Beijing's education authority has denied reports that Growing Steps is the city's first sex education textbook for primary and middle school students.

Growing steps.[File photo]

Controversy has raged over the book's frank descriptions of sexual intercourse and its explicit content, following reports that the book was to be tried out in 18 schools in Beijing. Some parents said it was pornography for kids.

However, according to Xian Lianping, spokesman of the Beijing municipal commission of education, the book will not be distributed to students or parents and there is no plan to introduce a textbook on sex.

Xian said Growing Steps was discussion material, written by a primary school, for the 2011 Youth Sex Education International Forum and is being used to help form Beijing's sex education plan for primary and middle school students.

There is a strict process for developing a textbook, Xian said. It calls for proposals to be made and reasoning, writing and editing to be done.

Currently, young students gain basic physiological knowledge using a biology textbook in middle school, according to Luo Jie, deputy director of the Beijing municipal commission of education.

Sex education is essential and the current plan is to include sex education in each subject, rather than creating an individual sex education course, according to Zhang Meimei, director of the Capital Normal University's sex education research center.

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