Parents at New York City’s elite private Dalton School have come out in force against videos dealing with the topic of masturbation that were shown to their first-grade children.
Parents who send their children to the $55,000 a year school have “bombarded” the school with complaints about Dalton Director of Health & Wellness Justine Ang Fonte’s curriculum, the New York Post reported.
Fonte showed 6-year-olds a cartoon during her sex ed class that featured small children discussing touching themselves “because it feels good.”
“Hey, how come my penis gets big sometimes and points up in the air?” a little boy cartoon character says in the video.
“Sometimes I touch my penis because it feels good,” he adds.
“Sometimes when I’m in my bath or when mom puts me to bed, I like to touch my vulva too,” a little girl character says.
An adult character describes what an erection and a clitoris are and tells them not to touch their private parts in public.
The curriculum reportedly includes multiple lessons on gender identity and gender expression as well.
Fonte insisted that she does not use the word “masturbation” in her classes, but parents still expressed outrage that they were not consulted about the material being presented to their young children.
“We are furious,” one Dalton mother told The Post. “We were horrified to learn this was shown to our first-grade 6- and 7-year-old kids without our knowledge or consent. But it’s so hard to fight back because you’ll get canceled and your child will suffer.”
Fonte previously came under fire from parents at another elite Manhattan school for a “porn literacy” workshop she ran for high school students, part of a health and sexuality workshop, the Post previously reported.
About 120 juniors, girls and boys, at Columbia Grammar & Preparatory School were subjected to Fonte’s class, called “Pornography Literacy: An intersectional focus on mainstream porn,” which presented them with explicit material including slides.
Fonte’s class included material such as semi-nude women in bondage, porn genres including “incest-themed,” “barely legal,” and “kink and BDSM,” and the most searched pornography terms of 2019 including “creampie,” “anal,” and “gangbang.”
Parents initially heard about the objectionable first grade sex-ed classes last fall but were reportedly assured that they had “misinterpreted” what the class was about.
The head of Dalton School, Jim Best, announced last month that he was stepping down to focus on “other exciting and inspiring opportunities” as the school weathers criticism from parents.
Recently, a Texas school district found itself in a similar controversy and apologizing to parents after books with inappropriate content including graphic sex scenes were assigned to teens as part of the reading curriculum.
Some of the books that Leander Independent School District north of Austin provided high schoolers included extremely graphic sex scenes with BDSM themes and the use of sex toys as well as frequent foul language.