Sex education is supported widely and even by parents, however, we are not teaching it effectively. In middle school, I didn't learn sexual education, let alone learn anything about puberty and what a menstrual cycle even is. In middle school, I learned more from my friends than from health class or my parents.
If parents supposedly support sexual education, why are we not creating a curriculum to teach it more effectively? These teenagers are 'learning' more from their friends than their parents or adults and learning from porn. No, porn does not teach realistic sexual expectations. Teens don't see the side of where the pornstars are posing in sex positions or take multiple takes. Teens don't see that pornstars get tested for HIV and STDs very often. Most teens say they never received any sexual education at all.
These topics we need to focus on teaching should range from menstruating, puberty, self-touching, and all the way to sex and diseases, as well as pregnancy. we teach girls that they need to be on birth control but what about these young men needing to wear condoms. Many girls don't even know the difference between tampons or how to even insert a tampon. Lots of teens are told that they shouldn't be touching themselves, but we should be teaching them that it is ok to explore your body. I've come across many young men that think that just because they don't feel like they have a disease that they don't have to get tested.
Everyone needs to get tested and everyone needs to learn an excessive amount of information about sex because no one else is teaching it.
I have a passion for teaching sexual health to middle schoolers for the sake of their sexual health and for future generations.
