Parents in Hull are “disgusted” after children as young as eleven were asked to consider different types of pornography and other inappropriate topics for homework. Eleven to 14-year-olds at Archbishop Sentamu Academy were told to define topics including hardcore and transsexual pornography.
Local mother Mrs. Taylor called the PSHE homework “completely inappropriate”, saying her eleven-year-old daughter does not need to know “things that would destroy her mind”.
‘Sick’
Mrs. Taylor said: “She was only in primary school last year living her best life, now she is being asked to search for hardcore pornography”. She added: “Now it’s making me think what they are learning about at school that we don’t know about. We only know about this because they’re home learning.”
Leon Dagon, whose 13-year-old sister also attends the school, saw the homework and took to Facebook to warn parents. He said: “Luckily I found the work otherwise she would have typed this stuff into Google and you know what would have come up and that makes me feel sick. I felt sick thinking she was going to go onto the computer to search it up.”
Parents
The Academy has apologised “unreservedly” for any offence caused, claiming that students were not expected to search the terms online but instead use the materials provided. But Revd. Melvin Tinker, Vicar of St John Newland in Hull, told The Christian Institute: “It was naïve in the extreme to think that children wouldn’t use the internet to look up these terms.”
He continued: “The Principal has promised to ensure all materials are fully age appropriate. What does that mean? When is ‘hardcore pornography’ an age-appropriate topic for school-children at all? The answer, of course, is that it is not.”
Revd. Tinker added: “The Academy needs to stop listening to the self-appointed ‘experts’ at the Sex Education Forum and start paying a lot more attention to local parents, to the wellbeing of the children and to its legal duties.”
Unnecessary
The Christian Institute’s Education Officer, John Denning, said the lessons were completely unnecessary. “Schools should not be teaching in this way. Statutory guidance recommends schools warn students of the damage pornography can do: not catalogue different types in a way that could encourage them to view it.
“It is good to see parents standing up for their rights and the rights of their children. I hope many more do the same.”