Welcome back for another engaging 'chat' with a guest blogger. This time I'm with Sophie Howell-Peak, a teacher currently working the UK with experiences in many countries abroad.
Could you describe your experiences of sexuality education at school?
Primary school: Watching a video about a male and female married couple in cartoon form having sex beneath a blanket in a bed, alongside more medical/biological images of penises and vaginas plus explanations about sperm and eggs
A girls only lesson in year 6 with a female teacher who asked us to put up our hands if any of us had started our periods (no one put up their hand so nor did I, even though I recently had). I can’t remember anything else about the lesson.
Secondary school: Focusing more on STIs and how to prevent them (again, through cis gendered heterosexual sex only)
A lot about teenage pregnancy and how to avoid it (ie safe sex for cis heterosexual couples)
So what do you think should be included at these different ages?
I think at primary it should be made clear that there are mutliple ways of adults partnering to produce children, and at secondary school I think safe sex ought to cover non cis het relationships as well, and also deal with issues around consent
As times have moved on since I was at school, internet issues should obviously also be covered (I have no idea if current sex ed in schools does actually do any of the things I've mentioned here or not, I don't know any secondary age students in the UK)
I would also have found a more Q&A approach helpful, ie a more student-led approach to the kinds of topics and discussions we had in those classes
what hurdles do you think would have to be got over in order for this approach to be introduced effectively?
That's a really hard question to answer - I think there needs to be more widespread acceptance that there is not a gender binary or sexual binary for everyone, that trans issues are important and need to be understood properly... I guess this would need to come down from government policy to be introduced into school syllabus, but equally I am aware there would be a huge backlash against this socially, especially regarding transgenderism, as people will argue that lgbtq+ people have 'mental illness' and educating students about this would be seen as 'promoting' this
I guess for me a solution would be for the state school syllabus to run more student-led sex ed, to provide an open discussion space facilitated by a teacher, but I fully recognise that a major issue around this is individual perceptions that being lgbtq+ is a choice/mental illness/ sin and so on
However on the issue of consent I think it can be extremely clear: consent must be a fundamental part of sex ed and there's no black and white around that, it's a crime not to have consent for sex acts and that needs to be reinforced and taught
Thanks so much Sophie!
