My mum answered the the questions when they arose, and that was probably about 8 through to 10, its just information. Best not to have 1 converstaion but an ongoing conversation, let him go away and reflect a bit, come back if something bothers.confuses him. Better to do it early as much less awkward IMO. What you are describing is the playground, we had some whacky ideas and I was tryin to get into girls knickers from about 6, I didn’t know why, but that didn’t stop me trying, quite the 6yr old sex pest now I think about it… 😳

When I was 7 my first girlfriend flashed. I told her Mum.

I think I was about 11/12 before I became ‘aware’ of girls as the opposite sex. I was too much into playing in the woods, abandoned buildings, riding my bike etc etc.

I guess nowadays theres less of ^ hence the earlier(?) awareness to boys?

I guess nowadays theres less of ^ hence the earlier(?) awareness to boys?

dunno about that, i spent my childhood playing in the woods yet i had the whole sex chat including condoms, AIDs, homosexuality, difficult births etc sometime before my 7th birthday.

i think you can learn about it young but when it comes down to it, until the girls you spend time with start developing sexually there’s little you can do as a young boy apart from bask in your extensive knowledge when it comes to the playground and other kids coming out with absolute rubbish cos their parents haven’t sat them down and told them the truth yet.

ahhh our school was much bigger, in fleet (listed currently in the UK’s top ten list of big spenders on sex toys) and my parent’s did their best to ensure i knew about the good and the bad in the world from a young age.

at 8 i was told they had no problem with my trying drugs when i grew up as long as i ‘make and informed decision’ 😆 this conversation happened whilst pingu was on tv pissing on the floor cos he was too desperate to get to the toilet in time.

I reckon that I was 10 when I received ‘the talk’. I remember it not making any sense and picking the rest up at school! Didn’t start being interested in girls until at least 13 possibly later….

Yeah just go with the whole hippy option, that way he won’t become repressed later on.

I don’t claim to be a perfect parent, or even an above average parent, but our method is openness and honesty. So, if son/daughter asks, or comes out with something that is wrong, we educate and correct as needed.

Our first horror experience was when junior (aged 11) came out of school crying hysterically telling me I had to come in to see his teacher, and that someone’s dad was going to kill him. After consoling him that nothing in life is worth getting THAT upset about and reassuring him that no ones dad was going to be doing anything at all, I suggested it might be wise to tell me the whole story before I got to hear it third hand.

Apparently he had said to a girl “I want to lick you mini”.

Now, I’m of the Benny Hill/Carry On generation, so sexual innuendo and general immature tom foolery is the order of the day in our household, but we don’t use language like that, have never discussed a sex act like that, and certainly teach junior what is and isn’t appropriate, and how that changes depending on who we’re with and where we are.

In the meeting I let his (very nice) female teacher repeat what was said (just to see her squirm – shoot me). It was obvious that our lad had been put up to it by another boy, and his teacher was a lovely lass and was happy to put it down to boys being boys (i.e. no further action) if the girls parents agreed, which they did. The most disappointing aspect of the whole sad affair was the girl he chose to say it to. Only the oikiest girl in the bloody year!

If any good has come from this (no pun intended), at least your son has given STW one of it’s mots enjoyable threads for some time. 😆

Aren’t you supposed to rub his nose in it saying “who did this? who did this? Bad boy”….or something.

I don’t recall ever having the birds and the bees conversation with my Dad…I found out myself that you grow babies in your Ollies.

So I was pretty well screwed from early on I suppose…

I blame the priests.

All you could ever need birds and bees

My daughter’s class (year 4 hence 8/9 year olds) had an introductory lesson on it at school this past term. The school also recommended a couple of books we could show them about body changes that will start happening before too long. The class was split into boys and girls for that bit – at the parents meeting a few days before, so we could see the video they were going to be shown and ask questions a parent asked whether they were too young, to be quite firmly told that if they wanted their child to sit it out they could, but they’d hear it from the others anyway. And very scarily, that at least one girl in that year group has started to show early signs of puberty already.

My daughter’s friend is a second daughter, with an older sister, and hence already knew quite a bit about it, so it transpired. Having learnt that sex isn’t just for making babies, but also for fun, and also knowing that some men like other men (and lady-lady) – she put 2 and 2 together and was most disappointed to not find out exactly how gay people had sex 😯

Not sure whether / when / how to broach that subject……..

I was going to say they’ve left that a bit late.

But then.

I seem to recall the NHS quote puberty for girls as started ON AVERAGE (so there are cases outside this range) from 8 to 12, and lasting on average 4 years.

This of course means you can have fully adult (in dictionary terms) girls in the same class as many boys (and some girls) who haven’t even started puberty. It’s one of the reasons some girls start gravitating towards much (comparatively) older boys. And of course you get kids almost a year apart in age in the same class, and when puberty gets going, a year is a long time.

LOL at this thread – will be putting Google on to safe search later tonight as my 9 year old has his mate popping round for tea tomorrow…..

I never had the chat with my parents either. When I was about 21 my mum came out with the classic “Your dad never sat you down to talk about the birds and the bees….maybe he should, he might learn something…” 😯

Type sorted above – nothing to see here!

I can’t comment personally as I’ve never used it, but I got this from a fellow tech the other day. May be useful.

https://dns.norton.com/dnsweb/dnsForHome.do

Basically 3 levels of filtering, just choose dns server to suit, nothing more complicated than router config.

(Yes, client level is better or open dns accounts etc, but you know you’ll explain these at length and they will never use them. At least these are simple and will stop consoles etc- it’s an easy answer for us and a “better than nothing” answer for them)