back to the books
Yo, yo, and hello! I hope and pray everyone is having a great day today. After thinking about stopping writing about books, I've changed my mind, again. Sorry (lol!).
I've read chapter four in The Dirt on Learning now. This chapter (and the next two as well) will focus on the seed that falls on rocky ground. On this soil, the seeds sprout and you can see little heads pop up above the ground, and they produce a crop. But, after a while, the sun gets so hot that it burns the plant to death, because the plant's roots can't go down deap into the soil for nurishment (spelling error?). So, this chapter is about short-term and long-term memory. Short-term memory is kindof a promblem posed by churches who give out rewards for memorizing scriptures. Now, memorizing scriptures is very important, but more than likely the kids just go from one memory verse to the next without going back to review any of the ones previeously learned. And thus whatever was learned in the past is now forgotten. Likewise we shouldn't be naive when we see people show initial (spelling error?) interest in the gospel and Christianity. If we don't do some follow up work with this individual, then the interest will soon fade away. And we shouldn't get so excited about winning converts either. We need to follow up on them. Nurture them. Help them grow. Problems are going to come into their lives, and if we haven't helped them grow in their interest and nurture them in their knew found faith, those problems will due them in and we'll loose them. We can't be satified with sprouts.
One thing that can certainly help us retain people is tie in heavenly truths with things are people will understand. Jesus was the Master at this. For example, He says "you are the salt of the earth" (Matt. 5:13a). "You are the light of the world" (Matt. 5:14a). And "For where you'r treasure is, there your heart will be also (Matt. 6:21), just to name a few. He knew what people would remember, and He tied eternal truths with things they knew about.
We need to develop in story telling. Another thing Jesus was masterful at, telling His parables.
The Schultzs tell of Rene Schlaepher, a California pastor, who told of filmmakers' story telling secrets in a ministry related magazine. These are ways people learn:
"Simplicity: Don't complicate. Be able to describe your story in one line.
Suspense: It's wondering- what's- going- to happen- in- the- end that pulls people through a story. Shared Emotion: When you tap people's emotions, you lock them into the story.
Surprising Start and Sudden Stop: Great movies bring you into the action before you know what's going on. And they end with a quick punch."
The Prodical Son story Jesus told in Luke 15 is a perfect illustration of all of these.
The Schulzs also advise teaching in, what they call, Interval Reinforcements. That means not going over brand new material all the time. We need to pick out some major points and reinforce them every so often. If we plant seeds and never water them, they'll never grow. Too much water will kill them off as well. They're research shows that if we go over material just once 10 percent will be remembered in 3o days. If there are six exposures to the same material in 30 days 90 percent of it is remembered. Those percentages are mind boggeling.
They advize the following: Review main points frequently within each lesson or learning time.
Address the point multiple times, using different approaches that appeal to different learning styles. Reinforce the key points at the conclusion of the lesson. Review main points at the start of the next lesson. Once a month, review all key points from the previous thirty days. Allocate an entire session once a month to reinforce key points. Set aside a session every six months to review all key points from the six months prior to that. Take a few key concepts and emphasize them for a year rather than tackling a new concept, verse, or story each week. And supply high quality materials for families to use during the week to review and reinforce the lesson points introduced at church (we'll talk about this more on chapter 6).
They also suggest taking a break every now and then during class. After every section of the class, take a short break to stretch and move around to let it all sink in and move on to a different part of the class. Also, they suggest use music to help students' memory. Music certainly helps people memorize things. That is all for that chapter.
I also read chapter five in Visioneering. It is about Faith the Essential Ingrediante. We must depend on God to bring about our vision and keep on depending on Him to keep us there. We must never think that God got us where we want to be, now we must work harder to stay there. No! Only God could get us there, and only God can keep us there. That was the basic jist of it.
Please, got out and get these books and read them.
Guess that's all for now. God bless you all in Jesus' name!
Zack
I've read chapter four in The Dirt on Learning now. This chapter (and the next two as well) will focus on the seed that falls on rocky ground. On this soil, the seeds sprout and you can see little heads pop up above the ground, and they produce a crop. But, after a while, the sun gets so hot that it burns the plant to death, because the plant's roots can't go down deap into the soil for nurishment (spelling error?). So, this chapter is about short-term and long-term memory. Short-term memory is kindof a promblem posed by churches who give out rewards for memorizing scriptures. Now, memorizing scriptures is very important, but more than likely the kids just go from one memory verse to the next without going back to review any of the ones previeously learned. And thus whatever was learned in the past is now forgotten. Likewise we shouldn't be naive when we see people show initial (spelling error?) interest in the gospel and Christianity. If we don't do some follow up work with this individual, then the interest will soon fade away. And we shouldn't get so excited about winning converts either. We need to follow up on them. Nurture them. Help them grow. Problems are going to come into their lives, and if we haven't helped them grow in their interest and nurture them in their knew found faith, those problems will due them in and we'll loose them. We can't be satified with sprouts.
One thing that can certainly help us retain people is tie in heavenly truths with things are people will understand. Jesus was the Master at this. For example, He says "you are the salt of the earth" (Matt. 5:13a). "You are the light of the world" (Matt. 5:14a). And "For where you'r treasure is, there your heart will be also (Matt. 6:21), just to name a few. He knew what people would remember, and He tied eternal truths with things they knew about.
We need to develop in story telling. Another thing Jesus was masterful at, telling His parables.
The Schultzs tell of Rene Schlaepher, a California pastor, who told of filmmakers' story telling secrets in a ministry related magazine. These are ways people learn:
"Simplicity: Don't complicate. Be able to describe your story in one line.
Suspense: It's wondering- what's- going- to happen- in- the- end that pulls people through a story. Shared Emotion: When you tap people's emotions, you lock them into the story.
Surprising Start and Sudden Stop: Great movies bring you into the action before you know what's going on. And they end with a quick punch."
The Prodical Son story Jesus told in Luke 15 is a perfect illustration of all of these.
The Schulzs also advise teaching in, what they call, Interval Reinforcements. That means not going over brand new material all the time. We need to pick out some major points and reinforce them every so often. If we plant seeds and never water them, they'll never grow. Too much water will kill them off as well. They're research shows that if we go over material just once 10 percent will be remembered in 3o days. If there are six exposures to the same material in 30 days 90 percent of it is remembered. Those percentages are mind boggeling.
They advize the following: Review main points frequently within each lesson or learning time.
Address the point multiple times, using different approaches that appeal to different learning styles. Reinforce the key points at the conclusion of the lesson. Review main points at the start of the next lesson. Once a month, review all key points from the previous thirty days. Allocate an entire session once a month to reinforce key points. Set aside a session every six months to review all key points from the six months prior to that. Take a few key concepts and emphasize them for a year rather than tackling a new concept, verse, or story each week. And supply high quality materials for families to use during the week to review and reinforce the lesson points introduced at church (we'll talk about this more on chapter 6).
They also suggest taking a break every now and then during class. After every section of the class, take a short break to stretch and move around to let it all sink in and move on to a different part of the class. Also, they suggest use music to help students' memory. Music certainly helps people memorize things. That is all for that chapter.
I also read chapter five in Visioneering. It is about Faith the Essential Ingrediante. We must depend on God to bring about our vision and keep on depending on Him to keep us there. We must never think that God got us where we want to be, now we must work harder to stay there. No! Only God could get us there, and only God can keep us there. That was the basic jist of it.
Please, got out and get these books and read them.
Guess that's all for now. God bless you all in Jesus' name!
Zack
posted by Zack | 6:49 AM
1 Comments:
hi Zach!! We do have emails!! :)
Jason is: jherman@hocc.org and mine is shannonlpc@charter.net
It is so great to hear from you! Tell Katie we say hey!
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