Online porn is a difficult subject.

Parents don’t want to believe that their kids are watching porn. But if they are computer literate, and over the age of about 6, they are probably watching porn.

I’ve had patients, age 7, who admitted that they had gone to a porn site and watched “sex.” This was accompanied by giggling and embarrassment. But behind the giggling was confusion over what sex is and why people are watching this stuff.

Older kids, from ages 10 through adolescence, may understand more about the meaning of the word sex and why people watch porn; but don’t assume that they have accurate ideas about either one of these.

Al Vernaccio, a teacher at Philadelphia’s Friends Central School, teaches sexual literacy starting in elementary school. He talks about puberty to fourth and fifth graders, continues with middle-school discussions about romantic crushes, and in high school he talks about the question: What is sex?

As I mentioned, he finds that kids are........

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