Teaching Teenage Girls Reproductive Healthcare

Teachers play a vital role in educating and teaching of children at school. One of the

areas for teaching responsibility is development of the individual learner to be a

competent community member, either as a professional or as an otherwise- skilled

person. It is therefore for that reason that the South African government introduced

into the curriculum at school level a subject that is directed at life orientation to

empower learners. Teachers bear the responsibility of teaching this subject.

One of the topics in the Life Orientation subject is Reproductive Healthcare, which is

supposed to empower the learners especially with matters of sex and sexuality,

diseases included. Despite the teaching of this topic in schools, the rate of teenage

pregnancies and occurrence of sexually -transmitted infections remains on the

increase in the country. Although much literature exists about teenage pregnancy in

the country, there is theoretical paucity on how teachers view their responsibility to

teach reproductive healthcare. The questions that prompted and have been raised in

this study have been.