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Consent?

At the sight of her friend being taken advantage of at a party, Claudia struggles to find a way to confront the situation as a bystander.

For all videos:

  • What did you see in the video?
  • What do you think this video was about?
  • What stood out to you the most in this video?

For this video:

  • What are the beliefs that our society/your culture has on consent? What have you been taught about the way someone should initiate a sexual activity with another person?
  • Does this type of behavior occur in real life?
  • What role do drugs and alcohol play in decisions we make about our personal health choices? Do these choices change at parties and/or other events?
  • When is it easy or difficult to intervene when you see an incident like this unfold? Why do you think many people would not intervene?
  • What do you think Claudia could have done to help?
  • Can a LGBTQ+ person be a victim or perpetrator of a similar situation?

Materials needed: paper, pen

Step 1.
Ask students to take out a sheet of paper (or their journals) and answer these questions:

  • Before this class, had you ever had sexual consent explained to you? Is it important for young kids to learn about consent? Why or why not?

Step 2.
Ask for volunteers to share their quick writes and guide students through a conversation about consent responding to the students’ writing.

Materials needed: 20 solo cups (makes one set per group. Each group will have two teams. Each team should have two to three people. Decide how many sets you will make), ping pong balls, paper, tape, markers, 20 different consent/sexual assault questions click here for sample of questions, tables, one chair per team

Step 1.
Before class: Create sets of cups by attaching/inserting consent questions, on folded paper, inside each cup. Set aside sets to give to students later for set up.

Step 2.
Intro: Ask students if they have ever heard of the popular party game, “Beer Pong.” Ask them to share what they know about it (how it’s played, how it’s set up, what the objective is, what it promotes, etc.). Ask them to describe how alcohol games like Beer Pong can lead to engaging in risky/dangerous/criminal behavior at a party. Tell them that they are going to play a healthy version of this game but this time it will involve reinforcing what they’ve learned/everyone should know about sexual consent.

Step 3.
Setup: Break class into groups of four to six. Give each group a set of (20) cups and tell them to arrange ten cups in pyramid form on each end of the table and have them split up into even teams. Teams will stand at the long ends of the table. The row closest to them should have four cups, and the last row that is closest to the middle of the table has only one cup. Make sure they set up opposing cups with enough distance from each other. Place a chair on one side of the table, facing other students.

Step 4.
How-To/Game Rules: Select one person from each team to play rock-paper-scissors against each other to decide which team will go first. Take turns throwing the ping-pong ball into each other’s cups. Keep elbows behind the edges of the table and make sure it bounces one time in the middle of the table before going towards the cups. When a ball lands in a cup, the person from that team that made it must answer the question that’s inside the cup. They must answer it all by themselves, without the help of anyone. If they get it right, they take the cup out and set it aside. If they don’t get it right, that person must stand on the chair and shout out “Consent, consent, I need to get to know you better!” (or any other funny statement that you come up with as a class). The other team then has a chance to answer (“steal”) the question. If the other team answers the question correctly, they keep the cup. If no one answers the question correctly, set the cup aside in a separate “Up for Grabs” section. The next person to answer a question correctly gets to take their winning cup as well as the cup that is Up for Grabs. Continue taking turns, making sure everyone in each team is getting a chance, until all the cups have been used or the allotted game time is over. Whoever has the most cups at the end of the game, wins!