Merry Christmas-Eve-Eve, if that’s your holiday of choice.
It is for me and my family. We usually note Solstice in one way or another. We talk about Hanukah and and Kwanzaa as they relate to families we know. But for us, it’s all about a secular Christmas morning after Santa has visited. We model new clothing, play new games, listen to new music, and eat absurdly rich food. It’s a good time all around.
We talk about how other families do things differently – they eat, celebrate, and commune with each other according to their own cultural and family histories. And that’s a good thing. It’s good that there’s a variety of ways to be human and that we talk about them.
And this leads us to today’s lesson, which is not actually a lesson, from Changes, Changes, Changes:
WHY TEACH IN COED GROUPS?
- Children are placed in coeducational classes in almost every subject at every grade level throughout their school years. By changing the format for sexual health education, this familiar pattern is suddenly altered. This serves to dramatically isolate sexuality from other curriculum areas and reinforces the aura of secrecy that is already associated with the topic.
- Coed classes help facilitate an understanding that there are interests, emotions and experiences common to all genders. By exploring these similarities, the misunderstandings between the genders might be lessened.
The list goes on – there are five reasons and then a follow-up section that addresses additional issues like schools which prefer single-sex classrooms.
My sexuality classes are always mixed gender, for a reason that isn’t included in this list, so I’ll add it here:
Transgender children are included in mixed gender classrooms.
I want children to feel that they, regardless of their sexual orientation, gender identity, race, ethnicity, ability level, and everything else about who they are, that they are invited into my classroom. Isn’t that what we should all strive for?
