Return-Path: <nifl-womenlit@literacy.nifl.gov> Received: from literacy (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by literacy.nifl.gov (8.10.2/8.10.2) with SMTP id j6I0iYG24254; Sun, 17 Jul 2005 20:44:34 -0400 (EDT) Date: Sun, 17 Jul 2005 20:44:34 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <s2dac27b.005@mailsrv21.gsu.edu> Errors-To: listowner@nifl.gov Reply-To: nifl-womenlit@literacy.nifl.gov Originator: nifl-womenlit@literacy.nifl.gov Sender: nifl-womenlit@literacy.nifl.gov Precedence: bulk From: "Daphne Greenberg" <alcdgg@langate.gsu.edu> To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-womenlit@literacy.nifl.gov> Subject: [NIFL-WOMENLIT:3263] RE: menstruation X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII X-Mailer: Novell GroupWise Internet Agent 6.5.4 Status: O Content-Length: 7436 Lines: 79 Deborah, Thanks for sharing with us! I am wondering if you remember whether the women had any questions or misinformation regarding menstruation or reproductive health that you can share with us? Daphne >>> Deborah.Schwartz@umb.edu 07/15/05 10:17 AM >>> Hi all, I've been expermenting a bit with teaching a unit on "reproductive rights and health." I'm teaching in a lifeskills/ESOL class that we designed for an Domestic Violence agency that provides shelter and support to Asian women who are "at risk." So far, we've covered topics related to pregnancy, menstruation, heterosexual safe sex and how to talk to your children about these issues. It has been very interesting to the women, so they tell me, and it has been much easier to cover these topics than I expected. I think for at least two reasons: we have a content-based, semi-participatory curriculum. By that I mean that there are many venues for the women to talk about what they want covered and for me too, as a facilitator to give suggestions about what I would like to cover. There's not always agreement, and that's something I would like to think more about, but that's a longer posting. Getting back to content: we have covered topics related to banking/money/asset development, work, general health care, rituals/holidays, cultural negotiations and food. Turns out that of all these topics "food" was the most charged- yet again, another posting, though it taught me that really any topic can be charged and difficult for learners depending on their lives, histories and circumstances. So, because the curriculum is built around various topics that now tend to emerge from formal and informal conversations, it wasn't too much of a stretch to introduce a unit on reproductive rights and health after we had a conversation about teenagers in this country and how sophisticated they seemd to be around issues related to sex. I'm using a nifty homegrown story/novella created by Aprendo Press/Women to Women, Lupe va a tener un bebe/Lupe is Going to Have a Baby. I won it in a raffle at the We Learn Conference and I bet the book's developers are somewhere out there, perhaps even on this list serve. Because it's a narrative--a story that seems realistic to the learners I'm working with, they have felt comfortable asking all kinds of questions-- including some that I don't have answers to. We've used the internet to get some answers and I've introduced them to Our Bodies/Our Selves. Also, because all of the women in the classroom have children and some have grandchildren, the mode of inquiry is framed around "How do we want to talk to our children about this?" In fact, that's how the conversation was framed initially. Most recently, a few women have started to admit that they don't know some of the basics around reproduction, reproductive health and family planning though I think, if I had done a survey on the outset, no one would have identified what it is they wantrf to know, or had questions about. If anything there's been shame built up around what they don't know related to reproduction/reproductive health-- especially since they're all parenting and pride themselves on that. Looking forward to checking out the book you cited. Maybe we can add it to our collection. Best, Deborah Schwartz -----Original Message----- From: nifl-womenlit@nifl.gov on behalf of Daphne Greenberg Sent: Thu 7/14/2005 9:20 AM To: Multiple recipients of list Cc: Subject: [NIFL-WOMENLIT:3259] menstruation Menstruation is not a topic typically discussed in health literacy classes. I guess this is not surprising, given the taboo it still has in society (I do recognize that we have come along way). Because of this taboo, many of us have questions, shame, misinformation regarding our periods that never get addressed. I wonder whether this may be even more of an issue for some of our learners who dropped out of school before they may have benefitted from sex/health education in school, for those of our learners who could not benefit from written information given by sex/health education teachers, and for those of our learners who grew up with mothers who did not discuss it. Compound this issue with the fact that health literacy classes don't usually address menstruation, and the discomfort many adult literacy teachers have discussing this topic. I have never read or heard anyone talk about menstruation and adult literacy. Maybe we can start here? I am thinking that cyberspace ma! y! feel like a safer place to discuss something like this. Here is what I can share: 1. A teacher relayed to me the following experience: A learner in one of her classes stood up to get a book only to discover blood on her chair. There were two other female learners and one female teacher in the class. She froze with a look of panic on her face while staring at the blood on the chair. The teacher couldn't figure out what was going on, until another learner pointed at the chair with a look of horror on her face. The teacher very calmly said wait a moment, went to the bathroom and brought back a few wet paper towels and without saying anything cleaned the chair. The female learner then started to cry terrified that her pants were ruined. One of the other learners gave her a jacket to cover herself and drove her home (no one had a tampon/pad to give her). It took a lot of coaxing on part of the teacher to convince the learner to return back to class. Nothing was ever mentioned about this event. Any thoughts about this? 2. The following site was mentioned in the most recent issue of Ms. Magazine: www.mum.org You may want to check it out and see if any of it would be appropriate for either advanced learners to look at, or for lower level learners to either hear while someone reads it out loud, or to use the pictures to spur discussion, vocabulary growth, and writing prompts. I found some of my reactions very telling-at times I was grossed out and even offended. I caught myself feeling these things and wondered why I have these knee jerk reactions about natural monthly events for most women. Why for example don't I have those feelings when an artist or photographer captures someone bleeding from the elbow, but menstrual blood feels different. Should it? 3. Finally, I did a search on National LINCS and found the following description of a book for learners. I am wondering if anyone knows anything about this book. Would you recommend it? Title: I call it the curse! A book about periods Series/Serial: Title: The New Start Reading Series Publication Information: Year: 1988 Language: ENGLISH Term(s): Menstruation Abstract/Summary: This 5x7 inch, 35-page, student-written story with extensive photos and lots of white space is about a women's group. One day the group talks about menstruation and menopause, covering both personal beliefs, embarrassments, anatomy, and physiology. The story was written for women with limited literacy skills. Notes: Readers Daphne Greenberg Assistant Professor Educational Psych. & Special Ed. Georgia State University P.O. Box 3679 Atlanta, Georgia 30302-3979 phone: 404-651-0127 fax:404-651-4901 dgreenberg@gsu.edu Daphne Greenberg Associate Director Center for the Study of Adult Literacy Georgia State University P.O. Box 3977 Atlanta, Georgia 30302-3977 phone: 404-651-0127 fax:404-651-4901 dgreenberg@gsu.edu
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