Exploring Sexuality Education Through Play and Queer Joy with Rural Early Childhood Teachers

Abstract

How might we reimagine early childhood sexuality education so that queer joy flourishes in these spaces through play? In this work, we come together as two queer researchers and ask how we might inhabit both play and queer joy to create a space where children can engage in queerer worldmaking and disrupt adult norms about sexuality, bodies, and identities in ECE classrooms. We describe how we engaged a group of 13 ECE teachers from a rural New Brunswick community in collage, zine, and cellphilm production to explore the ways sexuality education unfolds in their teaching practice. We specifically prompted participants to design and draw play spaces where young children might queerly and joyfully inquire about ideas of gender, sexuality, and identity. Ultimately, we propose that play-based approaches to teaching sexuality education creates room for young people to dream, joy, tap into their queerness, and rearticulate their bodies in ways that help them form and contribute to knowledge about the world around them.

Keywords:

• early childhood education,
• queer joy,
• rurality,
• sexuality education