A teacher who admits sexually abusing a female student has testified she knew what she was doing was both morally and legally wrong, but she "felt love" for the victim.
The 42-year-old woman has admitted six charges of abusing the 16-year-old girl but is standing trial in the District Court on a further seven counts, which she maintains just "did not happen".
The court has been told the abuse happened more than a decade ago, when the student was in her final year of school in regional Western Australia.
While the victim was not actually taught by the woman in her final year, the abuse was illegal because as a teacher at the school, the student was "under her care, supervision or authority".
In her evidence on Wednesday, the woman said in the years before the abuse, she regarded the student as like her "younger sister".
Teacher felt 'guilty, ashamed and disappointed'
She said the abuse started when the two of them had a sexualised encounter while they were play fighting on a bed during a sporting trip to the Great Southern Region.
"I felt companionship with her, I felt love," the woman testified.
"I knew it was wrong. I felt feelings I had never felt before."
The teacher said she had never had sexual feelings for another woman before, but she continued to abuse the girl even though she knew what she was doing was wrong.
"I felt guilty, ashamed and disappointed," she told the court.
School events 'off limits'
While the woman has admitted some of the child sex charges, she denies the incidents that are alleged to have happened during school-organised trips and camps.
The woman said she had regarded any school-related events as "off limits" because other teachers were around and there was an added risk of her being caught.
The woman testified she continued to have a relationship with the victim after she left school, which was not illegal, but because neither of them wanted anyone to find out, it was an open one, and so they continued to see other people.
The court heard the victim eventually went to police two years ago, which the defence has suggested was because she was upset the teacher was about to "out" herself as being in a same-sex relationship.
The woman was originally on trial on a total of 10 charges, but Judge John Prior has acquitted her of three of the counts because of a legal issue.
The jury was expected to retire to consider its verdicts on the remaining seven charges on Thursday.
