Conception of Sex Education in School Educational Programmes of Selected Elementary Schools and Grammar Schools

For children and adolescents, sex education is a topic important for personal development and future life. Given the nature of the subject, views of the problematics of sex education vary both between and among students and teachers. The goal of this thesis is to analyze educational programmes of elementary and secondary high schools with a focus on sex education-related topics and analysis of natural history and biology textbooks in the context of sex education. This thesis also explores the relationship of students and teachers to this problematics via the use of questionnaires. Analysis of school education programmes revealed differences in inclusion of sex education-related topics in specific school subjects and in teaching time allocated to these subjects. All analyzed human anatomy-depicting 8th grade natural history textbooks include sex education-related topics. Results from questionnaires showed that children recieve sex education-related knowledge primarily from friends and school, despite the fact that majority of them is not comfortable discussing this topic with teachers