Real sex education questions asked of a teacher

[SatansHobbit]

My Mum gave me the "talk" when I was about 10yo, and I didn't believe her.

We got our sex-ed from a guy in our year 6 class, Jimmy Michalopolus, who informed us at recess that a root was in the front part of a girl, but a f*ck was up a girl's bum...and we naively relied on him, because he was a worldly 11yo. The other pearl of wisdom we got from Jim was that girls could orgasm easily simply by shoving something "up there", whilst us boys had to try really hard for ages to make something happen.

Boy, did Jim dial a wrong number.

[FormicaArchonis]

Originally Posted by barbrainey

There were no sex education classes in any of the schools I attended. And this was in the 1960s. I had to learn it from books I found in my high school library.

I had to learn from an encyclopedia and assorted basic medical-themed books at home. My school didn't have a well-appointed library. Sex ed started at grade 7, but was all coed. Out of sheer embarrassment, I asked my mom to refuse to sign the permission slip for it. Teacher was rather angry at me over it, and had me read books aimed at grade 4 students in the library during sex ed class.

I later learned several good reasons NOT to have taken that class. When it became mandatory (no permission slip to not sign) in grade 9, I was flabbergasted at how information-free it was. They were just getting to condoms. Yes, the concept of a condom took them THREE YEARS OF SEX ED to get to. The primary focus of the class was self-esteem. Feeling good about talking to the opposite sex, not letting rejection get you down, etc. Was more of a dating ed class than sex ed.

Originally Posted by barbrainey

I recall some of my classmates in the seventh grade actually thought a male could get pregnant if a female f***ed him! How ignorant can kids be!?

You'd be amazed. We had a student who was fond of making his own dirty jokes. Said jokes made it obvious that even after a year of sex ed (the information-free one above) he didn't know that girls and boys were different below the navel. Still not 100% sure if it was his habit of sleeping in class or the info-free class that caused it. Since one girl NOT known for sleeping through class didn't understand why you never heard of a pregnant six-year-old, I'm almost leaning towards incompetent teaching.

[mizzie]

Wow, FormicaArchonis, that's actually really sad. I mean, if that's all you're going to do, just skip it altogether. Geez.

Oh, forgot to share this one before. After the aformentioned 5th grade "puberty" class, the girls were all given a free pad. A bunch ran to the bathroom right after the class to put it on. () I heard them talking later about how it kind of hurt... they had put them on sticky side up! I actually knew how you were supposed to use it and when I asked why they did that, they said "how else is it going to stay on?" Oh well, if they were going to be snarky with me, I wasn't going to help.

[KingDavid8]

This is probably just an urban legend, but I've heard about a girl who once asks her sex ed teacher, in front of her class, "Is there salt in semen?"
"No," says the teacher.
"Then how come it tastes salty?" she responds.

David

[Ellestar]

Originally Posted by KingDavid8

This is probably just an urban legend, but I've heard about a girl who once asks her sex ed teacher, in front of her class, "Is there salt in semen?"
"No," says the teacher.
"Then how come it tastes salty?" she responds.

David

I think the legend goes something like:

Teacher: Semen has a good deal of sugar/glucose in it.
Girl: Then why does it taste so salty? *embarrassed, she flees the class*
Teacher: *calls after her* Because sweet receptors are on the tip of your tongue and salt receptors are at the back!

Ah, here it is: http://www.snopes.com/college/risque/salty.asp

[imjustasteph]

Originally Posted by SatansHobbit

My Mum gave me the "talk" when I was about 10yo, and I didn't believe her.

My son, aged 7, asked me a bit back, something to the effect of "Mom, I know how the baby comes out, but how does it get in there? I mean, I know it's something the mom and dad do, but what?"

I answered and he said, "Mom, are you just making that up?"

[smittykins]

My late husband told me that his sixth-grade class was shown a video with scenes of a boy and girl...ummm...pleasuring themselves. This would have been around 1975. I'm still not sure he was telling the truth; this is a small, rural, conservative town, and I would think the parents would have been up in arms over their kids seeing something like that in school. I attended sixth grade in suburban Syracuse, and we were shown nothing like that.(Just the girls-only menstruation film, and I didn't even get samples...just a pamphlet.)

[Sister Ray]

Originally Posted by moonfall

Were you in college before you figured out the error like I was?.

No, just high school.

Fortunately, for a lot of questions I had I knew books would provide me with correct answers. I did this once when a girl who had to pick up trash on the playground (punishment for something or other) complained she had to pick up a condom wrapper. Everyone listening was grossed out, and I mimicked this. She accused me, correctly, of not knowing what one was. As soon as I got home from school I looked it up in the dictionary.

Sister "and was not grossed out; however she wondered who would have sex on an elementary school playground" Ray

[RCIAG]

I remember seeing the girls film in 6th grade & thinking that I already knew all that stuff, I wanted to see the boys film because I knew zero about boy stuff.

Looking back, it was probably for the best that we didn't get to see the boys film because we probably would've been grossed out.

After the film we could anonymously write down any questions we had on slips of paper & pass them forward & the teachers would answer them.

My question was "How is an abortion performed?"

Needless to say my question wasn't picked!

I have no clue why that interested me at the time or why I asked it. Maybe I thought all the other stuff was boring since I already knew it & since we couldn't see the boys film I wanted some real info on something that would be worth knowing.

But honestly, all these years later I can't recall why I had to ask that question but I knew I had to ask it.

[Varenka]

When I was in 6th grade they seperated the girls and boys and showed us girls a movie about a girl getting her period while she was spending the night at her friends house. So friend's mom makes a pancake uterus and ovaries for the girls for breakfast so she could explain what was going on. Afterwards all the boys at my school wanted to know why the girls said they never wanted pancakes again.

[Kamino Neko]

Originally Posted by Ramblin' Dave

I think I've shared this story before: in eighth grade, my best friend (yes, really my friend, not me) and I were talking about another kid in our class who was a real dim bulb, and the friend said something along the lines of, "He's so dumb, he probably thinks oral sex is..." and then he described exactly what oral sex really is.

I have to know... What did your friend think it was?

(For myself, for a long time, I couldn't picture how oral sex on a woman would work - I knew of the clitoris, and using hands I certainly could imagine (and I don't even just mean penetrating with fingers, I mean rubbing the clitoris and external genitalia, too)...and I knew it existed...for some bizarre reason, the actual mechanics escaped me. I figured it out a long time before it was an issue, however.)

[Ramblin' Dave]

Originally Posted by Kamino Neko

I have to know... What did your friend think it was?

Phone sex, I think.

I remember seeing a film that set out to dispel the myths that kids supposedly thought about sex, things like, "You can't get pregnant the first time." There was also a part about different contraceptives that could be use and how effective they were. I don't hear anything about this any more, but I remember Coca-Cola being used to kill the sperm.

Originally Posted by Dactyl

- Did Gay people have to wear anal tampons to stop their organs falling out their anus? (this put me off being gay for a good five years! - you can blame the tories and section 28 for that).

ETA: To give you all a laugh, until quite recently I thought the "female opening" was on the front, placed in approximately the same position as the penis. In my defence, I never had any need to think otherwise.

Apparently my mother was someone put off being anything for some years because she believed she dfidn't have a vagina.

She knew that she should have an anus, and a urethra and a vagina. But there were obviously only 2 orifices there. She could go to toilet fine so she must have no vagina.

As she hadn't even known about menstruation prior to her first period she didn't know enough about that to know she must be wrong.

I think she found out around 19 (when she was working as a nurse possibly) and looking back she doesn't really regret it as she feels she probably wouldn't have benefited from losing her virginity earlier. She still holds a grudge against her misinforming and uninforming mother though.

Originally Posted by mizzie

Oh, forgot to share this one before. After the aformentioned 5th grade "puberty" class, the girls were all given a free pad. A bunch ran to the bathroom right after the class to put it on. () I heard them talking later about how it kind of hurt... they had put them on sticky side up

Did that by accident once. Back when I was at school - I had my period and was in the toilets changing my pad etc. when the bell for class rang. Threw the old pad away, ripped off the sticky tape backing for the new one, swooshed it into my knickers and pulled them up. Um, something went wrong there. Definitely painful to remove and I was late for class that day. Thankfully no one asked me to explain why.

Originally Posted by Varenka

Afterwards all the boys at my school wanted to know why the girls said they never wanted pancakes again.

When surrealists make sex-education films

Victoria J

[zerocool]

Originally Posted by smittykins

My late husband told me that his sixth-grade class was shown a video with scenes of a boy and girl...ummm...pleasuring themselves. This would have been around 1975. I'm still not sure he was telling the truth; this is a small, rural, conservative town, and I would think the parents would have been up in arms over their kids seeing something like that in school. I attended sixth grade in suburban Syracuse, and we were shown nothing like that.(Just the girls-only menstruation film, and I didn't even get samples...just a pamphlet.)

At my high school in Australia (either 7th or 9th grade '97/'99, can't remember which), we watched that, but it was in infrared, so you could see the increased blood flow to the area, and also the result in the case of the male.

[purpleiguana]

Originally Posted by Sister Ray

I used to think women urinated out the clitoris. I've explained this one a few times, but my logic was that men urinate out the penis. Women do not have an actual penis, but must have some structure that allows for urination. The vagina and anus do not (I knew they already had roles, and ruled them out) so the clitoris must be the structure. It even looks like a small penis.

Sister "don't ask me how long I believed that one..." Ray

I used to think that too!

I also had a friend who, when we were 9 or 10, was terrified she was pregnant. She and a male friend the same age had played "doctor" 3 years before. Yes, years. My genius response? "Nah, I'm sure there would be a baby after 2 years. Three? No way."

[Arriah]

In fairness to your younger self, pregnancy does seem to take about 2-3 years once you get toward the end.

[Starla]

#10 isn't that odd of a question. I was surprised to find out that the semen wasn't somehow absorbed into the woman's body after ejaculation. I had not thought about it a lot, but I was surprised when I was told it just kind of leaks out later. Seems rather inefficient, really.

My mom told me when I was a teenager, I think as an attempt to gauge my response so she could figure out if my boyfriend and I really weren't having sex. I only told one other friend and she was surprised too, saying the same thing that she assumed it would absorb somehow.

[purpleiguana]

Originally Posted by Arriah

In fairness to your younger self, pregnancy does seem to take about 2-3 years once you get toward the end.

You are not wrong there!

[Artemis]

Originally Posted by Sister Ray

I used to think women urinated out the clitoris. I've explained this one a few times, but my logic was that men urinate out the penis. Women do not have an actual penis, but must have some structure that allows for urination. The vagina and anus do not (I knew they already had roles, and ruled them out) so the clitoris must be the structure. It even looks like a small penis.

Sister "don't ask me how long I believed that one..." Ray

I knew a girl who believed that in college. (And her boyfriend thought girls did pee out the anus!)