London, Oct 25 (ANI): Schoolchildren as young as ten should learn about pornography as part of the national curriculum, a teaching union in the UK suggests.
The National Association of Headteachers has said that primary school teachers needed to respond to the fact that children were now getting a large amount of their information about sex from the internet.
They said that sex education guidelines are hopelessly out of date and cannot cope with the "overtly sexualised world" in which children are now growing up, the Daily Mail reported.
But many family campaigners argue that teaching children about pornography could actually make the situation worse, because children could be introduced to the concept for the first time.
Campaigners said that the easy access of porn online is harming children, and the NSPCC says they have seen an upsurge in calls from teenagers upset by what they have seen.
However, another teaching union - the National Union of Teachers - said it was too early to start teaching children about porn at primary school.
NAHT policy adviser Sion Humphreys said teachers should hold lessons on the "impact of pornography."
"Children are growing up in an overtly sexualised world," he told BBC Radio 1's Newsbeat programme.
"That includes easy access to porn and they need the skills to deal with it.
"We would support children being taught in an age-appropriate way about the impact of pornography as part of a statutory Personal Social Health Education programme," he said.
Humphreys said that lessons could start from primary school but that the material would depend on age.
"Evidence suggests ten isn't too young to start lessons on pornography, but it wouldn't be a full-on lesson but the grounding would be laid down,'" he said.
At the moment, PSHE, which includes sex and relationships education, is not compulsory in England, unlike other parts of the UK.
Biological facts are part of all lessons in secondary school science lessons. Beyond that parents have the right to withdraw their children from any sex education. (ANI)