?Hey, today Kyle asked if I had a penis, and I said no,? five-year-old Sara said casually at the dinner table one night. ?He said, ?Prove it!? so I showed him my vagina!? Sara?s parents choked a bit on their pasta but kept their cool. ?We reminded her that private parts should stay private and no one should be looking at penises or vaginas at daycare,? remembers Sara?s dad, Rob Virtanen.* ?My wife also had a low-key chat with the supervisors at the after-school program and asked them to keep a closer eye on the play fort.?
Whether you call it ?playing doctor? or ?I?ll show you mine if you show me yours,? there will likely come a time when your child will be interested in seeing or touching a friend?s or sibling?s genitals. ?This comes up a lot, especially in the six- to nine-year-old age range,? says Saleema Noon, a sexual health educator in Vancouver and co-author of Talk Sex Today: What Kids Need to Know and How Adults Can Teach Them. She explains that kids this age are in what?s called the primary stage of sexual development, where they think words like ?coochie? and ?wiener? are hil-ar-i-ous, and where they also start to notice that other bodies look different. ?It?s important for parents to know that because, first, it?s totally normal, and second, it?s out of curiosity,? she says. Here are some tips on how to have these important chats. Keep talking

Ideally, you?ll have many mini-conversations with your kids about sexual health, starting when kids begin to talk, says...