Problems of Teaching Sex Education--A Survey of Ontario Secondary Schools

Abstract

To determine the status of the teaching of sex education in Ontario, a mailed questionnaire was sent to teachers of home economics, guidance and physical education in the public secondary schools of Ontario. The 65% response rate resulted in the return of 1,049 questionnaires. This paper reports on the difficulties encountered by teachers of sex education. Among the issues presented are the variability of student maturity and knowledge, student shyness, values conflict, inadequate teacher training, deficiences in sex education materials, opposition to teaching sex education and inter-disciplinary conflict in sex education. Within recent years, sex education programs have been introduced in several school districts in the Canadian province of Ontario. Although studies of the teaching of sex education have been done elsewhere, especially in the United States (Force, 1970; Ready, 1973), similar studies have not been conducted in Ontario. Therefore, the objective of this survey was to determine the status of sex education in the schools of Ontario. Because much concern has been expressed about the difficulties encountered by teachers of sex education (Sommerville, 1971), the focus of study was on the problematic aspects of sex education.