12
The Southern Cross, May 12 to May 18, 2010
EDUCATION
Sexuality education: Clearing up the confusion As the world becomes increasingly sexualised, education on the subject of sexuality becomes more important, yet there is much confusion about how to structure sex ed and what to teach. ANNE FRENCH explains.
W
HAT are the barriers that exist among teachers in South African Catholic schools to teaching sexuality education? The Catholic Institute of Edu-
cation (CIE) in Johannesburg established an HIV/Aids Prevention and Gender Unit in 1999, which focused mainly on HIV prevention. Teachers in Catholic schools were trained to implement a life skills programme with learners. The task appeared straightforward, as implementing a life skills programme in keeping with the national curriculum, with learners in Grades R–6, was not that challenging from a teacher’s point of view. Project implementers were welcomed by most schools, and there was little that needed to be explained about sex since a sound approach to sexuality edu-
cation with younger learners involved teaching simple lessons that were deemed appropriate for the age group. Lessons, for example, were about “good touches” and “bad touches”, changes to be expected during adolescence and biological instruction on the male and female anatomy. When life skills education was implemented in Grades 7-12, the project team encountered some major challenges. It became apparent that many teachers were reluctant to teach sexuality education; teaching life skills to learners, where sex education had to be more explicit, and where some learners were already sexu-
ally active, was challenging to teachers. Before developing and implementing its HIV and Aids Prevention and Gender Education programme, the CIE undertook research to find out if teachers were teaching sexuality education as part of an HIV/Aids prevention strategy. A survey was conducted among 41 life orientation teachers from 13 Catholic schools in six provinces. Skilled facilitators performed them either in private with individual teachers or with groups of teachers. They were asked the following questions: What qualifications do you have?
Have you received training to teach sexuality education? What materials are available? What materials do you use? Is there sufficient information in the policy documents you get from the Department of Education? When teaching life skills, are there some lessons that you avoid teaching? Why do you avoid teaching these lessons? What difficulties do you have teaching sexuality education? What does your religion say about teaching sexuality education? What language do you use to teach sexuality education? What role do parents play? Who could help you teach sexuality education? Does your principal support the teaching of sexuality education at your school? When you have presented lessons on sexuality education, what gets the learners talking the most? Is there anything more you would like to know about sexuality education? How many teenage pregnancies have there been at your school this year/last year? The findings showed that teachers were confused about what to teach about sexuality, were uncertain about the age to start doing this, and did not know how to choose age-appropriate materials. In South African schools sexuality education is often randomly assigned to any available teacher, who is expected to deliver a comprehensive sexuality education programme without training, and without curriculum guidelines. The only available guidelines in South Africa are the Learning Outcomes and Assessment Standards found in the National Curriculum Guidelines. The department of education has also developed Guidelines For the Prevention and Management of Teenage Pregnancy. The guidelines recognise the place of the school in managing the prevention of pregnancy, sexually transmitted illnesses (STIs) and HIV. But crucially missing is a comprehensive curriculum, content information, training and the “permission” teachers feel they need for teaching the subject. Those teachers who taught sexuality education used whatever resources they could find—posters, text books, newspapers, magazines, DVDs. In all the schools except one, school leadership supported the teaching of sexuality education. In the single exception Continued on page 13