Sexplanation!

I must admit I was genuinely excited about opening the box when the Sexplanation! board game arrived. I had heard of the Grapevine game, of which it is a descendant, but had never played it.

The design of Sexplanation! is great: the colours of purple and black attrac-ted both the young people and myself. Inside, there was everything a game should have - an eye-catching board, Cluedo-style players and Monopoly-style cards.

The aim of the game is to go round the board answering fact or opinion questions, asked by your peers. As a youth worker, I could either sit passively outside the circle enjoying the debate or join in, especially when all hell broke out.

Some questions can be quite controversial. For example, an opinion card asks: "Should a girl tell the father if she chooses to have an abortion?"

This caused quite a heated debate, but also a surprising change in attitude of some of the players when they were confronted with the other side of the argument. The cards also give you facts that can be used to do that.

The only downside to the game was the amount of time it took to get around the board. The young people were willing others to win by the end and the competitive element had well and truly gone - this was especially so with younger players. Some young people were also worried about reading out loud and this needs to be handled sensitively.

Of course, the beauty of Sexplanation! is that it can be adapted to allow double throws on the dice, groups instead of individuals, or just using the cards and not the board. The questions are provocative and youth workers should familiarise themselves with them first to modify the game for different groups, if they need to. They should also be aware that some of the information could go out of date.

After we had played the game, one youth worker summed things up thus: "Overall, the questions were good and the learning was gained from the factual cards. But what was better was the debate sparked by those cards that required an opinion."

- Reviewed by Angie Heins, senior youth information worker, Youth Information Powys.

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