Teaching reproduction

[WomenShouldWinWomensSports]

Hi all,
I'm generally a lurker on these boards, but occasionally comment. I'm returning to the science classroom after 10 years away. When I was last teaching, wokefuckery wasn't really a thing. I'm trying to get some lessons planned in advance and have hit a wall with reproduction in Key Stage 3.
How can I make my lessons open and inclusive of young women/girls and give them an open space to ask "no stupid questions" when I'm constantly dreading people expecting me to affirm the Emperor's New Clothes? I'm worried about basic stuff like being accused of erasure for putting "male reproductive system" and "female reproductive system" diagrams on the board. Or getting in trouble for referring to pregnant women as... pregnant women.
And I haven't even gotten to thinking about how to teach chromosomes/inheritance/etc. Or "observed at birth" vs "assigned at birth".
Is it still ok to say in the classroom, "sex" is biological and "gender" is something else?
Does anyone have any links to resources or advice for how I'm supposed to teach this topic now without setting my career on fire or outright lying?

I tried Googling and all I could find was more affirmative, anecdotal TWAW stuff with really bad misuse of stats.

Just teach them the truth. If you get awkward questions, just say you can’t give a view on controversial issues without breaking your responsibility towards political neutrality.

What have you googled? If you google KS3 reproduction resources, you'll find they haven't changed much in the last 10 years.

I think you’re over-thinking it.

just stick to the national curriculum:

”Reproduction
 reproduction in humans (as an example of a mammal), including the structure and function of the male and female reproductive systems, menstrual cycle (without details of hormones), gametes, fertilisation, gestation and birth, to include the effect of maternal lifestyle on the foetus through the placenta
 reproduction in plants, including flower structure, wind and insect pollination, fertilisation, seed and fruit formation and dispersal, including quantitative investigation of some dispersal mechanisms.”

I'd take the pragmatic approach and go by how the syllabus/exams phrase things. What I mean is presumably "womb carrier" wouldn't get the marks in their exams so the word woman is correct. If a student brings it up then that would be a legitimate defence or am I naive?

Just teach it as you have always done. Refer to science scheme of work. They haven't changed GCSE biology yet, or the textbooks.

That's how I dealt with teaching creationists back when I started teaching. "This is what will bring the exam" and don't get into any arguments in class.

Be in the exam sorry, autocucumber.

@achillestoes thanks, that's a good line to take. I'm so good at putting my foot in my mouth without even meaning to that this huge elephant in the room is really worrying me.
@TheFallenMadonna The resources for the actual in-classroom lessons aren't the issue. I'm not looking for diagrams etc, I have boatloads of that stuff and can knock up all sorts in Photoshop. I'm looking for resources or guidance covering what I'm supposed to do when a kid puts their hand up and goes, "miss, you've labelled that is a male reproductive system, but Tiana is a girl and she has a penis, you're being transphobic." Or when they don't put their hand up and I get a call from a parent or a complaint goes into my HoD behind my back. I got bullied out of teaching before (not for GC views) so I'm quite wary of this and want to be mentally prepared with the right words to say.
@Fucket Yeah I'm probably massively overthinking... I'm planning lessons for a job I start in September, so definitely going a bit overboard. I was getting worried about referring to them as "male" and "female" reproductive systems, but I guess I could always defend it with "that's literally what it says on the NC."
@PeekAtYou That's a good idea to look at the exam syllabus and see what they say. KS3 won't be taking exams but it will be building towards that, so that's a good line to take.

@Plasmodesmata Thank you that's really helpful.

If asked you could respond with - Learning about human anatomy and reproduction is on the curriculum and considered important as unfortunately if you consider only gender and not sex it doesn't give you all the information you need to figure out which people are in danger of an unplanned pregnancy, how they are to know and what they need do to prevent one.

Sex is real and in certain situations clearly matters.

We had professionals in the other week to do it, I thought it would be because they knew the correct terminology etc better or something. But actually it was fairly straightforward/no nonsense language - no different to how it's always been done. There was no mention of people being assigned a gender or identifying as anything.

I actually think that's quite important as it's a lot to take in and understand for pre-teens and teenagers and it needs to be as clear and unambiguous as possible.

I'd check with the HOD in advance.

what I'm supposed to do when a kid puts their hand up and goes, "miss, you've labelled that is a male reproductive system, but Tiana is a girl and she has a penis, you're being transphobic."

Could you ask your head of department ahead of time what they would suggest you do if this comes up? Say what you've mentioned above, that since you were last teaching this topic the situation appears to have changed and you are worried that you might say the wrong thing? If it's likely to be an issue in your school you won't be the only teacher in this position and it sounds like a HoD job to me.

cross post with daps!

I think you should make it clear that you are at all times referring to sex.

The word "gender" has no place in a science lesson.

i wouldn’t say man or woman, you’d have to say male or female. Sexual reproduction whether it be in a plant, rabbit or human involve male and female sex organs and their gametes.

any questions about can men have babies, you keep it science based, foetuses grow in a female uterus.

Gender is not relevant as not applicable to every other living organism on the planet. The question is best asked in SMSC or to talk to their parents about it as it’s not part of the science curriculum.

I’m a science teacher. I teach it as I always have - because it is factual, not opinion. I always use the word sex. If a child uses the word gender I don’t tell them not to, but I repeat what they’ve said with sex instead. Always use male and female. No emotion, just clear and straightforward. At the start I make it clear that this isn’t pshee and we will be doing talking about the science and the different organs, just like we have with reproduction in flowering plants. No one has raised it yet. The text book is still the same as ever. If anyone does raise it I will say that obviously any one can dress how they want and we must respect that but that is a different issue, we are talking about male and female reproductive organs. We briefly discuss xx xy, punnet square if they are interested, but that is yr 8 really. If you get any questions you can always say ‘as I had said at the beginning that’s an issue for pshee’.

‘I think you should make it clear that you are at all times referring to sex.’

Also a good idea. You’re teaching science, not philosophy or sociology, and gender isn’t on the science curriculum.

If you want kids to be able to ask questions without embarrassment, have them write their question on paper. Then you can collect the questions and read them out to answer anonymously.

If they ask, explain the err progressive victorians invented the word gender to mean sexist stereotypes. The concept of gender has to place in a reproduction lesson so you shan't be addressing it. Although you're happy too answer any questions on-topic.

Thank you so much everyone, loads of food for thought here and I'm feeling very reassured that a) biology is still factual and b) that potentially bringing this up with HoD won't be an unreasonable thing to do.
I'll stick to the biological facts and maybe make my lessons less "ask any questions about this stuff" than they used to be. I always used to like creating an open environment and making this topic one where they could ask about anything, so they got the facts about things like contraception, abortion etc, but maybe it's time to change what I'm doing, stick to the basic facts, and they can learn about the rest in PSHE.
They have access to so much more information than we did when I was at school, or even than the kids did when I was last teaching.

I used to like the "ask any questions" bit. I think the best one was teaching reproduction to year 7 while visibly pregnant "Miss, can we come and watch you have your baby?"
That was a No.

I was once asked years ago about pregnant men, I explained that the gender of the people involved was "man" but the sex was female hence they had ovaries, uterus etc. so were able to become pregnant. Nobody complained, but as I said this was some years back. I no longer teach KS3.