Where Outspoken stands on the government consultation on relationships and sex education (RSE)
Updated: Oct 15, 2019
Near midnight on 12 February 2018, the website for the Department for Education (DfE) seemed close to crashing. The deadline was imminent for contributing to the government’s consultation on updating relationships and sex education (RSE) and personal, social, health, economic education (PSHE).
The goal was to update guidelines that have not been revisited for 17 years in order to “make sure pupils are being taught the knowledge they need to thrive in the modern world”.
The call for evidence, entitled Changes to the Teaching of Sex & Relationship Education and PSHE, appealed to parents, children, young people, teachers – to anyone at all – to answer eight questions.
Here are the answers submitted by Outspoken Sex Ed and by Teaching Lifeskills – the educational consultancy run by Outspoken co-founder Yoan Reed…
1) How is your organisation involved with relationships and sex education (RSE) and/or personal, social, health and economic education (PSHE)?
OUTSPOKEN REPLY
Outspoken Sex Ed for Parents is out to empower parents to talk openly with their children about sex-education issues.
Outspoken panel discussions, group discussions and seminars for parents focus on such relationships and sex education (RSE) topics as porn, sexting, consent, pleasure, body image, puberty, unwanted touching, appropriate language and gender stereotyping. These events spark conversation among parents that is the catalyst for them to start an ongoing conversation at home.
Outspoken was co-founded by two professionals with a grounding in RSE: Leah Jewett – formerly of the Guardian/Observer but currently working-group lead on RSE for the Women’s Equality Party – and Yoan Reed, RSE facilitator/educator/consultant, founder of Teaching Lifeskills and author of an MA dissertation from King's College London about parents’ explicit and implicit RSE needs entitled ‘What’s out there for us, putting us in a better position?’ Parental needs for engagement in children’s relationships and sex education.
Encouraging parental engagement around RSE issues is Outspoken’s remit, focus and driving force.
TEACHING LIFESKILLS REPLY
Teaching Lifeskills offers relevant, engaging and effective approaches to RSE based on needs rather than a prescriptive model of teaching.
Using experiential, interactive and age-appropriate teaching methods, we facilitate individuals, groups and educational establishments where there is a need to know more about RSE or how to teach it effectively. Assessment for and of learning is based on continuous evaluation and monitoring through self- and peer assessment.
Teaching Lifeskills offers the following services:
RSE Provision and Policy review in consultation with key stakeholders
RSE Needs Assessment and Analysis of year groups
Development and delivery of scheme of work informed by the above
Training and support to staff delivering RSE
Evaluation report following completion of a programme or workshop to account for learning in RSE
Information sessions to inform parents about schools’ RSE vision and provision
Delivery of RSE sessions and workshops
Key Stage 1 & 2: Learning about the body and how to stay safe
Key Stage 2: Prepare for Puberty
Key Stage 3: Puberty, Leavers’ Programme
Key stage 3 & 4: Contraception and STIs, Leavers’ Programme
Teaching Lifeskills offers the following parent seminars:
Bodies, Staying Safe and Friendships Skills
Let’s Talk About Puberty
Guiding Teens in a Sexualised World
As the autonomous practitioner who runs Teaching Lifeskills, I consult current educational legislation and best practice. My work is informed by regular CPD and through my partnership with Sex Education Forum (NCB), among other organisations.
2) Thinking about relationships education in primary schools, what do you believe are the three most important subject areas that should be taught for different age groups/key stages and why?
OUTSPOKEN REPLY
To combat, early on, the increase of peer-on-peer sexual abuse; to raise awareness around unwanted touching, and to combat the internalisation of gender stereotyping it is vital that primary-school aged children are taught – in gender-neutral, LGBT-inclusive language – about:
PERSONAL SPACE / BOUNDARIES Concepts around bodily autonomy and bodily integrity form the cornerstones for understanding respect and, later on, sexual consent. This is a key safeguarding issue: when taught anatomically correct names for body parts, young children have the vocabulary to accurately articulate anything negative that has happened to them and to understand the differences between safe and unsafe touch
GENDER STEREOTYPING It’s vital for children to question, as early as possible, the narrow, limiting ways that society defines girls/women and boys/men which have damaging emotional/psychological repercussions and societal implications. Children as young as two years old, and by age three and four, have rigid socialised views of what females/males are capable of doing and becoming. This underpins not only their respect and empathy for others but also their self-respect, self-esteem and aspirations/ambitions
BODY IMAGE This issue is affecting younger and younger children and often their self-esteem. They are exposed – via TV shows, films, ads, the media, online activity – to body shaming and negative representations of body types that don’t fit an idealised norm. They are already alert to the constant evaluation, policing and objectification of – predominantly girls’/women’s – physical appearances. It’s vital to embrace physical diversity, including disability, and to lay body-positive groundwork
TEACHING LIFESKILLS REPLY
A spiral curriculum to build on knowledge, skills and behaviour should include:
Learning about diverse relationships and family units to promote tolerance and equality. In line with Equality Act 2010, learning needs to emphasise gender equality, challenge gender stereotyping and be inclusive of LGBT rights and how these may be reflected in family units and in society
Learning about life cycles, including how babies are made, and prepare for the physical and emotional changes in puberty for both genders. This must include learning the correct vocabulary for sexual anatomy. The teaching approach should emphasise gender equality and topics such as masturbation and menstruation need to be addressed for both genders
The above points lend themselves to learning about personal boundaries, unwanted touching, assertiveness and consent, helping to equip children with the language and skills to assert agency and bodily autonomy
Through reflecting on my practice teaching RSE, children who have learned about these basic RSE elements at primary level are much better equipped to move onto secondary school with confidence and skills to keep themselves safe and open to further learning.
Putting learning into the context of a loving and respectful relationship is an important aspect of the delivery.
All three topics are building blocks in a spiral RSE curriculum.
3) Thinking about relationships and sex education in secondary schools, what do you believe are the three most important subject areas that should be taught for different age groups/key stages and why?
OUTSPOKEN REPLY
To combat the increase of peer-on-peer sexual abuse and unwanted sexual touching in schools and to raise awareness of #MeToo issues, for secondary-school aged children it is crucial that there is discussion – in gender-neutral, LGBT-inclusive language – of:
PORNOGRAPHY Porn is the centrifugal issue around which so many relationships and sex education (RSE) subjects revolve: body image, self-esteem, harmful gender stereotypes, unrealistic expectations of sex, violence, the degradation of women, pleasure and consent. The epidemic accessibility of hardcore mainstream porn has detrimental effects on both girls and boys
CONSENT News stories have driven heated debate around gradations of consent from enthusiastic mutual consent to non-verbal cues. Discussing these nuances unpacks the predatory social construction of sex being sought by men and relinquished by women. Consent is twinned with pleasure
PLEASURE This is at the heart of talking about consent. Though closeness, communicativeness, fun and enjoyment are a natural part of sex, which is a natural part of life, they often go unmentioned in RSE. Culturally and educationally, sex is still seen through the filter of the male gaze and the objectification of the female body. Sex education primarily focuses on male anatomy, wet dreams and male masturbation. Girls’/women’s experiences are characterised by absence. Many anatomical diagrams do not include the clitoris; periods – along with the words vagina and vulva – are still taboo; female desire is rarely discussed. All of this leads to a disconnect in some girls’/women’s understanding of their bodies, their desire, their sexuality, themselves
TEACHING LIFESKILLS REPLY
Building on from learning in primary schools, children should continue the spiral curriculum:
Relationships education to include learning about positive relationships and recognising unhealthy relationships. This includes all kinds of relationships in their lived experiences: physical, emotional and online
Continued learning about the physical and emotional changes in sexual development that are inclusive of topics relating to sexual orientation and sexual identity and gives a positive view of human sexuality including equality, shared responsibility and pleasure
Factual information relating to sexual health and rights and signposting to accessing support and help
4) We are particularly interested in understanding stakeholder views on relationships education and RSE which are specific to the digital context. Are there important aspects of ensuring safe online relationships that would not otherwise be covered in wider relationships education and RSE, or as part of the computing curriculum?
OUTSPOKEN REPLY
To counter the impact of porn and other detrimental online influences, it is vital to inspire children and young people to be questioning, self-policing, active consumers of both media and social media – and to become critical thinkers.
Digital skills already form the basis of the computing curriculum.
Digital life skills should be an integral part of the PSHE curriculum.
But most underlying issues around online safety fall within the remit of relationships and sex education (RSE) and the challenging topics it covers.
Today’s children, the so-called digital natives, are canaries down a very dark mine. They have engaged electronically – often from a young age – with friends and the wider world via the powerful portable computer that is their smartphone.
A focus on both prevention and protection is key, as is education around sharing content – particularly sexual material – online.
On a mental-health level, safeguarding children and young people online includes looking at…
digital pressures from within immediate family, school and friendship circles – including social media, sexting, peer-on-peer abuse, cyber-bullying
influences from the outside world – including the dangers of online grooming, live streaming, sexting, sextortion, child sexual abuse images CSAI and especially the impact of porn
On a both a physical- and mental-health level, safeguarding children and young people online includes looking at technology in terms of…