The problem pages in teen magazines are said to be a positive source of advice

Teenage magazines are taking the place of parents in teaching children thefacts of life, an official report warns.

Education watchdog Ofsted (Office for Standard in Education) said today problem pages in publications such as Cosmo Girl and Sugar - and 'lads' mags' including Nuts and Zoo - are a "very positive source of advice and reassurance for many young people".

Ofsted said magazines were filling the gap for teenagers because too many parents - especially mothers of adolescent girls - were failing to give children the advice they need about sex and relationships.

The watchdog's education director Miriam Rosen said: "No matter how difficult it may be, parents and teachers have to discuss sensitive issues with their children and pupils to help them make the right choices as they grow up."

The controversial endorsement of teenage magazines came in a new Ofsted report looking at the way schools teach children about sex, drugs and alcohol.

So-called "personal, social and health education" was still patchy in many primary and secondary schools, Ofsted said in a review of inspection reports from 2001 to 2006.

Polls of pupils by the Schools Health Education Unit for Ofsted showed: "Parents were generally less likely than previously to be seen as the main source of advice; the decline has been particularly marked for Year 8 (12-yearold) girls."

Parents were too shy to tackle embarrassing issues such as sexhead-on.

Ofsted continued: "As well as failing to provide the information themselves, some parents express concern about the suitability of information young people receive from other sources.

"Nevertheless, the 'problem pages' in magazines remain a very positive source of advice and reassurance for many young people, but difficulties may arise if the messages clash with parental and cultural norms."

Ofsted urged schools to provide embarrassed parents with material to help explain the facts of life to their children. But it also warned that in most primary school sex education lessons pupils knowledge and understanding of factual aspects wereno better thanadequate".

(Reuters)