Category: Faith Sharing

Teaching Christian Kids Logical Fallacies (Made Easy!)

Teaching Christian Kids Logical Fallacies (Made Easy!) - Parenting Like HannahIn Why Christian Kids and Teens Must Learn About Logical Fallacies, I shared how learning about logical fallacies can help protect your kids from false teachers and teachings in the Church. You may have tried to find more information about logical fallacies only to read pages full of Latin terms and pretentious explanations. It probably feels like you are missing a piece to your child’s faith puzzle.

I’m no expert on the subject, but below I have given the most common logical fallacies easier names to remember and hopefully definitions a bit easier to understand. I have also given examples of the types of ways they may be used in the context of Christianity. (Any resemblance to any actual teaching is purely accidental.)

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Why Christian Kids and Teens Must Learn About Logical Fallacies

Why Christian Kids and Teens Must Learn About Logical Fallacies - Parenting Like HannahA stint working for Hearst Magazines taught me a lot about the tricks of advertising. I became fascinated by the Good Housekeeping Institute. Anyone wanting to run an ad in Good Housekeeping magazine had to submit the ad copy and the product they were advertising for testing, before being allowed to advertise.

The people at the Institute were meticulous. If a product claimed to have zero of an ingredient and the test showed even one millionth of a particle of it, the ad was rejected until the copy was changed. Mind you, even back then advertisers were paying over $100,000 for a one page ad in one issue. Yet, they willingly accepted the rigor in order to have the cache that came with advertising there (that didn’t even earn you the “Seal”!).

During those years working with advertisers and their agencies, I realized there is a lot of subtle and not so subtle deception in ads. As the years have passed, I have also come to realize people are most often tricked by logical fallacies – a statement that on the surface sounds absolutely logical, but in the end is utter nonsense.

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Teaching Kids How to Help Others In Crisis

Teaching Kids How to Help Others In Crisis - Parenting Like HannahIf you volunteer in your child’s school, Church Bible classes or even their extracurricular activities, you have probably realized there are entirely too many children living in crisis. Often, these children will never turn to an adult for help. Instead, they will share their concerns, fears and problems with a peer.

If your children are loving, kind and supportive in their interactions with other kids, they may be the ones to whom these hurting children turn. Unfortunately, no matter how mature and godly your kids may be, they just don’t have the training and life experience to handle this vital task fully.

You can however, teach your kids some important Christian Life Skills that will help them step in and give their peers some hope and direction while facing life’s problems. So what are the skills most children should be able to handle when trying to help a peer? Here are some of my favorites.

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Kids, Ecology and God

Kids, Ecology and God - Parenting Like HannahGlobal warming. Pollution. Renewable energy. Recycling. If you are like many, those words create a strong reaction in you. It may be positive or negative, but what does God have to say on the subject of ecology? What should you be teaching your kids? What, if anything, should you be doing with your kids to care for the earth?

Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” Genesis 1:26 (NIV) Inevitably, when talking to Christians about ecology, this is the verse that is first quoted. Ironically, I have heard it interpreted in two basically opposite ways – “dominion/rule also implies caring for something” OR “rule means we can do whatever we want – use it up/destroy it, etc”.

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Fun Art Activity To Help Kids See God

Fun Art Activity To Help Kids See God - Parenting Like HannahWhen talking with young adults who have rejected God at some point, there are two common themes. The first is usually that they did not see God making a positive difference in the lives of their parents. The other is that they cannot see God working in the world today, attributing everything that happens to luck or fate.

There is a fun family devotional you can do with your kids to help them begin to understand how God works in the world today. Read or tell your children two stories in the life of the prophet Elijah. The first is the story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal found in I Kings 18:16-45. The second is the story of God appearing to Elijah found in I Kings 19:9-18.

Talk about the amazing “big” way in which God showed himself in the story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal. Then discuss the “small”, gentle way God appeared to Elijah in the second story. Explain that sometimes people only see God when He does “big”, miraculous things. Tell them how God is sometimes even more amazing in the “small”, quiet things He does for us.

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