reasons: the use of food additives and the presence of hormone disrupters in the environment—plastics and chemicals in cleaners and fragrances, to name a few.