"Teachers are ashamed to talk about sexual education, because the children laugh." Monologue of a biology teacher from St. Petersburg, who was forced to quit because of a blog about sex education

In St. Petersburg, a biology teacher Olga Schegoleva quit school at the conservatory named after N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov because of the blog about the sex educational, which she leads on Instagram. Parents of the students complained to her to the management of the institution, and the director invited the girl to choose - either work or a blog. About how she became a teacher, why she began to blog about sexual education and what would do after dismissal, Olga told “such matters”.

Olga Schegoleva photo: Elizaveta Boytsova

About yourself

I graduated from St. Petersburg State University in the direction of "Biology". Later she went on retraining to a biology teacher, and then to a psychologist. Now I get an additional education in family psychology.

I have been working as a teacher since 2014. At first she helped with practice at the university, and then she came to school, where she worked for five years. After that, I took a break for two years and just at that time I began to start a blog . This September, she went to work at a secondary special music school at the conservatory named after N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov. I also teach children at the University of Children in the Erudite courses, I read “Fascinating Biology”. I don’t know if they will leave me there now or not.

I did not want to work as a teacher. Just like that, life circumstances were formed - I needed to feed the child. Unfortunately, in my specialty there is no work in Russia, so I had to retrain and go to work as a teacher. In fact, teaching is a very interesting thing. Of course, it is difficult with paper reports that take some wild amount of time. Plus low salaries that do not provide normal residence. Therefore, you have to have several part -time jobs to exist.

About teaching

Since I have a psychological education, I treat children more loyal and with understanding. For example, I allowed them to drink in the lessons. Yes, at first they brought two -liter bottles of Cola and drank imposingly from glasses, but then they understood everything.

I also allowed the children to go to the restroom without eating. But not the whole class, not a "herd." I had a framework for me: you can go to the restroom without demand, but one by one. One returns - the second leaves. There is nothing catastrophic, terrible in this. There was not a single case without permission for a long time. It took them a week to join the new rules that I admit in the lessons.

Children are not fools. They relate with great confidence in the person who himself trusts them

Do not let go of the restroom or force the children to ask whether it is possible to trace - this is humiliating. And the children also think so. They obey the rules, but are much better about people who are open to them. It seems to me that education should follow the path when the teacher relates to children more openly.

For some reason, it is believed that if you do not put pressure on children, then they will not study. Yes, some adaptive period will certainly be-they will check the boundaries, behave in a slaughterhouse. But if these boundaries are correctly built, then the children will be pushed.

A lesson for me is a place where I should interest children. It is clear that there are very boring lessons, they can not get rid of them. But the way you tell how you draw, go, communicate, what you ask, creates the mood of the lesson. It is important for children to be in a good-natured atmosphere of knowledge-when you ask one or the other, laugh over some kind of joke. There is nothing terrible in jokes of children. On the contrary, it relaxes them. Therefore, students can be loyal to my mistakes. I can skip the letter when I write on the board. Then I say: "Sorry, I was mistaken." There are no questions.

About blog and sex education

I began to start a blog two years ago, having seen enough of what is happening at school. How children feel uncertainly, growing up how much information they lack. A lot of incorrect information began to appear on the Internet, and schoolchildren can not always properly share it. They can find articles that you need to douch from the inside, pour lemon juice or wash with soda from the inside. A huge number of myths exists among adolescents. They need to tell adequate, scientific information so that they do not spoil their health.

My blog is 18+. I aimed him at parents, teachers, educators, in order to teach them how to talk with children about sexual education and explain this information to adults themselves.

A lot of people write to me that they do not know something at the age of 40, they cannot figure it out. If adults cannot figure it out, then how will they correctly convey information to children?

Information about the structure of the sexual system of a man and a woman, about the menstrual cycle, contraceptives and STDs appears in the textbooks for the eighth grade. In these lessons, I try to invest in children the maximum amount of information that I can afford in the framework of the law and the program. There are very few such teachers. Most of biology teachers do not affect the theme of the reproductive system. They are afraid to speak, they are ashamed, because the children laugh. And teachers do not know how to laugh with children. Not over children, but together. They cannot relax, cannot tell truthful information.

Children really need to laugh for some time. The teacher can laugh with them, and then say: “Let's get the information. Yes, this is a very intimate topic, it will excite you. ” Because the eighth grade is the peak of puberty, and, of course, they are interested in everything. When children understand that they are talking adequately to them, they stop laughing and goggling over it.

About the conflict at school

The first conversations with the head teacher began about three weeks ago. My parents complained to me to the director. As a result, the head teacher asked to remove several posts, including a post about breast cancer, because there was my photo in the bra. But under the post, medical information that everyone should know. The fact that breast cancer happens not only in women, but also in men, what screening and how often should be carried out. I converted this post, and it seemed to me that the incident was exhausted on this.

But since the parents launched a wave of discussions around my blog, of course, children learned about this and began to go into my blog. I openly asked them to leave my page alone, because it could affect my work at school. And they stopped doing it.

A week later, a conversation took place with the director, where she found out that the parents wrote to the rector, pulled out some of my photos from the context of the blog. I tried to convince her that the content is 18+, everything was done on my part to protect children. And if children deceive the filter, this is the parental duty to follow them. There are a lot of different information on the Internet, and my blog is not the worst. I am very responsible for the preparation of posts, translate a lot of information from foreign sources. But, unfortunately, they did not hear me, and I had to write a letter of resignation. Apparently, the parents pressed the administration so much that they were scary for themselves. I understand why they did this. They did not want to lose me as a teacher, but they were not going to put up with my parallel to legal activity. I am very sorry that all this resulted in such a media wave that is very exhausting.

The children wrote a large paper that they want to be left. The next day, the head teacher told me that the director and the rector have cooled down and you can pick up the application. But since the school did not go to the mediation of the conflict, they did not meet with me and my parents-I do not know these parents and what exactly they were unhappy-it was decided that I would still quit. Because it is impossible to work in a state of powder barrel.

I don't know what I will do next. I do not plan to work as a biology teacher in the near future. It takes me a lot of time to move away from this situation. But I will not throw sex losers.

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