Teachers (or parents) help - sex education!

[LaBelleDameSansPatience]

I am new to y5/6 and need to quickly do sex education and the changes involved in puberty. My jobshare partner is reading a class book with them which involves the issues facing a girl in Pakistan on entering puberty. I therefore need to do these lessons soon this term, not in the summer term when I had planned to do it and therefore not even thought about it yet.

Have you any really creative, positive ideas to share? Or, of course, terrible tales of horrors to avoid?

My entire sex education at school was watching a film called 'The Summer of 42' when I was 14. I actually learnt 'the facts of life' by listening to a schools radio broadcast in the chicken house on our farm. (Radio made good background noise to keep the chickens calm.) I didn't believe what I heard. I am not sure that my own experiences give me anything to reproduce with my class.

Make sure you emphasise that it';s supposed to be enjoyable for everyone concerned, and that consent doesn't just mean 'not screaming and fighting to get away'.

Every school I've worked in does it differently, but I find it's handy to have this stock response on the tip of your tongue: "That's something you need to ask your parents about." For those little darlings who put questions in the anonymity box such as "wot is wancking?"

Why shouldn't sex education cover 'what is wanking?' Obviously you wouldn't want to go into great detail for yr 5/6, but most young people are going to masturbate long before they have sex with another person, it's safe and normal and in most ways less complicated than having sex with another person! If they're old enough to learn what sex is they're old enough to learn what masturbation is.

'Ask your parents' isn't a great response IMO.

Doesn't your school have a policy and a scheme of work for this?

Why is "ask your parents" not a great response? It's the parents who should be the first port of call for curious children after all.

If the letter sent out to parents explain children will be learning specifically about body changes, puberty and periods (which has been the extent of it for all schools I've worked in) then many parents would have issues if masturbation was then explained. Once the parents have been to the info evening and been informed what will be discussed, they then have to make a decision whether to let their children partake in the lessons. I think they'd feel mislead if other issues were included into the scheme of work.

Crap grammar - tired!

I see what you mean that the parents want to know in advance what will be discussed, but it does seems to defeat the purpose of having an anonymity box if teachers can't answer the questions children put in it!

Obviously it's best if parents can talk to kids about sex but a lot of parents (and kids) are going to be embarrassed to talk about it so that's why it needs to be taught in school too (or parents might not know the answer to some questions - there have been threads on here about how a lot of adults think that girls/women only have two holes, for example)

My dd has just started year 5 so she has the school sex ed coming up. I appreciate that it must be a challenge for teachers to handle.

Yep, in an ideal world I would genuinely prefer to answer those questions in the box - many of the kids I've taught will already have a fucked up view of sex and relationships/gender roles due to parents' examples. I could rant for England to both sexes....but probably not a great idea! :)
The anonymity box is useful for kids who don't want to ask a question out loud for fear of embarrassment.

As a slight aside, (sorry OP,) we had a wonderful local copper at my last school who was a lot more plain speaking that we were able to be. Not in terms of sex itself but children's "issues." He asked the year 5 boys during a talk on gender/relationships "what's that game...you know...the one where you can beat up women and take their money..." (you know, playing dumb). ALL the boys shouted GRAND THEFT AUTO and started wooping, and he immediately quietened them, and said "in that case it's not you I have an issue with - it's your parents." It was a bloody good talk actually.

(Making notes) ... parents' evening ... annonymous box .... good grief, this is going to take some organisation!

Love your name, BTW.
See what your school does and follow that. Your jobshare's book sounds quite... interesting! Can I ask what it is?

Will check out name of book.

Our school is quite small and has just got a new HT. I know that y5/6 teacher last year just didn't do all this stuff and before that a nurse used to come in ... so nothing to follow.