h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

My son got interested in bodily matters when he was four and we had another one on the way. Our childminder took us aside and asked if it OK that he was talking at his nursery about seeds coming out of Daddy's penis. Then, a couple of years later, he asked anxiously, "Daddy...when the seed comes out of your penis...does it hurt?"

Some friends had s spot of bother at their son's after school club. (Possibly it's significant that most of the children were Muslim). They were told there son (7) had been talking about inappropriate topics. What had actually happened was that he'd put someone right...in detail...over the assertion that "Babies come from god". They insisted that the other child's parents were spoken too also, because he was the one who raised the topic.

What I like about your curriculum is that it seems much more "interactive" - in ours there's not really any opportunity for discussion, disagreement, debate, anything like that. But then again, all "political" issues - such as abortion or same-sex relationships - are strenuously avoided.

A relatively famous example in my peer group concerns a friend who was in biology sex ed last year. They were asked what some characteristics of being "sexually healthy" were, and my friend suggested "being comfortable with masturbation". Apparently the teacher immediately negated this without providing a reason as to why it was invalid (it seems relatively valid to me), and refused to add it to the chart on which she was listing a wide variety of student responses. I find this a bit annoying, myself.

The thing is, in the States we also don't have any sort of nationally-mandated curriculum concerning anything, including health/PSE. It varies from state to state, county to county, district to district, school to school. I suppose this is probably for the best, though - otherwise we'd *all* be subjected to abstinence-only.

My mum's gone along to the parent informational meetings a couple times and asked why sexual orientation isn't discussed in our curriculum. The question was studiously avoided.

We had the dreaded Section 8, now repealed, which outlawed "The promotion of homosexuality and pretended family relationships." Leaving aside how one would actually promote homosexuality (loyalty cards? buy one, get one free?), or what the dickens a 'pretended family' is (the Sylvanians?), the law was routinely ignored without consequence.

And I suppose that now - in Northern Ireland at least (with the rest of the UK to catch up), those providing a sex education service can no longer discriminate against homosexuality.

Doesn't mean we are an *entirely* gay-friendly society, of course.

each school has its own sex education policy, which means that, for instance, catholic schools don't have to deal withsome aspects in that much detail

it also means that soem schools will be able to launch into lessons in Y7 on relationships, while others can't

Except for that whole national curriculum thingy they have to adhere to.

yeah, but the nat curriuclum says what has to be taught as a minimum.

which is from a lesson I was in ...

sex is when a man's erect penis ejaculates into a woman's vagina

and condoms can stop STDs (not even sure howe much that is in there)



it doesn't say what else we can go into (as a manner of speaking)




as trainee science teachers we are told never to teach sex-ed without consulting the school's policy.

You can get into trouble for concentrating too much on certain methods of familiy planning in catholic schools

while other schools may set aside a few lessons to talk over realtionship issues

>>You can get into trouble for concentrating too much on certain methods of familiy planning in catholic schools

To be fair, in many Catholic schools, the attitude seems to be, "For chrissakes, don't let the priests know what we teach." After all, most Catholics use contraception.

There was a case fairly recently where one of these one-man-band evangelical 'groups' waged an internet campaign against a Catholic girls school for teaching about contraception. A quote I saw from the deputy headmistress was somewhere along the lines of "Yes, our curriculum does cover contraception, just like in most Catholic schools."

(And, of course, many priests turn a blind eye on matters sexual. It's the cardinals you have to watch!)

Hi Eddie

From increasing evidence about RC Schools, it seems that the teachers give the theory... and the Priests give the practical.

I'm going straight to hell for that one ain't I?

Blessings,
Matholwch .

Too easy man, too easy.

oof. Nice one!