Family Life Coordinator at Planned Parenthood, Karen Fabien, said many schoolchildren do not know their private parts and cannot distinguish when someone touches them inappropriately. She made this revelation as part of the discovery the organization made when they reached out to teach sex education to primary school pupils.
The Planned Parenthood Federation is taking sex education to primary and secondary schools across the island. The organization is even reaching out to preschoolers to get them to understand the concept of puberty and sex. They taught 70 students of Newtown Primary School on what it means to be touched the right way and what it means to be touched inappriately.
“Some of the children don’t even know what a private part is,” Fabien said. “Some of them do not know the difference between a good touch and a bad touch. Some of them were asking interesting questions, some of them didn’t even know what to ask. But at the end of the day we believe we have achieved our goal, we got to educate the students and we’re pleased.”
The family life coordinator said it is imperative to teach sex education to students of all ages because child abuse and sexual molestation have become rampant in Dominica. She said the rising incidence of HIV/AIDS cases underscore the urgency for teaching proper sex education. She urged parents and teachers to train children on sex and sexuality in relation to the changes that occur within their body as well as dealing with sexual urges.
“If we have education from the school, if we have education from the parents, and then we have Planned Parenthood and HIV/AIDS Response Unit coming in and making it holistic, then we know for sure we got the message across,” Fabien said.
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