With one week of school left, my son's jr. high science class just began its section on "Healthy Choices," a not-too-shabby euphemism for "Sex Ed."
.
The last week of school? Really?
Is this,
a. saving the best til last
.
b. avoidance of the uncomfortable
c. one last ditch effort before the long days of summer
...aka, under the boardwalk we will make healthy choices
d. if we wait til the last week of school, teacher will be long on her way to the beach by the time irate parent finds way to classroom
e. another mindless mandate of no-child-left-scratching-their-behind
f. all of the above
Oh, and the kids had to move their classroom seats to a boy, boy, girl, girl configuration.
Huh? We're both scratching our heads on that one.
14 comments:
Sounds like some freak at the school level forgot the sex ed until last week and said, "Oh Shit! We forgot Healthy Choices!"
(Yeah we all did buddy... heh heh hee). Oh someone shut me up, I'm too cynical. But hey, I work in schools! Betcha US schools have a whole lot in common with us.
Oh and hee hee, I love that boy boy girl girl seating arrangement too. "Now this is what where teaching you...And you can't do it".
Ya gotta larrf eh?
Oh yikes I remember the sex ed class. It was so horribly embarrassing and useless - everyone just messed about blowing up condoms like balloons. One odd thing though -the school had a pickled baby. I presume it was an aborted foetus but one girl ran out of the room vomiting when she saw that. I'm sure that wouldn't be allowed anymore but it was probably pretty effective in terms of getting the realism of the stuff across. Still gives me the creeps to this day to think of it there in the cupboard.
I would say "All of the Above." Yet more ways our society sends kids the message that sex is an uncomfortable and embarrassing subject, changing seating arrangements, giving it a pretty little pseudonym "Healthy Choices" vs. Sex. Ed. I like Sex Ed. much better. It's like calling a penis a wee-wee and a vagina a hoonie or something. Just say the terms folks, just say the terms. It's all good in the end!
Just wanted to add that I'm a hypocrite, usually I do use the term penis but I often say va-jay-jay in place of vagina in my blogs. Just because of Oprah's influence and I just think it gets more laughs when read in a blog.
Ooh, no, Annd: I hate the term va-jay-jay but vagina does sound a bit formal somehow...
Maybe the teacher of "Healthy Choices" is hoping to bring across the joys of gay sex with his seating arrangements?!
Oh, and the kids had to move their classroom seats to a boy, boy, girl, girl configuration.
Hey, at least they were all in the same room. When my 4th grade class learned about the "miracle" of menstruation, the girls were herded into a classroom for The Talk and the boys were sent to the gym. To watch "Dumbo." For real.
Our high school sex-ed class was mostly a slide-show of disgusting tertiary-stage syphilis cases and a movie-of-the-week about AIDS.
I vote that they forgot and are just tacking it on here to make it short and sweet.
our sex ed lesson is at least 3 weeks long
jeannie
That's what my daughter's school is doing also. She has a science teacher who is totally into teaching sex ed so that's good. It makes for lots of interesting conversations.
alison - is there a school on the planet that handles sex ed with grace? I had same thought, we'll sit you this way but you can't have sex this way.
rb - no matter how you look at it, a fetus in a jar is no way to introduce sex to young people
ann & slutty - vagina and penis are both the oddest words to begin with, they sound absurdly alien. Most body parts are comparatively simple and accessible: arm, leg, head, nose, mouth, ear, toe, foot. What is up with VAH-GINE-UH ? Why so clinical and remote? But use these odd words we must, at least some of the time, so they know technical names. Around our house we shorten to "giney", I mean, trying to get a 3 yr old to say vagina was just asking for trouble. But now that they're older, I shoot for the correct term.
casey - agreed, its better now then it was. I got my introduction in catholic school - a hokey cartoonish vagina-ovaries film, showing a woman drying her hair by the fireplace, warning us we could 'catch cold' easier during our periods. I do wonder, however, if kids wouldn't ask more questions if boys/girls were separated. But then, that likely perpetuates the lack of talking about sex later in life.
I would vote for "f".
When I look back on my co - ed Catholic high school sex education class I have to say the nuns did a good job. Very detailed including highly detailed discussion of when to know you were ovulating. This was of course so you could avoid getting pregnant but I will always be grateful because years later it helped me GET pregnant. !!
mary - I can assure I go no such practical or useful sex ed at my catholic school. I did have one excellent nun who was young, vivacious, and we got to spend an entire day listening and interpreting Godspell. I lurved that nun. I still look back fondly and wonder where she is today.
so did your child in sex ed actually learn anything? have anything interesting to tell you ... besides how odd to learn about heterosexual sex while paired up with same sex? that's the most peculiar bit of all .....
Post a Comment