When the eldest came home from school last night, I greeted her with the usual ‘had a good day?’ question. As the answer is always the same, except for when she can’t be bothered to talk and just grunts instead and as I was busy cooking dinner, I must admit I wasn’t really listening to the reply.
So it took a few seconds for her response to sink in. When it did, I stopped stirring whatever it was that I was stirring, dropped the wooden spoon and said ‘WHAT?’
'Like I said, fine, other than I spent two hours with some woman waving a polystyrene penis wearing a condom, in my face.'
It seemed that yesterday was the day the 3iemes ‘did’ sex. They had a two hour session of sex education and the subject is now covered. No pun intended. Its a bit late in the day in my opinion, as according to my friend Colette, who works in the local pharmacy and knows these things, most of them are ‘doing’ sex already.
The daughters account of the session was hilarious and I don’t think I can do it justice. For starters they watched a cartoon film about a couple of teens, Jean-Pierre and Lucille, who discussed having sex, had sex and then analysed the whole thing. How very French.
The style was sheer 70’s (Joy of Sex) but with added psychedelic overtones. To appeal to the teenage market maybe? By the time JP said to Lucille during the post coital analysis, ‘I wanted to touch your vagina…again’, my daughter was in hysterics. I’m no teenager but even I know they stopped talking like that in the 1930’s - if they ever did.
And the grand finale was a full screen of 52 cartoon cocks of all different shapes and sizes that suddenly all ‘stood to attention’. Presumably this was to reassure the boys in the class? Or maybe to imply that there’s a different shaped willy for every week of the year. As the daughter was laughing out loud by now, the sex expert who had been shipped in for the mornings session, had her marked down as a troublemaker and moved her to the front row. None of the other kids laughed. After all, this woman was an ‘expert’ and the French have huge respect for experts.
So my poor daughter had to control her giggles. As she said afterwards, 'I can see the point of showing us how to use condoms. But did she really need to keep hold of it once she finished putting it on? And did she need to wave her arms around quite so much when she talked?
Still as a method of birth control it is probably quite effective. I think the moth-eaten polystyrene penis has put her off sex for the foreseeable future.
Mine had a sex education lesson in primaire - can't remember what age. They had the safe sex talk at collège last year and were asked to draw pictures to illustrate this theme. I was very surprised by the results decorating the entrance hall when I went to collect them one day.
At least they didn't ask her to read Fifty shades of Grey!
Nothing like that when I was at school - a convent, and many moons ago. The little nun who took us for Biology asked as all to read the chapter on reproduction in rabbits for our homework. we all did this, and for the next Biology lesson the little nun ( who was actually very young) asked the class for any questions. Obviously we tried to tie the poor woman into knots with all sort of questions, and one bright spark - the class clown ( no - not me) asked the little nun if she ever has any sexual thoughts and desires, and what did she do when it happened........... to which the nun replied " Oh, I just think nice pure thoughts ! " Honestly this is true. Needless to say most of us had already read Lady Chatterly's lover, and The Tropic of Cancer, which us boarders found well hidden in the convent library.
Both of ours just 'found out' - I think it might have been talking to older girls whilst at a big gathering of families. It is a bit of a basic knowledge BUT having human reproduction explained by (then) a ten year old with 'special educational needs' and an eight year old, as if I was the 'novice', is both scary and hilarious. Being told what I have in the nether regions, how it works and what to do with it and why maman is required to do such and such was a bit like being shown the moth-eaten object you describe, except that it has possibly put me off for the rest of my days and on guard for when my precious little girls start to experiment with non-polystyrene penises...
Hmmm
Literally last week my Nine Year stopped us dead in our tracks with (In English) …“Daddy, do you “Do the Love” with Mummy” (She is bilingual and this is a very literal translation)
Now as someone who has travelled the world a bit and existed before all the nasty STDs were even named (Other than ones that good old penicillin could sort ou) this should not have shocked me. It did! She is nine and the Angelic little friend standing next to her waiting for the answer will not be 9 until next week!! “Of course not” was the immediate and very hurried reply. “You must have” she crooned, “Otherwise I would not be here…and Anyway Louise’s Daddy said he does the love with her mummy”. Game set and Match.
On enquiring a little I discovered that the little cherub’s interest had been sparked by a school biology lesson on frogs, or some other equally rampant reptile. It had taken her and her friend less than five minutes on the Internet to find and locate the necessary information that was intended to shock.
What was even more astounding was the calm acceptance of the explanation that we then gave.
“Ah OK” she said, "Anyway its all on the Net, so I didn’t really need an answer about THAT, I just wanted to know if you still did it, because you are old"
So much for modern parenting!!