Parenting Beyond Belief Channel on YouTube
Dale McGowan is there for us freethinking parents. He has two books on the topic of raising children in nonreligious households: Parenting Beyond Belief, the “first comprehensive book for nonreligious parents”, which includes a collection of essays by Julia Sweeney, Richard Dawkins, Penn Jillette and others, and Raising Freethinkers, which is a practical guide to parenting beyond belief, which includes activities and resources for the actual hands-on aspects of the subject. He also has a blog, The Meming of Life, which gives freethinking parents continuous support, with short articles and funny anecdotes.
In addition to these resources, Dale has personally been criss-crossing the country to host Parenting Beyond Belief seminars. Handsome Skeptic Husband and I were lucky enough to attend one of these seminars a couple of weeks ago at CFI in Indianapolis, and it was a real treat. Dale is funny and very personable, and obviously very passionate about teaching parents the best practices for nonreligious parenting. His seminar includes topics such as encouraging moral development, promoting ravenous curiosity (I love that phrase!) and encouraging religious literacy. We learned a great deal from Dale that day, and we are grateful to have a plan for how to deal with religious friends and family and how to talk to our kids about religion. We gained a new found understanding of how important it is to make death natural and familiar to our kids. It really was helpful to us, since there really aren’t many places to go to find information and support for parents who want to raise moral, caring children without religion. His plans are now to train seminar leaders across the county in order to offer many more of these seminars.
Can’t wait? Good news! Now Dale has started a YouTube channel for Parenting Beyond Belief. He plans to offer many short, informative videos on nonreligious parenting. The first one is up already, and there’s a schedule for the next seven. Check out the first video, a short description of what Parenting Beyond Belief is, and how he got started:
Julie Said,
June 15, 2009 @ 7:41 pm
Dale and I have the same bookshelf.
Becky Said,
June 15, 2009 @ 10:11 pm
I really enjoyed his YouTube clip. Sounds intriguing. The only other parenting book that I have read that didn’t center around religion was a Janis Gioia book titled, “The Wolf Pack Classroom Management Plan.” The book centers around teaching kids life skills as well as kindness. I am really excited to see what else Dale has to offer.
jessiemarion Said,
June 16, 2009 @ 9:39 am
This looks really good. Thanks for sharing.
Kristen Mary Said,
June 18, 2009 @ 7:59 am
I’m a huge D McG fan!! We have both of his books, follow his blog and am psyched about these videos!! Yay! I only wished I had known about him before he left Minneapolis…