Another week, another story in which power disparities have been abused for personal gain. This time, news outlets are abuzz with the fact that Bill O’Reilly has, at long last, been forced out at Fox News because of numerous sexual harassment allegations. Tales of people in positions of power using that dynamic for sexual gain is… Read more »
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 »
This week I seem stuck on anatomy. It’s not my usual focus – I prefer the more social and emotional sex ed topics – so it’s probably good for me to focus on the more practical every now and then. Today’s lesson from Changes, Changes, Changes is about anatomy and vocabulary. These topics are inevitably… Read more »
I’ve been reading through Changes, Changes, Changes recently, and so I want to focus on puberty education this week. When I work with young people, I am always interested to know what they know and what they don’t know. Some groups seem beyond their age, knowledge-wise. They come into the classroom full of information (and… Read more »
This lesson is the one that gave the manual its title: Positive Images. When I first held this manual in my hands, I wasn’t quite sure what the title meant. The subtitle helped me out: Teaching about Contraception and Sexual Health. And then I could piece it together a little more: these lessons are all… Read more »
Happy Monday, everyone! This week I’m looking into Positive Images. This manual focuses on contraception, with a specific focus on how people judge contraception and the people who access it. The introduction of the third (and current) edition includes the following: “This edition of Positive Images continues the tradition of creating positive images of contraception and… 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 »
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 »
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 »
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 love, love, love the critical thinking and connections that happen during this game. It’s basically the same game as the classic version, but it asks that the game players make connections between ties based on contraceptive information rather than matching numbers. These kinds of real-world putting-together-of-pieces is fantastic. It’s all about the connections, both in… Read more »
