From “what we teach” to “how we learn”. Bridging the gap between school-based sexuality education and learning cultures

Comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) poses major pedagogical demands, with research on students’ perspectives revealing a distance between the goals of CSE programmes and young people’s experience and needs. This paper argues that closing this gap requires a renewed focus on the concept of learning, departing from a neoliberal frame. Cultural-historical approaches can contribute to understanding how people collectively appropriate and transform contested areas of knowledge and experience, by means of a learning culture beyond traditional forms of schooling. Examining some of the main gaps emerging from an analysis of CSE pedagogies and research on youth voices, we analyse sexuality and gender in schools as concepts that crosscut formal and informal learning within a wider contested, values-imbued social arena. In line with concept formation theory, we argue that sexuality education needs to be engaged with collectively rather than individually, redefining schools’ role in shared learning amidst social challenges, and changing not just the methods for delivering CSE but the school system as a whole.