Puzzles and magic tricks for sexuality education!

Adolescence, a vital stage of growth and development, marks the period of transition from childhood to adulthood. Adolescents are full of energy, enthusiasm and new ideas. During this period, adolescents tend to indulge in experimentation and risk-taking, of giving in to negative peer pressure, of taking uninformed decisions on crucial issues, especially relating to their bodies and their sexuality. In fact, adolescent sexuality, masculinity and femininity as concepts are inadequately understood and, due to social taboos, rarely discussed. As a result, distorted information often leads to exploitation, abuse, mental health problems and heightens the risk of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections, says Dr Manish Kumar in a research paper presented at a conference in Hyderabad.

According to him, adolescents have specific needs and concern which have to be timely and appropriately addressed and that also in a very efficient, interesting and innovative manner. "The methodologies and the tools being used for creating awareness on adolescent issues should be full of fun. As per our experience of working with adolescents in the last 14 years, we have found that entertainment education can play an important role in creating awareness on adolescent issues including sexuality education", he says.

Here is what he says in the paper: Since 1993, we have adopted and developed various methodologies for creating awareness on adolescent issues including sexuality education which are as follows: Magic, Puppetry, Activity games, Board games, Game shows, Puzzles, Mobile exhibitions, Ventriloquism and dolls.

By claiming records in various record books like Guinness Book of World Records, Limca Book of Records.

All these methodologies have been developed by us with the active involvement of participants, especially young people. Due to the fun loving nature of these methodologies they have been very helpful in creating a discussion around sexuality. But while using these methodologies we have to be very careful about cultural beliefs and practices. The beauty of these methodologies is that they can be adopted by any community after making few changes.