At-Home Sex Ed Learning Part 2: Manufacturers
We’re learning about how to support our kids’ developmental readiness for information about sex and sexuality. Last time, we talked about our young children’s desire for names and labels with their “Geographer” brains. Now, we’re going to focus on our early elementary kids. It’s a long one, because they are ready for so much information!
Manufacturers – Grades 1 through 3
Manufacturers want to know how things work. They are no longer satisfied with Geographer–level answers, they want to know more. For example, if your child is starting to question how the Tooth Fairy knows when to visit, or why some kids get more money from the Tooth Fairy than others, this is a sign that they are wondering how things work and they are a Manufacturer.
Your Geographers love those stories (Of course the tooth fairy knows they lost a tooth, comes and checks on them and leaves money for them. It all makes perfect sense, obviously!) Manufacturers are starting to really think about the process…they start to wonder how it all works. If you’re at home with a Manufacturer during this time, here are some things you can focus on during your at-home sex education (and some creative ways to initiate conversation):
1) Make sure they are caught up on proper names and labels, and that they have a Geographer–level understanding of how babies are made.
If you are at home with an early Manufacturer, make sure they know that “it takes a man’s body and a woman’s body to make a baby. Inside of a man’s body is something called sperm and inside a woman’s body is something called egg. If that sperm and egg meet, sometimes a baby is made.” Ask them if they have any questions about that. If they don’t, just remind them that you are always ready to talk about these things with them and you want to make sure they know they can come to you with their questions. If they do have questions, proceed to the next conversation.
2a) By the time you have an older Manufacturer (end of 3rd grade) they are ready to know the process of how babies are made. Yes, the actual process.
It’s time for them to know how the sperm and egg meet. Some of your kids will ask you this question on their own, and with others you might need to initiate the conversation (Read more about that here).
Here’s your basic script: “In our family, we believe, that when a man and woman love each other, they like to kiss and touch and hug each other in ways that feel really good. One of those ways is they put the man’s penis inside of the woman’s vagina. The sperm comes out of the man’s penis and goes inside of the woman’s body. If the sperm meets and connects to an egg, sometimes a baby is made.”
(I know. Let's take a collective breath.)
Saying that might be scary. But it's also very simple. And very true. For a lot of your Manufacturers, that is more information than they expected to hear. For some of them, it will take them a while to process. Others might think it’s really gross! (To which you can reply “It’s okay that you think it’s gross. Because this is not something for kids. This is something that you will decide whether or not you want to do when you are an adult. But until then, it’s okay that you think this is gross.)
At this point, there’s no need to tell them any more or any less. You satisfied their curiosity by telling them how this happens, you showed that in your family you talk about this stuff, you showed that you aren’t afraid of answering these questions, you shared your family’s value/belief, you mentioned consent (Did you catch that? “They” decide this…), you mentioned that when this happens, only some times babies are made, and you respected your child’s developmental readiness by not going on and on. You did a lot in that 20 second script! You can also tell them that what you just described is called sexual intercourse, and that other people might call it sex or making love, or you can tell them other names you think they might be hearing.
2b) Your family situation might require more to the story.
If that is not the way your baby was made, you should still tell them the process because it explains to them what sexual intercourse is… And they will hear about that and should know about that regardless of whether or not that is how your babies were made. If your Manufacturer is still attentive, you can go on to tell them that in your family babies were made in a different way. You can tell them more about that process using this same level of simple, but truthful, information. If they are not listening to you any more, then just tell them that some other time you would like to tell them about the special way babies were made in your family.
3) Manufacturers should also know about puberty.
They do not need all of the specific facts right now, but they need to know what it is and that it is going to happen to every single person they know. You can explain to them that puberty is the term we use to describe the process of young boys and girls becoming young men and women. You can tell them it involves physical, mental, social, and emotional changes. They will eventually learn about these changes at school, but you want them to know about it from you first AND you want to make sure you talk with them about the emotional and social changes, too. For many of our kids, that will be the hardest part of puberty and no one ever talks with them about that stuff!
Boy boys and girls should know about these changes. Do your 1st graders need to know all of these details? No. But, by the time they enter 4th grade, they will start to see some of the changes for themselves, in their own body or their peer’s bodies. And we want them to be prepared for that.
Many girls don’t tell their moms when they get their first period because they’re embarrassed and they’ve never talked with their moms about this. Many boys are confused about what’s happening to the girls in their class and don’t respond to those changes in a mature way because they weren’t informed. If our Manufacturers are prepared with the process, they will be better equipped to learn about the details as they get older and they will be capable of handling the experience with more kindness and maturity.
AT-HOME SEX ED IDEA
Remember that raising sexually healthy kids isn’t just about making sure they know what sex is, or how babies are made. It’s also about helping them understand healthy relationships, and teaching them about appropriate behavior, and helping them identify and express their emotions. Try this modified game of charades with your Manufacturers:
Create a list of cards that people will draw from. Make several cards with the names of different emotions on it (for younger kids, keep it simple like “happy,” “sad,” “mad,” etc but for older kids make them a little harder like “frustrated,” “irritated,” “content,” “lonely.") Then, make a few cards that say “Act out something you really want right now” and a few more that say “Act out something people need”.
Play a typical game where someone draws a card and acts it out while others guess. Have fun with this!
Follow-up during the game, or when it’s over, to talk about the following things:
It can be hard to tell how people feel and what they want! Why is this? Sometimes people communicate what they feel or want in different ways – I might not communicate the same way you do, but also nonverbal communication can be tricky to interpret.
Sometimes we don’t know how people feel or what they want unless they use their words. This is why it’s important that you tell us, and your friends, what you want or how you’re feeling. We can’t read minds and our relationships will all be better if better understand people.
Emotions are complicated! Sometimes we feel many feelings at once, which makes it even trickier to understand how someone feels. But that’s okay, it just means we might need to ask more questions and use more words.
Allow family members to share their own observations about this from the game, or from real life. Be prepared to share some of your own examples of times you misunderstood someone or someone misunderstood you. Share examples of how, in all relationships, we need to talk with people and not just assume we can understand their wants, needs, or feelings based on their nonverbals.
This game is a playful way to build connection with your kids. It teaches them the importance of using their words to share their feelings, wants, and needs and it teaches them to consider how other people communicate their feelings, wants, and needs. This becomes particularly valuable as our kids enter more relationships, and as we aren't around them as much to intervene.
Final thought
Trust is key! Trust that your child is truly developmentally ready for this information. Their brains want and need to know this, and now is the time. It’s easy to think your 7-year old is too young to hear this, but when you give them a Manufacturer-level answer to their question, and you see that they are satisfied, you will see that it works!
Trust yourself to be able to responsibly, accurately, and honestly answer their questions. Trust that you will get another chance to talk with them about these topics, so you don’t need to cram it all in to one time. If our kids start to think that every time they ask us a question, we will give them a 30-minute lecture, they will stop coming to us with those questions. Hear their question, understand what they want and need to know, answer simply (at a Manufacturer level), and then wait. Wait for them to ask another question, or wait for them to leave the conversation.
Trust that silence is okay – you don’t need to fill that silence with more information! Trust that you will get another chance to tell them more, because you’re building that important culture of conversation in your family.
And most importantly, trust that you are doing the good work of raising sexually healthy kids.