Use these ideas and resources for helping you raise compassionate, conscientious children who become committed citizens and solutionaries. Curated by the Institute for Humane Education.
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parenting
How Barbie Changed a Black Girl’s Life
Zoe Weil is a blogger for Psychology Today, and we share her blog posts here. As a child, I loved Barbie dolls and crafting Barbie stories with my friends. Getting a new outfit for Barbie — especially when I could pick it out myself at the nearby toy store — filled me with joy. But…
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Helping Families Navigate Plant-Based Eating: an Interview with Robin Coarts
Robin Coarts, founder of Plant-Based with Robin, earned her M. Ed. in Humane Education with IHE in 2019 and has since started teaching an online course titled “Plant-Based Parenting in a Fast Food World.” Bringing her graduate program experience to her work, Robin provides support and education to families who are navigating a plant-based journey….
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12 Children’s Picture Books About Families With Gay Parents
by Marsha Rakestraw In November 2017 California announced that it is adopting “LGBT-inclusive” history textbooks for grades K-8. It is the first state in the US to do so. Some schools may try to ban or discourage talk about homosexuality or about families with gay parents, but the fact is that there are a growing…
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Tips for Selecting Anti-Bias Children’s Books
by Marsha Rakestraw Stories are a powerful tool. They teach us about the world and ourselves; they influence our values; and they help shape our worldview. With children’s books, we’re usually looking for a good story to share with our children. Less often are we paying much attention to the kinds of messages those stories…
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5 Strategies to Help Raise Caring Kids
by Marsha Rakestraw We want our children to be kind and to grow up as caring adults. According to a survey, more than 96% of parents say that moral character is “very important, if not essential.” But how often does that happen, especially when 81% of children surveyed think that happiness or achievement is their…
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9 Resources for Finding Multicultural Books for Children
by Marsha Rakestraw According to the latest figures from the National Center for Education Statistics, “black, Latino, Asian, and Native American students will together make up a narrow majority of the nation’s public school students,” yet the number of children’s books that feature characters of color are shamefully sparse. Studies show that having multicultural literature…
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Looking Beyond “Pinkification” and Other Gender Stereotypes
by Marsha Rakestraw In March 2014, a couple of essays appeared in Slate and New York Magazine, castigating mothers of girls for complaining about the “pinkification” of girl stuff, citing it as an example of girl blaming. Author Yael Kohen wrote, “No symbol of girl culture is more powerful than pink.” There was a significant counter-response…
Read more »Giving In to “Bad Guys”: The Parental Struggle of Making Choices That Support Our Values
Image courtesy of mikecs83 via Creative Commons. We’re swamped with some exciting projects (stay tuned), so please enjoy this repost from 11/23/10. by Mary Pat Champeau, IHE’s Director of Education “Conflict is the gadfly of thought. It stirs us to observation and memory. It instigates us to invention. It shocks us out of sheeplike passivity,…
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12 Children’s Picture Books That Challenge Traditional Gender Roles
by Marsha Rakestraw Each May and June in the U.S. we celebrate Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. Moms usually receive pretty, smelly, “girly” stuff, and dad’s get yet another manly tie, cologne, or something to BBQ. Just one of the countless ways we perpetuate the stereotypes and biases about what women and men are supposed…
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