My precious 5-year-old granddaughter just started kindergarten, and she knows absolutely nothing about God, Jesus, Heaven, Hell, or anything else related to religion. Her parents are atheists.

I was wondering - is this something she could get teased or picked on about? We don't live in an area that is top-heavy with any one religion, but you never know what kids will talk about.

Should she be given a little background, along the lines of "Some people believe that. . .?"

Am I worrying prematurely and should just chill until the subject comes up? Have any of you had experience with this sort of thing?

I think that it is always good to inoculate children against ideas they may encounter that you don't agree with. Talking to them ahead of time gives them a canned response they can give when these subjects come up. It can and should be very basic. Something like.

At school you may hear people talking about god and Jesus or see people wearing special clothing. This is because of their religion. We believe in "insert beliefs here" but while our beliefs may be different we respect the right of everyone to believe what they want.

Then as they have questions about other people's religions they can ask about it without being indoctrinated by it. Children tend to believe anything they hear regardless of who told them. Getting there first makes a big impression.

If your g-daughter is going to a public kindergarten, my experience is that you need not be concerned. I can tell you how it is where I live (east coast); not sure if the experience is different elsewhere.


Public school is PC. There are really only 2 reasons that God or religion come into a kindergarten conversation (that I've seen as a mom who worked at school): The little ones bring it up in conversation somehow, or the class is discussing holidays, which is a much loved topic in kindergarten.


If the topic comes up spontaneously among the kids, they ask each other questions ("What does that mean?") and answer each other to the best of their ability. No harm there.

If the kids are unable to communicate about it, an adult may help them out with a simple and age-appropriate answer. Occasionally, the topic may be used as an example of differences across cultures, so a teacher might gently say something like, "In our country, people have lots of different beliefs about things like that."

In a holiday discussion, the conversation usually veers toward cultural celebrations and the teacher will steer it with questions like, "Who knows the name of a religion that some people believe in?" or "Who knows another holiday that some people celebrate this time of year?" and things like that. Kindergarteners are much more interested in comparing food and games than beliefs in God(s), and the class can have a lot of fun with that.

That's my experience working as a teacher in the mid-Atlantic. Religion really isn't an issue between students. It seldom comes up in their conversation.

Children should absolutely hear about religion regardless if the parents are religious or not.

I suggest reading:

Raising Freethinkers: A Practical Guide to Parenting Beyond Belief
and

Parenting Beyond Belief: On Raising Ethical, Caring Kids without Religion

Both of these books are by Dale McGowan and are a how-to guide on how to address religion.

It is important to teach a child about religion in order to create religious literacy. A child may not fall for the claims of religions such as Mormonism if they are aware of their teachings beforehand. I also suggest taking a child to religious services so a child won't believe what happens inside a church is in anyway mystical. A child shouldn't have worldview forced on them before they are cognitively able to make those decisions.

I don't think it would even occur to me to warn a kid ahead of time about religion. My nephew was 8 or 9 when he suddenly asked, "What religion are we?" I said, "Do we go to church?" He said, "No." I said, "Then we don't belong to any." My Dad very curtly said, "We're Christian!"

I was thinking, "Oh, yeah? You never taught me anything about Christianity." But anyway, it was a brief conversation, but I imagine he asked because someone at school must have mentioned it.

I was not taught about god before I went to school. It was a bit harsh to learn about god on the playground, but I made it through.

I think it would be best if a child learned about religion before school, just because it is a large part of the culture.

That said, she is not YOUR daughter to teach or not teach.

MJ Wrote:
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> That said, she is not YOUR daughter to teach or
> not teach.

That's a good point. You might want to run that idea by the parents and see what they think.

a little kid just starting school should be told about the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Christianity is a major part of our world's history, and children should learn that history just as they learn about ancient Greece and the Civil War.

Other religions are also a part of our world's history, and children should learn about those as well.

Learning that people believe different things and how those beliefs inform their cultures, actions, etc. is an amazing, mind-opening experience. Parents who do not teach their children these things are missing a great opportunity.

Even a five year old can understand the broad strokes of Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, etc.

There is a lot of diversity in schools these days. I don't think that religion or the lack of it is a big deal (it might have been a generation or so ago).

I think it's helpful for kids to have a heads up about the variety of beliefs that people have.

But that's the parents' responsibility. I would stay out of it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/01/2013 11:48AM by ellenl.

Actually, since my kids don't claim even their tenuous link to Mormonism, they have been pretty much religion free most of their lives. Christians children (even in liberal NJ and CA) tell them they are going to Hell about every 18 months. Often these unwanted comments are from friends trying to "save" them. I have a pretty nice older daughter about 20 years old. The Muslims and Asian Christians both like her and want her to join. Having done her own thinking and studying makes dealing with that easier. We read the bible to learn about what everyone thinks. I think some gradual preparation would be good but it should come from the parents. You can suggest it, but let them handle it. Just be willing to have a supportive conversation where she does the thinking if she comes to you.

Wow, that's interesting to me. (Sorry for anybody's kids that had that happen, tho'!) Thankfully, my religion-free kids never had anyone try to "save" them, but I do think they would have laughed at the idea of hell being an actual danger to them.

I'm thinking back to when they were five . . . I think they might not have laughed when they were only five, but they sure would have been incredulous. They likely would have come home saying, "You're not going to believe what so-and-so said!"

We're atheists in Texas. My kids are 4 and 7. With my first, I really didn't say much of anything to him. He knew we didn't go to church. In general, about everything in life, I teach them that there are lots of different people out there and everyone gets to choose their own way to live- and that's totally OK. I find that when this simple way of viewing all of humanity is what they learn, they are never shocked when they hear or see different ideas or lifestyles. They just shrug it off as one of those things that is different from them.

In public school kindergarten and 1st, my son has been asked what religion we are and he did have one particularly annoying kid last year that did tell him that people that aren't christian will go to hell (among a lot of other judgemental things). But because my son feels free to tell me anything, he tells me about these comments and I try to never respond angrily or defensively. I usually just calmly say, well, there are lots of different people in the world that believe lots of different things. We don't believe in hell. You can tell your friend that we don't believe those things. That usually diffuses it.

Last year (ages 6 and 3), we decided to talk about different religious holidays. We got books about Kwanza, Hannakah, Christmas, etc. We talked about the stories behind each holiday, even lighting a mennorah and putting up a christmas tree and such. We talked about the fact that for our family, Christmas is when you show the people you love how much you care about them. Easter is a celebration of Spring... We still do all the fun stuff, but with a secular twist on it.

So far, my kids are well-adjusted. They have friends of all different faiths and, for the most part, kids do not seem to have issues with the differences. No teasing or bullying- 1 kid with a few odd comments, but because my son was already armed with good self-esteem and the ability to recognize a different belief that he didn't have to agree with- it was really no big deal.

I don't think you (as the grandma) should do anything at all without the consent of the parents. It is absolutely not your place. However, I do not think you should worry either. Kids are pretty accepting and I think the conversations are mostly inquisitive and not intended to hurt. At some point, her parents would probably be best talking to her about other people's faith, but it is their call to decide when and how.

Just to add one more thing. I do not teach my kids that they are atheists. I tell them they are too young to decide what they believe spiritually and whether or not they want to be part of a religion. My oldest does ask what mom and dad are and we do tell him we are atheists because we see no proof of the existence of god or an afterlife. No one knows for sure because there is no proof. But some people choose to believe and some people choose not to believe- it's completely OK to decide whatever you think is best for you once you are old enough.

I have found this does make it hard for a 7 year old to explain when someone says, "what is your religion." He usually says, we're not religious. But I really want my kids to not feel boxed into picking sides when they know so little about the world. I do the same with politics. You will find kids in public school that say they are republican or choosing Romney- when they are 7!! Clearly this just comes from the parents and I don't want to indoctrinate my kids at all. I want to give them values and morals and the ability to critically think through problems and questions. They can make the final decisions themselves.

My son's mother and I didn't tell him about religion before he started school, and it hasn't really been a problem. I don't think he had even heard of Jesus at that time. It just isn't that important, and the mythology is simple enough that he got the jist of it from the other kids right at the beginning. We're in the deep south (Florida), btw. He's in the 5th grade now, and he has a strong sense of identity and is generally respectful of the other kids who are believers, though it's mystifying to him why anyone would believe in such a thing. And they DO talk about it -- a lot. He hangs out with the kids who talk about his interests though (video games).

I was a bit worried about it too, but what would you tell a five year old? Every time we tried to prepare something to tell him, it sounded a bit like the George Carlin routine about religion. It just sounds ridiculous unless you've been indoctrinated into it. So, we just let him find out for himself. I think that was the best way, because it didn't set up an us vs. them situation right at the beginning. He has friends who are believers, and they get along fine. I'm relieved too. Living in the south, I thought religion would be a big problem at school, and it's not.

(Now that I think about it, we may have told him about Jesus at Christmas time. I can't remember.)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/01/2013 01:41PM by Makurosu.

which god would you tell the little kid about ?

All gods are equally real.

Told WHAT about God?

Thanks, everyone, for your thoughts on this issue. I definitely have no intention to make an end-run around her parents. But I was present at this little girl's birth and she is definitely tucked into my heart.

I guess what triggered this was a local program about bullying in school, and I got to thinking about whether kindergarten-level kids were likely to tease my little granddaughter because she literally has no idea who or what God, Jesus, et al might be.

It doesn't sound like that is likely to be a problem. We have a few wingnut cases in our area, but not a lot of them. My son and his wife will handle the issue appropriately, I'm sure.