Sexuality education covers SO MANY different areas: law, biology, psychology, religion, history…I tend to say that if it’s something humans think about, it probably applies to sex too. As a subject matter to be taught and discussed, however, sexuality is often given a very short shift. Many of the schools I work in only give… Read more »
Young people are often more able to talk about safe sex and sexual decisions with their friends than they are their partners. This makes sense for a lot of reasons. Friend groupings tend to segregate by sex from middle through late childhood, as conversations about sex and sexuality start to become more frequent within friend… Read more »
It’s a game week again! I’m almost half way through Game On!, which is both exciting and a little sad. It feels like it’s going to be a good week when I dive into this little manual, looking for something that will engage, educate, and enliven my sex ed classrooms! I have mostly focused on… Read more »
The last lesson for this week focused on parents and other adults comes from Making Sense of Abstinence. I was pretty sure I had already written about this lesson plan, but I can’t find the blog post, so I guess not! It aims to support youth in beginning (or continuing, I suppose) an intergenerational conversation… 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 »
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 »
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 »
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 »
Merry Christmas-Eve-Eve, if that’s your holiday of choice. It is for me and my family. We usually note Solstice in one way or another. We talk about Hanukah and and Kwanzaa as they relate to families we know. But for us, it’s all about a secular Christmas morning after Santa has visited. We model new… Read more »
Today, the Monday before Christmas, I find myself sitting at my father’s kitchen table. My family is bustling around, working, cleaning, cooking. There are laundry and dishes being washed. A lot is happening. A lot of good. It’s making me grateful for family, communication, and other good things. So today and tomorrow I’m writing about lessons… Read more »
