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The changes to Ontario’s sex education curriculum made headlines last April, and as a result the controversial changes were withdrawn, but the rest of the curriculum revisions are going ahead as this CBC story explains. Ontario schools will be tackling, either for the first time or else at a younger age than previously, a number of delicate issues such as cyberstalking, alcohol and drug abuse, gambling, the use of defibrillators, and race-based violence.
It’s hard to put my finger on exactly why, but much of this stuff makes me uneasy. Perhaps it’s because I worry that kids will be losing their innocence too early and be exposed to issues they lack the maturity to process well. Maybe it’s the realization that the new content will subtract even more time and emphasis from what is after all schools’ fundamental mission of teaching academics. And, since it appears that most schools are not exactly doing a stellar job of teaching academics, I’m not convinced that the new material will be presented properly either. Topics like this need sensitive handling, and unfortunately I have noticed that the kind of teachers who are attracted to teaching this sort of stuff are not necessarily the people I would like talking to my own kids about it.