Presented by Rev. Patricia Hoertdoerfer, Director, Children, Family and Intergenerational Programs, Religious Education Department, UUA and Rev. Keith Kron, Director, Office of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Concerns.
Parents want to talk to their children about sexuality, but they don't always know what to say and how to say it. New resources from the UUA's Religious Education Department can help parents find the tools they need for these important discussions, participants learned in a workshop Friday led by Rev. Pat Hoertdoerfer and Rev. Keith Kron.
Revs. Kron and Hoertdoerfer began by having participants brainstorm they messages about sex and sexuality they heard in their childhood: from parents, school, peers and friends, the media, their religious community, and elsewhere. Whether through silence or explicit messages, parents are the primary sexuality educators of children, especially when it comes to shaping values. Hoertdoerfer and Kron challenged participants to put into words the values around sex and sexuality they'd want their own child of eighteen years old to have. Answers included such ideals as emotional and physical safety, embracing the joyfulness and sacredness of sexuality, respect for self and others, understanding the mechanics of sex, acceptance of one's own and others' sexual orientation, and understanding the potential consequences of intercourse.
Hoertdoerfer and Kron then described how parents are involved in the Our Whole Lives sexuality curriculum units for K-1 and 4-6 grade levels. Built around core values of respect, responsibility and reciprocity, and around the latest scientific information about sex and sexuality, these units provide age-appropriate information. Developed by the UUA and the United Church of Christ (UCC) together, and supplemented with separate faith-based segments emphasizing each denomination's religious foundation of sexuality values, these curriculum units extend the Our Whole Lives units for adolescents already in use in many UU (and UCC) congregations.
For the K-1 and 4-6 grade units, parents attend an information meeting even before the Sunday School chooses to use the Our Whole Lives programs. Parents can include not only biological parents, but any adults who serve in parental roles with children. After a congregation begins using the Our Whole Lives program, there's a two and a half hour parent and child orientation for each level. Parents stay involved through the eight sessions of each course through "home links" sent home each week to help parents talk about the issues raised and their own values. In the K-1 course parents attend the first and last sessions with their children, and in the 4-6 course they attend one session together.
The final segment of the GA workshop allowed participants, through role playing, to practice communicating on sexuality through "teachable moments," a concept used in the parents' involvement in the Our Whole Lives courses. "Teachable moments" are opportunities for parents to communicate values and information when children ask questions or make statements.
It's important, Hoertdoerfer emphasized, for parents, who often had little or poor information imparted from their own parents, to be able to begin discussions and answer questions on sex and sexuality. Children, Kron reminded the participants, learn to handle their own emotions around sexuality from how parents handle their own emotional process in talking with their children about the subject.
Just as parents need to encourage their children to continue to ask questions, Hoertdoerfer and Kron closed the workshop by urging the participants to continue to ask their own questions of the UUA staff as they work with their churches to give tools to parents as sexuality educators.
Handouts
- Our Whole Lives Philosophy and Goals
- Program Goals and Values
- Content and Schedules
- Primary Messages and Parent Participation
