Parenting at the speed of the internet; John Hoad, PhD, Leader Emeritus

At the request of our Leader (Kate Lovelady), John Hoad is addressing guidance on parenting. John’s qualifications include raising five children and enjoying five grandchildren. But are these qualifications out of date as we move into the Age of the Internet? Just as many of us could not help with New Math when it became standard, can we help our children face the growing frontier posed by new technology? Or are they out beyond us? The American Association of Pediatrics has recently called for some good old-fashioned playtime for our kids, and less regimentation and less devotion to video games. What are the values that abide that each generation needs to learn to build an ethical world? How can we address the Confucian challenge that there be a thread of values that runs from the individual through the family, through the nation, to the laws of the universe?

Dr. Hoad is a Leader Emeritus of the Ethical Society of St. Louis, having served 1980-1994. He lives in Charleston, SC, where he and his wife, Karen, have a practice based on her work as a hypnotist and his as a lifetime coach. John is a native of Barbados and previously served as a Methodist minister and seminary president in the Caribbean. After retirement from the Society, he served with Provident Counseling of St. Louis and as a visiting preacher for Emerson and Alton Unitarian churches.