Yesterday the Argus Leader did a report on sex education in Sioux Falls. Excerpt:
A group of parents are concerned about how sex education is being taught in Sioux Falls middle schools.
Based on copies of new teacher manuals they have seen, they're opposed to sections on anatomy, oral and anal sex, masturbation and, in general, the graphic nature of the books.
I have found similar content while researching Mitchell’s "Health" curriculum. I usually get the same response from school officials that the Argus Leader provided:
Schools aren't teaching a lot of what Wornson is worried about, teachers and school administrators say. They don't teach masturbation or oral and anal sex, said Rhonda Kemmis, a health teacher at Memorial Middle School.
"We don't use all of the lessons that the curriculum prints," she said.
When it comes to sex ed - two weeks of lessons about anatomy, diseases and healthy choices in a nine-week health course - teachers don't deviate from the district lesson plans, she said. "We are mandated to follow the sex-ed guidelines verbatim."
Later in the report, Planned Parenthood added their two cents:
Kate Looby, parent of a middle school-aged child and state director of Planned Parenthood, said middle school students need information about their bodies. That information can help them make good choices about sexuality and health, she said.
"The schools have a role in that," she said. "We can't allow an entire generation of our children to go through the system without having the essential knowledge they need about their bodies," she said.
Many students don't get that information at home, and a majority of parents want age-appropriate, accurate information on contraceptives and abstinence taught in schools, she said, quoting the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States.
Here are guidelines for 5 to 8 year olds that I found on the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States web site regarding masturbation:
Touching and rubbing one's own genitals to feel good is called masturbation.
Some boys and girls masturbate and others do not.
Masturbation should be done in a private place.
Here is more insight about the real agenda of Planned Parenthood in regard to sex education in the public schools:
Abstinence-only education is one of the religious right's greatest challenges to the nation's sexual health. But it is only one tactic in a broader, longer-term strategy. Since the early 1980s, the "family values" movement has won the collaboration of governments and public institutions, from Congress to local school boards, in abridging students' constitutional rights. Schools now block student access to sexual health information in class, at the school library, and through the public library's Internet portals. They violate students' free speech rights by censoring student publications of articles referring to sexuality. Abstinence-only programs often promote alarmist misinformation about sexual health and force-feed students religious ideology that condemns homosexuality, masturbation, abortion, and contraception. In doing so, they endanger students' sexual health.
