Sex Education......

[punkrockmommy]

Hi Admittedly my dd is still only three, but here is my question. I am taking a class in my college class where we are getting together a curriculum to bring to parents about educating there children about sexual things. I live in Utah and the sex education here is very lagging <if it exists at all> I wanted to get as much info from as many different parents as possible.
What would you want to learn about sex? What kind of things would you want to feel better prepared to talk to your pre-teens and teens about? What would you want to be included? Thank you so much for your time.

[sunflwrmoonbeam]

I'm 22, so I went through this a lot more recently than probably most of the people who would answer.

At puberty, I would want to know basic anatomical structures. At 12, I found my clitoris, and thought I was a hermaphrodite. While I eventually figured it out and didn't think too much about it, I would have liked to know that having a clitoris is normal.

Later on, I think having accurate information about contraception, the menstrual cycle, and sexual feelings is important. No one is better off from learning that sex is wrong and that if you don't want to get sick and die you need to keep your legs closed. People, especially teenagers, have sex. Why give them guilt complexes?

I think that's all I have for now. But essentially, comprehensive, open, and unashamed sex education is important for a healthy psyche, and healthy adult relationships.

[Arduinna]

Please include positive information about same sex relationships and std protection for people in them. That seems to be sorely lacking in many sex ed discussions and curricula.

[Monkeygrrl]

Originally Posted by sunflwrmoonbeam

But essentially, comprehensive, open, and unashamed sex education is important for a healthy psyche, and healthy adult relationships.

i totally agree with this...i think healthy sex practices should be included along with abstinence (which is what is generally taught here in CA) in the education process...teens will have sex, maybe not all of them, but some of them will...and they need to know where to go to get protection, the right answers, counseling, etc without the potential to feel ashamed of what they did...

my daughter has friends that are afraid to go to Planned Parenthood, for fear their parents will find out...they need to be educated that those services are confidential, and it is against the law for them to let anyone know who walked in their doors...

peace...

[woobysma]

I really wish that sex-ed programs would talk more about the emotional aspects of sex. Granted, I strongly believe that parents should really be teaching this stuff to their kids, but the truth is that a lot of parents just hope (blindly maybe) that the school system will do their job for them.

I think it's important, especially during the teenage years, to not talk down to kids. Be honest about the normal urges that teens face and offer solutions beyond astinence only. It seems weird now to think about it, but I really never had someone tell me as a teen girl "you know, you can make out without having sex". When you talk about all sexual contact in a black and white kind of way, I think it leaves out all the middle-ground safer activities.

Also, I just wanted to share an exercise that we did in jr. high that still sticks with me today:

We were all seated around in a big circle and given index cards that had codes at the top and then we were told to get other people in the circle to sign our cards for 5 minutes.

After 5 minutes, we all sat back down. Then, the teacher asked everyone who had an A on their card to raise their hand: these people were "HIV +" and got a stack of red stickers cut into 1/4ths. Then, we went around the circle and anyone who had these people's signatures on their card got pieces of a sticker. How much of a piece you got depended on the code on your card. If you had a U, it meant you'd had unprotected sex and you got a whole sticker, if you had a C it meant you'd used a condom and you got 1/4 of a sticker, if you had a W it meant you'd used the withdrawl meathod and you got 1/2 a sticker, etc.

If you ended up with a whole red sticker (either all at once, or from accumulated peices) it meant you'd gotten HIV.

The stickers were handed out in the order of the signatures on your card, so it was possible to have a partner "get HIV" after you'd already "had sex" with them, etc.

When we were done, almost half the class had HIV from our little "orgy". It was very eye-opening. I still remember that I had a card with a U and had 5 signatures, but ended up with only 1/2 a sticker. (2 of my partners had 1/4 stickers, just my dumb luck) It was pretty scary.

The only people who didn't get any stickers were a few people who'd used condoms and 2 girls who were "monogamous" and had only signed each other's cards.

[Monkeygrrl]

my daughters health class did that same excersize...but they did all of the STD's...it was really eye opening for her...

peace...

[maryeliz]

If you are looking for resources on comprehensive sex ed you might check out the organization SIECUS, they have a website with lots of info and they have been around since the 1970s. Just for full disclosure I should probably also say that they have been the bane of the abstinance only movement for decades. The Unitarian Universalist church also has a comprehensive sex-positive curriculum; however, I think they have toned it down and made it more difficult to get ahold of because of outside pressures.

[punkrockmommy]

Thank you for all your imput! I am really excited about putting this all together! Utah is very abstinance only, teachers cant even talk about condoms!