If children had a bit of education about breastfeeding at school...

[hunkermunker]

Would that be good or bad?

I think from the pov of raising awareness and normalising bf might be good.

But it might also make feelings of guilt rise to the surface if they come home and say "Mummy, did you bf me?".

Whaddya think?

Yes Hunker it's the adults who're uptight and pass this on, in all sorts of areas.

Oh, don't they just - mind you, the lovely comments I had from people when DS1 was trying on bright pink wellies the other day made me happy!

YES YES YES we should definately be educating schoolchildren about breastfeeding we need to get in early when they are more receptive to different ideas - every year during national breastfeeding week schools should have someone come in and do an assembly (age appropriate infomation of course) I'm afraid mum's who felt they failed will always have feelings of guilt but i'm sure they would be more than happy to feel when their own dd's grow up and have their own lo's they will have more help and support in a society where bf had been normalised

lol...this is probabloy really sad...but imahappybunny...if you were 18 by the time you had your Baby, you weren't really a teenage mum...i.e. to me a true teenage mum is sort of under 16...you were just a young mum!
Also, I actually do know a 14 year old mum that did breastfeed...and she did it against the will of her mum!
I know that not ALL Teenage mums have Baby's purely to get a council house or because it's the latest fashion accessory...however many young girls do it for that reason.
A steretype will never fit ALL people in that category, will it, and isn't meant too, neither!

Just thought i would mention the campain that Davina McCall has started... Anyone see it on TV last week?

To bring contraception/sex education into (i think) it was primary schools as compulsary. The UK teen preg statistics were compared to the Netherlands where sex/contraception education IS compulsary and the "norm" in schools. Children DID NOT get embarraced when being taught how to put a condoms on but in the UK they did. Anyway the point is where there was education the rates were considerably lower and the discussions were welcomed and natural to them. The same would apply with BFing. If it were taught from a young age it would be normal and comfortable to talk about, see or do.

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I haven't read all this thread, BUT, as part of latest government iniative called "Every child matters", breast feeding is supposed to be promoted in schools.

However just before I went on maternity leave, my head of dept, suggested I do this promotion thing IN FRONT OF Y9!! Fortunately she was joking, but did say in little girl voice that "the government says we have to......."

I think it's a brilliant idea for children to be taught about breastfeeding but why can't it just be part of biology? Surely that's the way to teach kids that it's a natural progression - mammals have rudies, they go through pregnancy, they give birth, then they feed their offspring. You could then cover the hormone aspect, how the breast actually produces milk etc and hopefully debunk a few myths in the name of the national curriculum. You could even slip in a mention that when occasionally, things go wrong, formula feeding can be used. I think children are probably more open to the idea of breastfeeding as opposed to ff being the norm purely because they have yet to 'inherit' their parents prejudices.

However, think you might have some problems with certain parents complaining about their children being indoctrinated with insert your own insult (my chosen one would probably include the words militant, hippy and disgusting somewhere)

This was a link on another thread -
clip of mother who excluded her four year old from a lesson which explained how babies got milk from their mummies. This was from Teesside in the UK, I think. In 2006.

That's a healthy atitude, now, isn't it?

Pathetic, I call it.

Good thing.

omg. that primary school is about 3 miles from where i live. it is in a deprived community (Dawdon) in a pretty but deprived ex-mining and harbour town. (Seaham) i feel for the mother in some ways because i could see the pain in her face over this issue. sometimes people say ignorance is bliss. well it ain't in this case. these are the same people that bf education is trying to reach. BTW, the PCT for this district was second from bottom for initiating bf in England last year or so.

can you imagine if her son was at the same nursery as my dd. i bf my nearly 2 yr old there every day!!

I meant 'good thing' in response to the OP not the post about the child being excluded.