Ontario
Premier: 8-Year Olds Will Be Taught
Sex Ed
Dalton McGuinty defended the
province's new
sex education curriculum Tuesday,
saying
children as young as eight years old
should
be learning about a variety of
issues,
including gender identity and sexual
orientation. "I think I speak with
an
understanding of the information
available
to children today. They are going to
get
this information. We [can] provide
it in a
format and in a venue in which we
have some
control, or they can just get it
entirely on
their own and be informed by
potentially
uninformed sources like their
friends at
school." The revised curriculum,
which
will be implemented in Ontario
schools
beginning in the fall, will see
Grade 3
students being taught about gender
identity
and sexual orientation. This is the
first
time this topic has been specified
in the
sex education curriculum. Students
in Grade
6 will learn about masturbation and
wet
dreams while those in Grade 7 will
be taught
about oral and anal sex.