MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. (AP) – Several parents of students at a downtown Minneapolis school are protesting a second-grade teacher’s decision to tell his class he’s gay as part of a discussion of diversity, without first notifying them.

The parents and about a dozen supporters held a protest on Oct. 6 at the Interdisciplinary Downtown School, which serves students from 10 Twin Cities-area districts. They want the school to let their children switch to a different class, a request that Principal Laura Bloomberg refused.

The incident again raised perennial questions about the inclusion of social issues in public school curriculum.

But the protest drew an unexpected counterprotest from a 17-year-old student at the school, who confronted the group and said he didn’t see how anyone could think the second-graders were in any danger. The parents replied that the young man didn’t have children of his own in the classroom.

The controversy stemmed from a Sept. 15 classroom discussion led by Peter Sage, who was teaching a curriculum about different types of families. Sage said he read a prescribed book about a two-mom family, and then explained to the 23 students that he too is gay.

Sage said he went on to tell students that some people have different views of people not like them, describing how he disagreed with his own grandfather’s negative view of black people. The protesting parents are black.

The ensuing classroom discussion prompted a wide range of responses, Sage said, prompting him to write a letter a few days later to the students’ parents explaining the discussion.

Parent Gena Bounds said she doesn’t object to Sage’s sexual orientation, but that she considers the discussion inappropriate for a second-grader. She said parents had “no right or say-so” in approving the curriculum.

But Sage and Bloomberg said parents overwhelmingly support the school’s diversity curriculum. Bloomberg noted the mission of the seven-year-old school is to build “a partnership of diversity, community and technology.”

She said she denied parent requests for classroom transfers because students at the school are placed carefully based on abilities, classroom mix and past performance. Bloomberg said parents are free to object to the school board or withdraw their children from the school.

School districts around Minnesota use several types of curriculum that explain different types of families, including those with gay parents. Debra Davis, an expert on gender curriculum topics who conducts training sessions around the country and who was once a man, said she’s not heard of anyone in Minnesota being upset about the materials.

“I don’t think there is an agenda here” to push gay issues, Davis said. She said such curriculums are reviewed by school boards and oversight groups that often include parents and community members.

Parents by law do have the right to review curriculum and request their children be excused from parts of it. Felicia McCorvey Preyer, one of the protesters and the mother of seven children at the school, said she met with Sage in August and, “I mentioned that I did not want my child hearing this information” about gay issues.

But the feelings were strong on both sides. The young counterprotester, Walter Kaplan, shouted that the parents and their supporters were “hatemongers,” and insisted that the school was “not teaching anything wrong.”