Tag: shameless self-promotion

  • A secret deal on my book

    My new book, co-authored with Marko, comes out next week.

    I’m very excited about it for two specific reasons.

    1. Parents of teenagers really need this book. The days of fighting or banning or trying to wall off kids from social media is over. Parents need to know how to help their child live a life that will increasingly be lived online. This book does that really well. It’s short, easy to understand, and very practical.
    2. I’m proud of how this turned out. Marko and I worked really hard on making a book that’ll last a few years. We focused on helping parents understand social media while avoiding all of the pitfalls of your typical Christian book about media– there’s nothing here that is alarmist. We aren’t trying to scare parents, we are providing tested principles that have worked for years, work today, and will work for years to come. Trust me, that wasn’t easy.

    Here’s the Official Description

    With each passing day, teenagers’ lives become increasingly intertwined with social media. How can you as a parent stay informed and involved in healthy ways? How can you help your son or daughter make wise decisions and remain safe online?

    A Parent’s Guide to Understanding Social Media will equip you to have meaningful conversations with your teenager about the best, wisest ways to get connected while staying safe.

    Your guides for this journey are Mark Oestreicher and Adam McLane, who draw from their own wells of experience as parents and youth workers. They’ll help you chart a course toward discovering and practicing wise family online activity.

    My Secret Deal

    I would love for you to get this book in the hands of all the parents in your ministry. Like the other books in this series, this would be great to use as the content of a parent meeting. In fact, the book is based on a short seminar I’ve done for parents of teenagers in a bunch of churches.

    You can pre-order it on our site right now for $6.99.

    If you buy 10 or more copies, you’ll automatically get free shipping on your entire order. (media mail, US addresses only) Check this out. Add whatever else you want to that same order, as long as you order 10 or more copies of the book, you’re getting free shipping.

    If you buy 20 or more copies, I’ll still pick up the tab for shipping on your order, and I’ll start tossing goodies in the box.

    This secret deal expires on December 15th.

    p.s. If you don’t automatically get free shipping, apply coupon code SECRET62

  • Your Weekly Dose of Adam

    Here’s a round-up of stuff that I’ve appeared in lately. It’s kind of crazy, but of all the stuff I write and do on a regular basis… only about 33% of it is here on my blog. So, here’s the tour de Adam:

    [Commercial] I have to give a special shout-out to Matt Cleaver. His blog has been giving me tons of love lately. I look forward to his posts popping up in my Google reader, if you do youth ministry you should head over there and subscribe to his RSS too. [/commercial]

    – Youth Hacks interview: I spoke to Josh Cook about all sorts of stuff we’re doing at this year’s NYWC. It starts off slow and gets increasingly better. When  I do early morning stuff like this I need to remember to drink 2-3 cps of coffee first.

    – YS Podcast: Each Monday I host the podcast for Youth Specialties. My part is typically pretty small in that what appears on video is just me doing the intro, segway, and closing. It’s just a little dose of Adam McLane with your big meety dose of youth ministry goodness.

    – We’re hosting a rummage sale: We’re downsizing our offices at work, this is a little post I did letting local folks know. If you live in SoCal you won’t want to miss it. (Though, I’m actually missing it! Kristen and I are sneaking off to San Franscisco that weekend.)

    – Cell phone poll: This is my shortest post, but I was very interested in the results. Who would have thought that 20% of youth workers currently have an iPhone?

    – Bagillions of youth ministry links: Part of my role in putting together the 3 newsletters per week at work is to help keep youth workers around the country up on news effecting adolescence. I use Delicious to do that, I’m really thinking I need to start adding blogs to Delicious too. Thoughts?

    – The Trust Business: Each week I write an article for YMX. This week’s one struck a cord (in a good way) with folks.

    – May conference call: One of the smaller changes we’re making to NYWC is trying some new ways to communicate to folks about our conference. Here’s a recording of May’s conference call with Mark Oestreicher. Just like the podcast, I’m the moderator. (June’s conference call will feature Mark Matlock.

    – The best small group ever: This post continues to live on. I was happy to hear that the story was distributed to our church staff. I guess it connected with them, they re-posted it an article in their quarterly newsletter.

    – What Happens to the Coddled?: Rants never cease to amaze me. This one touched a nerve. It continues to float around the internet… forwarded from parent to parent. There’s even a rumor that this may re-surface as a parenting resource. I’m brewing another parenting rant. One that will hopefully continue to wake up the parents who coddle.

    Am I missing something? Probably. Each week I am amazed at how much I write! What’s my secret? Discipline. Things don’t write themselves, you know? What’s my second secret? A journal. Want to write more? Get a journal at Target for $7.

  • Youth Worker Book of Hope

    Youth Worker Book of HopeBack in January 2008 I was asked to participate in something out of character. Tim Baker, a well-established youth ministry author, emailed me and asked if I’d be interested in submitting a chapter to a book he was working on. My first few reactions were simple…

    – I don’t want to write a book. (Kind of weird for a guy who works for a publisher, eh? Just not my dream.)

    – I don’t have anything important to say.

    – I don’t have time. (Besides running YMX and a ministry in Romeo, I had just dropped out of grad school because I was too busy.)

    When I talked to Kristen about it she read through the concept of the project and gave me the look and said, “You need to do this.” As I looked at the project once again it became clear to me that I had to participate in this project, I did have something important to say, and I needed to make time. If there is one thing I want my ministry to youth workers to say over and over again it is that youth ministry matters, it changes lives, and no matter how bad it is, there is hope!

    At this point, 16 months later, I am stoked to see this book come out in August. I don’t often get Perry Noble-stoked about stuff… but I am getting close with this one. There is a mega-pile of fresh authors, each sharing their unique story of finding hope when bad things happen. But let me be completely selfish here… I think you need to buy this book simply to read my chapter. My particular chapter is on, “How do I find hope for tommorow when the crap hits the fan?” And how many people in ministry haven’t had a moment when everything hit the fan?

    So, here is the link. You can pre-order it now.