Week 10 Post 1

Chapter 16 discussed a number of different issues faced by adolescents.  One issue that interested me was the difference in sex education among different countries and in the United States.  European schools start sex education in elementary school and in middle school, children are taught about sexual responsibility, masturbation, same-sex couples, and oral and anal sex.  Sex education in the United States do not cover as much knowledge in their classes and education varies in each state.  The better curriculum in European schools is one reason why the teenage pregnancy rates in European countries is less than half of the teenage pregnancy rates in the United States.  I think that we need more education in the United States because adolescents are starting to have sex at younger ages and they are poorly educated.  The first time I was taught about sex by the school's education system was in 9th grade.  I believe we need to be teaching children about sex in the beginning of middle school, 5th grade.  There are 12 year old girls who are pregnant.  When I was 12, I don't think I knew what sex was and I definitely wasn't thinking about doing it.  Schools need to provide more sex education so adolescents are better educated and hopefully the teenage pregnancy rate in the United States drops.