Boys should be allowed to play with toy weapons at nursery, according to government advice that contradicts guidance from police and teachers.

Ministers do not mention toy guns specifically but they claim that some form of “weapons play” could help to engage boys in education.

However, teachers said that the guidance, published today, had no basis in educational practice, could encourage aggression among pupils and would anger and confuse parents.

Children have been suspended from school previously, or even arrested, when caught playing with toy guns.

The advice, from the Department for Children, Schools and Families, says that nursery staff should ignore their “natural instinct” to stop young boys playing games with weapons. It says that such activities can help to engage them.

Boys begin falling behind girls in education before they have even started school and the Government is desperate to tackle this pattern. Its guidance says: “Images and ideas gleaned from the media are common starting points in boys’ play and may involve characters with special powers or weapons. Adults can find this type of play particularly challenging and have a natural instinct to stop it.

“Creating situations so that boys’ interests in these forms of play can be fostered through healthy and safe risk-taking will enhance every aspect of their learning and development.”

The advice, Confident, Capable and Creative: Supporting Boys’ Achievements, was drawn up to help to raise boys’ educational achievement by “creating the right conditions for boys’ learning” before they start primary school. The document says: “Sometimes practitioners find the chosen play of boys more difficult to understand and value than that of girls. “[Stopping it] is not necessary as long as practitioners help the boys to understand and respect the rights of other children and to take responsibility for the resources and environment.”

Two years ago one chief constable called for a ban on parents buying toy guns for their children. Michael Todd said that 70 per cent of incidents attended by Greater Manchester Police’s armed response unit turned out to be children with replica guns.

Chris Keates, general secretary of the NASUWT teachers’ union, said that parents could be confused or annoyed if their children were allowed to play with toy guns at school or nursery. She said: “There could be concern that it goes against the values they want to establish in the home. It doesn’t seem to have any basis in educational practice.”

Steve Sinnott, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: “The real problem with weapons is that they symbolise aggression. The toy gun is often accompanied by aggression. We do need to ensure, whether the playing is rumbustious or not, that there is a respect for your peers, however young they are.”

Beverley Hughes, the Children’s Minister, defended the advice, saying that it did not refer specifically to toy guns. She said: “It takes a common-sense approach to the fact that many children, and perhaps particularly many boys, like boisterous physical activity. The guidance also impresses upon staff the need to teach children that they must respect one another and that harming another person in the real world is not acceptable.”

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