Hi Priscilla,

I work with 9-12 year olds a lot.  This group can be very sqeemish talking
about breasts, especially the boys.  As I was just writing in response to
Naomi's school presentation, I find it most effective to use animal stories.  I try
to get stuffed animals for the ones I use in my presentations so the kids have
something to look at and even play with.  I would approach it by looking at
the species-specificity of breastmilk.  You can look at how each mammal is
designed to nurse its young -- even if the mother doesn't have nipples.  I always
have a platypus and a whale to talk about adaptations.  You can also look at
different nursing lengths to see how animals nurse for different lengths of
time depending on their developmental needs.  Since humans are born so helpless
and grow so slowly, they need to drink milk longer than, say a baby horse.
There is a great handout you can use on my website at
http://platypusmedia.com/documents/mamlactate.htm.  Also, my book "If My Mom Were A Platypus: Animal
Babies and Their Mothers" is filled with cool mammal stoies and the accompanying
Activity Guide is also availalbe, at no charge, at my website.

Once kids are comfortable talking about breastfeeding through animal stories,
you can make human connections such as all human babies need human milk and
that sucking is the first survival skill.

I hope this helps.

- Dia


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Dia L. Michels
Platypus Media -- Books for Families, Teachers and Parenting Professionals
627 A Street, NE
Washington, DC 20002
202-546-1674 / 1-877-PLATYPS (toll-free)
202-546-2356-fax
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PlatypusMedia.com

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