Moms in Babeland

How do you get a bunch of rowdy fourth graders to sit still for a lesson about sex? I asked Canadian sex educator Meg Hickling—she’s been visiting schools for the past twenty-five years dishing out her brand of “body science” with astonishing success. Meg stands before preschoolers, middle-schoolers and high-schoolers, as well as parents, doctors and teachers, but her message and manner are always the same: straightforward sex information delivered honestly, candidly, and with respect for individual curiosity and opinion. Parents and kids alike love her, their word-of-mouth referrals have landed her in classrooms all over Canada, and in the US and Japan as well. She shares the secrets of her success:

It’s all in the approach

“The first thing I say to fourth graders is This is not about how to have sex. This is about your body and how it works. I know you all think having sex is gross and you’re never going to do it. Well, you never have to have sex in your life, but you’re always going to have sexual health to think about. You’re always going to have those parts. We’re here to talk about body science.’”

A little humor works magic

“I tell kids to think like scientists and that scientists never say “ewwww”, they say “in-ter-esting.” It works like a charm, the kids enjoy repeating it, and the teachers use that for the rest of the school year.”
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My older daughter loves musicals. She has aspirations to sing on Broadway. So we watch a lot of musicals, which I must admit (not having been a big musical fan), I have enjoyed very much. Musicals really do put a spring in your step and a song in your heart (which you can use when you’re pushing Fifty). But lately what I’ve enjoyed about them most are the ways they are teaching my kids about life, diversity, sex, history, and morality.

Sure we love the classics like Singing in the Rain, but there ain’t much of a social message there. Give us Hairspray with the drag queen mom, the fat-positive teenage lead, and the civil rights struggle. And they adored The Rocky Horror Picture Show with its fabulous soundtrack and lore–but boy did I answer a lot of questions about transvestites, bisexuality, and geez, even cannibalism. In South Pacific the characters struggle with racism, interracial relationships, and children born out of wedlock. In Funny Girl they see a driven and talented career showgirl who earns more money than her husband (and does exactly what she wants while telling everyone else not to rain on her parade).
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