HANDLING HORNY
LESSON PLAN · MAKING SENSE OF ABSTINENCE
Savvy about Sexual Response
OBJECTIVES:
Participants will:
1. Increase awareness of the physical aspects of sensuality and sexual response.
2. Recognize the role the senses play in sexual response.
3. Understand that sensual feelings are present throughout life.
4. Identify ways to handle sexual feelings that are consistent with one’s values, including personal definitions of abstinence.
RATIONALE:
Since sexual feelings are present throughout life, learning to identify one’s own sexual responses can help young people manage them, and make decisions to help themselves avoid unplanned pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. Whether teens’ conscious decisions are to be abstinent or to engage in sexual intercourse, understanding and valuing their bodies increases the likelihood that they will implement their decisions in effective and healthy ways.
This lesson, in contrast to those sometimes found in abstinence-only programs that promote simplistic slogans (like “Just Say No†or “Put a lock on itâ€), helps normalize natural sexual responses for young people and build skills for recognizing and handling sexual responses. Research shows that for young women, in particular, validating experiences of sexual desire and expectations of sexual pleasure in relationships increases the likelihood that they will delay intercourse for the “right person†and the “right timeâ€, and use contraception if they begin to have intercourse.
