KHEC Repository of Resources 1
Do you know about Camp Quest? Camp Quest is the first residential summer camp in the U.S. for the children of humanists, atheists, freethinkers, brights, or whatever term is applied to those who hold to a naturalistic world view. The purpose of the camp is to provide children of freethinking parents a camp dedicated to improving the human condition through rational inquiry, critical and creative thinking, scientific method, self-respect, ethics, competency, democracy, and free speech. Campers learn about these things through games, skits and other activities. At mealtime, they celebrate the lives, beliefs and accomplishments of freethinkers throughout history. Campers are encouraged to be comfortable with who they are, while at the same time being respectful of people with different world views. Educational programs are interspersed with traditional camp activities such as swimming, campfires, chess, and archery, Camp Quest, Inc., an independent 501(c)(3) educational non-profit, operates the Ohio Camp Quest and works to coordinate with and support the other independently governed Camp Quest programs. Six Camp Quest summer camps currently offer programs across North America. On a personal note, I (Bob Bhaerman) recently returned from spending a day at the Ohio camp. What impressed me most was the balance between the “traditional” camp activities and humanist principles which are presented in non-didactic or pedantic ways. To learn more about this marvelous learning experience, check the web site -- www.camp-quest.org or write to Camp Quest, Inc., 48 Howard Street, Albany, NY 12207.
Camp Inquiry introduces children to the principles of humanism. In addition to Camp Quest, there also is Camp Inquiry. Sponsored annually by the Institute at the Center for Inquiry and located at the sprawling and picturesque Camp Seven Hills in Holland, NY, Camp Inquiry promotes secular humanism through collaborative engagement in science, skepticism, and the creative arts. Children and teens from across the nation spend a week of exploration, imagination, and critical thinking. Camp Inquiry integrates the elements of a memorable camp experience for kids—roasted marshmallows, pillow fights, and new friendships—with the tenets of secular humanism, including ethical choice-making, taking naturalistic approaches to garnering knowledge, tapping into our boundless imaginations, and applying science and reason to human quests and dilemmas. It is a place for children to think, question, and grow. You can learn more about Camp Inquiry at www.campinquiry.org
The Ethics Curriculum Project (ECP) began in 2005 as an effort to produce high-quality online resources to enable educators to introduce ethics and critical thinking across the curriculum. ECP is a project of the Youth Ethics Initiative, Inc., a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit charity. This site provides "modules" on a broad array of topics under the headings "Language Arts," "Science and Math," "Social Science," "Arts and Humanities" and "Special Topics." The modules include content introductions, lesson plans, student activities and knowledge assessment tools. The ECP team includes university faculty with special expertise in the individual topics. These experts include faculty at Barry University, Florida Atlantic University, Florida International University, Miami Dade College, Miami-Dade County Public Schools, St. Thomas University and the University of Miami. The website is under development. While the site is intended to be an open-source utility, the ECP asks that it not be used without prior arrangement. Schools and individual educators interested in using these materials are asked to contact them first. For further information, including a lesson plan template and an “ethical reasoning tool”, check their web site: www6.miami.edu/ethics/ecp
Teaching Compassion to Children by Dr. Caron Goode. [Selections of the resource]
Compassion is the desire to assuage feelings of suffering in others. A compassionate person considers the sufferings of others as his own. But compassion is not pity and it is also different from altruism, which is simply an action of helping others. Compassion is a combination of feeling for someone else, experiencing the suffering and a positive move to reduce the suffering of others...
All education begins in the home and so does teaching the virtue of being compassionate. Here are a few things that you can do to encourage compassionate actions in your children:
Volunteer service as a family - The act of giving up certain things to others and helping others can provide a great sense of achievement and fulfillment to an individual. You could plan trips to an orphanage and have your children give away some of their toys and clothes to other children. A family tradition of community service, setting aside of a certain amount every year for each member of the family to give away as charity... are among some of the family routines that go a long way in nurturing compassion so that it becomes an essential feature in the mindset of children.
Use the aid of stories, folklore and mythology - Folklore, and mythology are mostly associated with positive values and the theme almost always provides useful lessons in moral and ethical values. Children who are constantly exposed to reading and discussions on such stories are prone to be more compassionate than those who listen only to the violent fare shelled out through the electronic medium.
Talk about real life famous heroes - Stories of famous compassionate people help in developing high moral values in children and adults alike. Choose people like the Dalai Lama, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King who are renowned for their compassion and moral attitudes. Reading sessions in the family of their life histories and events can also be instrumental in teaching the importance of being kind, caring, and empathic.
Source: www.more4kids.info/277/teaching-compassion-to-children/
From an Essay on “How to Educate an Atheist” by Michael Martin
Michael Martin, now retired, received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Harvard. Beginning in 1975 he was a philosophy professor at Boston University. In addition to over 100 articles, Martin has written several books including Atheism: A Philosophical Justification and a collection of short stories, The Big Domino in the Sky and Other Atheistic Tales. In this essay, available on the Internet at -- www.infidels.org/library/modern/features/2000/martin1.html, Martin raises a number of questions, including how should atheistic education proceed? when should it start? who should be the educators? The following excerpt, on children’s education, has some useful insights for Humanist education:
Children's Education: Ideally it should start in early childhood. However, this is not absolutely necessary since we all know people who are well educated as atheists but had a religious upbringing. Still most atheistic parents have the desire to educate their children to be atheists and since they know this education will not occur in the public schools, they think in terms of home education. However, although this home education in being an atheist is certainly desirable, it must done in such a way that children don't rebel. Nothing should be forced or unpleasant or else atheist parents, to their dismay may find their children embracing evangelical Christianity.
Perhaps the best sort of home education for children should not seem like education at all: Let them simply pick up the attitudes and ways of thought of their atheistic parents from causal conversations and day-to-day living. This informal and unconscious education, of course, can be supplemented and improved upon in various ways by more formal and explicit methods. First children's books can used be to teach critical thinking. For example, in Joe Nickell's, The Magic Detectives (Prometheus Books) 30 actual cases of seemingly supernatural and paranormal phenomena are presented. At least two of the cases are directly relevant to religion: The Shroud of Turin and The Religious Healer, The Reverend Peter Popoff. The young reader is asked to provide solutions to the mysteries based on clues provided in the presentations and to compare his or her answers with those in the book that show how the mystery is solved in rational terms. Readers are told not to be discouraged if their answers differ from the ones in the book for they may have valuable ideas that are worth talking over with their science teachers. They are told that the important thing is to think critically. They are urged to try their hand at solving other mysteries they have heard of by doing research and are referred to sources listed at the end of the book.
There is no doubt that, if used well, Nickell's book can be a valuable aid in helping atheistic parents to teach children to be critical thinkers with respect to religion. However, parents will have to see that their children do not just read this book, but actually tried to solve the mysteries before looking up the answers. For example, each mystery could be discussed as a family project before the book's answer was read. In addition, the model of critical thinking provided by the solutions could be applied to other cases not found in the book and could thus become a habitual approach. The skeptical critical stance taken in the book could thus become part of a child's way of life.
Such books should aim to present the evidence and arguments for atheism and not present atheism as another dogma.
Another supplement to informal parental education may shock some. Children raised in atheistic homes should be exposed to religion in churches, on TV, in books etc., but initially only with the guidance of an atheistic parent who encourages the child to ask critical questions. For example, a family project might be to watch a TV preacher, see how many unsupported or dubious claims he or she makes, and consider what type of evidence, if any, could support or refute these claims. Needless to say, the spirit that should pervade this family project should be one of honest inquiry and openness, not mean spirited dismissal.
Parents should teach their children about brave and compassionate skeptics and rationalists of the past for the purpose of providing them with rationalistic role models. This might involve reading stories to their children about the lives and work of famous freethinkers and religious critics and discussing these books with their children.
As an illustration of a unified approach to atheistic education at home let me briefly describe the educational program a couple designed for their three school age children. Their goal was to educate their children to be critical thinkers. Raising them to become atheists was a by-product. Their children read The Magic Detectives and magazines like Zillions: For Kids from Consumer Reports. They did math and logic and watched TV programs such as "Bill Nye: The Science Guy."
Dinnertime topics of conversation were especially worthwhile. The family talked about the logical problems of time travel, the existence of homophobia in our society, Galileo's objections to Aristotle's notion that heavy bodies fall faster than light ones, and the National Day of Mourning commemorating the genocide of Native Americans. They critiqued popular books or TV programs that promote the public enjoyment of pseudologic and pseudoscience, such as the Sherlock Holmes mysteries by Arthur Conan Doyle and the Star Trek TV series by Gene Roddenberry.
Home education is not the only type of atheistic education for children, however. There is also the equivalent of an atheist Sunday school. Here instruction takes place in some atheistic or rationalistic center. One good example of this is the work done at the North Texas Church of Freethought by Tim and Deborah Gorski. This is a real church with community spirit, uplifting sermons, church socials, a singles group, and Sunday school -- except that there is no mention of God. Deborah Gorski is the church's Youth Education Director and runs two Sunday school classes -- one for children from infancy to 5 years old and another for children from 6 years to 14 years. She selects a factual or scientifically related topic for each Sunday School class. These range from evolution to meteorology to human anatomy. In her classes she teaches critical thinking skills as well as how to cope with the problems of being an atheist in a largely unsympathetic world. For example, one such problem is how atheistic boys should deal with being bullied by Christian boys. There is another such program at the Center for Inquiry in Amherst, NY. Divided into sessions on moral education, critical thinking, and scientific knowledge about evolution, the program has been expanded and refined each time it has been given.
Another example of atheistic education for children outside the home is a humanist summer camp, called Camp Quest, run by the Free Inquiry Group Inc. of Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. Activities at the camp include standard fare such as arts and crafts, nature walks, and folk dancing and also workshops on ecology and astronomy that stress the meaning of secular humanism. The children are taught that there are no gods, devils, heaven or hell, that by careful thinking and the use of science we can understand our world and solve our problems, that we are all citizens of the same world and that people working together can make a better world.