Yesterday I wrote about women’s second sexual wind in mid and later life, and today the focus is on men. The assumptions that exist in our popular culture about male sexuality during the aging process is not a particularly rosy picture. Popular opinion seems to hold that good sex for men requires a strong, firm,… Read more »
There are two lesson plans in Older, Wiser, Sexually Smarter that are called Get a Second Wind. The first is for women, the second for men, and the focus is sexuality at mid and later life. Today and tomorrow I’m going to highlight these two lessons. The assumption that older people slow down sexually is… Read more »
I love it that the second lesson plan in Older, Wiser, Sexually Smarter is all about sexual humor. Humans turn to humor so often when we feel unsettled, uncomfortable, or unsure about how we should be approaching something. And so our extravagant repertoire of sexual jokes has no shortage of jokes about sexuality and aging…. Read more »
I’ve been thinking about the illustrious Peggy Brick recently, and her amazing and groundbreaking work with older adults and sexuality. So this week we are delving into Older, Wiser, Sexually Smarter. This manual, written in 2009, includes 30 sex ed lesson plans for older adults. I’ve pulled a few lesson plans from this manual into… Read more »
Yesterday’s post was all about decision making and values clarification about abstinence. Today’s lesson is for young people who want to move forward with abstinence in the immediate future. When someone chooses to remain abstinent, they need to talk with current or potential romantic partners about that decision in a way that offers love, support,… Read more »
It’s time, today and tomorrow, to dive into supporting students in re-visioning abstinence. The choice to refrain from sexual activity is such an important one! It remains unclear to me why people would restrict this opportunity to people who were willing to do it all the way until they were married. Instead, I think we… Read more »
Abstinence means many things to many people. Among other things, it may or may not include masturbation. Being sexual with yourself carries none of the risks of being sexual with another person (physically or emotionally) and has loads of benefits. And so, included in Making Sense of Abstinence, is this awesome lesson on masturbation. (The title… Read more »
Oh abstinence-only-until-marriage…you disappoint me so much. Seeing this job, this work that I love so much forced into a mold that is so distorting of what is good and meaningful about sexuality makes me sad. Which is why, given that I am here, in Texas, where so many students receive poorly conceived, distorted understandings of… Read more »
Today we’re continuing our exploration of the lesson plans on technology and relationships from Sex Ed in the Digital Age. This next lesson plan is about something that is gathering a lot of media attention as of late: the difference between people’s real lives and the lives that they talk about on their social networking… Read more »
After yesterday’s lesson about technology as a form of sexual and romantic communication from Teaching Safer Sex, I thought I would pull lessons for the rest of this week from Sex Ed in the Digital Age. This brand new, two volume manual by Carolyn Cooperman (edited by Susan Milstein) delves into technology and sexuality in… Read more »
Last week we dove into the communication section of Teaching Safer Sex – but I missed the last lesson plan in this section, so I’m going to catch up on it now! This lesson plan happens to be about one of my favorite subject matters: sex and technology. Because so much romantic and sexual communication… Read more »
Every now and then, the media gets it right, and that’s a pretty great time to celebrate what can happen, what kind of information, can get out to people in need of that information. Last week, that exact thing happened! Bill Taverner, our Executive Director over here at the Center for Sex Education, was interviewed… Read more »
Coming off of yesterday’s post encouraging participants to talk about safer sex in general, today’s lesson plan from Teaching Safer Sex is about condoms and considering the reasons people don’t talk about them, the cultural stigma around them, and how to bring them up and talk about them anyway. CONDOM TALK Practice Makes Perfect… Read more »
Safer sex – we talk about it all the time. We offer condom demonstrations and detailed information about contraceptive options. We give away condoms. We take trips to clinics to teach about STI testing. So much goes into the education we provide about safer sex. And we need to be sure that the conversations that… Read more »
Continuing this week’s focus on the communication lessons from Teaching Safer Sex (volume 1, section 4), today’s lesson has one of those classic and timeless titles. It gets to the point, it reminds you what you’re there fore, and it is a lovely little play on our culture’s hang-ups with language. And that’s what it’s… Read more »
This week it’s all about Teaching Safer Sex! Did you know that TSS was the recipient of the AASECT Book Award? Yep. It’s pretty great! All of the Teaching Safer Sex lessons were recently uploaded to the Sex Ed Network, so if you become a Network member you’ll have immediate access to this and hundreds… Read more »
“Am I normal?” “Is it normal to…?” “How often do normal people…?” Regardless of the age of people in my classrooms, they all want to know what’s normal, what’s not normal, and how they and their friends fit into that spectrum. I have a hard time answering their questions, because normal has so many definitions…. Read more »
One of my favorite activities to do in classes with middle and high school students is this kind of role play from the second lesson in Positive Images. I have typically used this kind of lesson to deal with condom use exclusively. So many young people have a deep sense of shame around accessing condoms… Read more »
Ontario Sex Ed Update! In an update on the Ontario, Canada sex ed curriculum revisions, which we brought to your attention in the January 20th Sex Ed Roundup, Premiere Kathleen Wynne held a press on January 26th to announce that the topic of consent has officially been included in the sex ed curriculum that will… Read more »
I’ve been spending a lot of time recently talking with and thinking about parents as sexuality educators. I initially got into sexuality education with the goal of working with parents – and then the parents I was working with started asking me to teach their kids instead of teaching them. It was disheartening. It’s been… Read more »
