Teaching sex education through stories
Ameen Haque
Q: What is the biggest problem with sex education in India?
A: It’s ABSENCE!
Q: What is the second biggest problem with sex education in India?
A: The way it is implemented – by the few schools that attempt to do so.
Of the many myths associated with sex education, the most popular one is that awareness will lead to experimentation. Such fears are misplaced and the truth is quite the contrary. A study conducted by the World Health Organization (WHO) titled Effects of Sex Education on Young People’s Sexual Behavior has shown that sex education does not encourage young people to have sex at an earlier age or more frequently. On the contrary, the study shows that sex education delays the start of sexual activity, reduces sexual activity among young people, and encourages those already sexually active to have safer sex.
The next few lines will paint a scenario that most of you are already familiar with. The few schools that bravely attempt to implement sex education in India face the first hurdle in their struggle to find teachers who are willing to take this up. The principal or the management committee then calls for a meeting where they try to persuade the teachers to take this up. As expected, most resist and give ‘valid’ reasons why they cannot do this. And all eyes then fall on the biology teacher – who also tries to offer valid reasons but her voice gets drowned under collective pressure. Half-heartedly and without any formal training in delivering a sex education curriculum, she gingerly steps into grade IX and as soon as she broaches the topic, somebody from the last bench breaks into giggles and the already nervous teacher loses all confidence. End of class. End of the experiment. Sounds familiar? Been there, done that?
Hats off to all the wonderful biology teachers who have taken up this task – and some of them are doing a decent job of it as well. However, asking a biology teacher to take a sex education class is no different from asking the yoga teacher to lead a mountaineering expedition. She can very well do it, provided she has undergone the right training for the same.
Assuming a school wants to impart awareness and also finds a teacher willing to take this up, the next challenge is training the teacher and providing her the right set of tools, techniques, and frameworks to enable her to do this well. That is where a story based curriculum for sex education can come in handy.
Why a story based curriculum? Let me answer this using two beautiful quotes:
The human species thinks in metaphors and learns through stories – Mary Catherine Bateson
The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon – Brandon Sanderson
We at The Storywallahs have developed a story-based curriculum for sex education and have tested this at some schools that have been willing. A very brief synopsis of one of the stories – this one focuses on relationships and social media:
Avantika, a girl in grade 9 is really good in basketball and represents her school in a lot of tournaments. As a result, she spends a lot of time coaching and travelling to various places for matches. She has a mixed group of friends and her relationship with her mother is more like that of a friend. She shares everything with her mother. Her mother trusts her and has recently allowed her to open a facebook account.
Rahul has moved from another place and joins Avantika’s class mid-term. He is a bit shy and reserved initially, given that he is in a new class but is one of the best basketball players on the court. Naturally, he ends up spending a lot of time with Avantika as they have a common school coach and attend the same tournaments. Both realize that they have a similar taste in music, movies, and novels. Avantika introduces Rahul to her gang and soon they all start hanging out together. One day Rahul updates his status on facebook, it says – ‘in a relationship with Avantkia’. This takes Avantika by surprise as she considered Rahul a good friend but not a boyfriend. But the damage has been done since the update has been seen by everyone on facebook including Avantika’s mother who confronts her and says ‘there can be no smoke without fire’. Avantika is at a loss as to what to do. She does not feel like going to school.
Questions for discussion
a) What should Avantika do to make her mother understand?
b) What could have gone wrong with Rahul – why do they both have different ideas about their ‘relationship’?
c) What are the 2-3 things Avantika should do and not do?
The above is only a brief synopsis and the questions are a partial listing but I am sure you got the idea. While this particular story is on relationships, we use a similar format for all other topics – gender, sexuality, menstruation, abuse, etc. Here’s what we found when we told stories like these to students:
- Because the story is about somebody else (Rahul and Avantika) the students open up and start talking about what could have happened, what Avantika should do now, what signals could have been misread or misunderstood by Rahul and so on.
This is magical because for the first ever time, on a topic like this, there is dialogue – a two sided conversation. So far most of sex education has been one sided – the teacher talking and the students listening. But here, we find the students talking, discussing, arguing, debating. This is wonderful because when we listen to them talk – we get an idea of what is going on in their minds – their fears and misconceptions, their anxieties, even their level of awareness on these issues.
- Stories are like case studies. From Harvard to IIM, some of the best academic institutions use case studies to impart education. When we use stories, we are relying upon one of the most powerful learning methodologies.
- Stories are wisdom disguised as entertainment. They can make any content interesting and engaging. So a subject that was so far considered taboo suddenly becomes engaging.
Anybody facilitating this kind of a discussion needs to be trained on facilitation skills. One has to be specifically careful that the focus is on creating awareness, not preaching. A teacher cannot let her religious or any other biases come in and reflect on the discussion. Which is why, the storybased curriculum we have prepared is based on real life issues and stories. And it stops short of offering a solution – by inviting students for a discussion these stories have created the space for a real conversation on these issues. The awareness happens when the right context is created – and that’s exactly what these stories do.
It’s high time that we stopped brushing things under the carpet. Not talking about these things only makes it worse – because children will live with all kinds of misconceptions, fears, and anxieties. Stories make taboo topics easy to talk about. Let’s leverage the power of stories and have a real conversation.
The author is the founder of The Storywallahs, a company that trains teachers in integrating storytelling into teaching. He is a firm believer in the power of stories and says that story based curricula not only makes learning fun but also permanent. He works with some of the best schools in the country helping them leverage the power of stories. He can be reached at ameen@thestorywallahs.com.
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For more information on The Storywallahs and their sex education curriculum please visit: http://www.thestorywallahs.com/schools.html
The Storywallahs also visits schools to train teachers in delivering this curriculum. Schools that are interested can contact The Storywallahs at ameen@thestorywallahs.com.