End of the year interesting stuff

It is always exciting to reach this point in the year, to look back, and to consider God’s faithfulness! As we head into summer, we always have high hopes for catching up on our reading and reflecting. So, no guilt if you don’t look at things below, but here are things that caught my eye recently:

A few weeks ago I finished reading a wonderful book In Search of Deep Faith: A Pilgrimage into the Beauty, Goodness, and Heart of Christianity by Jim Belcher, who I learned in the meantime has accepted a new job as President of Providence Christian College in Pasadena, California. His new book has received recognition as Christianity Today’s “Best of the Best” book for its 2013 Leadership Journal awards.

Here is a thoughtful post by Ontario, CA school head Paul Marcus about Christian schools being judged by the behavior of their students – Not Angel Factories

I am just finishing Michael Frost’s new book, Incarnate: The Body of Christ in an Age of Disengagement.  This is an excellent book for Christian school leaders to read to help them in their task of cultural discernment. Not only does he point out ways that our culture sucks us into excoriation/escapism, but suggests how Christians might better love God by loving neighbors. This book provides excellent guidance for educators who seek to live out an incarnated life with students.

Good videos on vocation/work from Tim Keller:

Work defined – “arranging of raw material for the flourishing of everyone”

Why Work Matters – A Christian understanding of why your work matters and why God matters to your work

On the lighter side:  Video – How to Write a Worship Song( in 5 minutes!)

Fantastic collection of science resources for congregations and educator at The Ministry Theorem.

A very helpful video companion (and great charts also!) to the book Origins: Christian Perspectives on Creation, Evolution, and Intelligent Design by Calvin professors Deborah and Loren Haarsma – available here.

Our Children Should Not Have to Choose Between Science and Faith by Tim Stafford

A follow-up to Stafford: Why You Might Have to Choose Between Science and Faith

What do we really tell our boys by saying “Be a man!”? This video trailer “The Mask You Live In” questions assumptions. Warning: Language is realistic, but may be offensive)

What will education look like in the future? Helpful infographic from KnowledgeWorks.

The study habits of today’s students: interesting infographic.

Excellent thoughts, research and resources on the use of lecture from Grant Wiggins.

Quote: “The observer of beauty always gets a passion to share that beauty with others. You always talk about what you love.” Tim Keller

How would you define beautiful work?

One pastor’s observations about the 5 Traits of Kids Who Keep Following Christ As Adults.

“Unsung Hero” video – the difference one life can make in the world – very touching!

Inspiring creativity in schools – relationship between chaos and creativity.

Buck Institute’s PBL project search tool – 500 projects!

This is a truly amazing video – Wonder! TED talk on the hidden mysteries of our world. 

 

Thanks for reading Nurturing Faith again this year! CSI will be discontinuing Nurturing Faith and so this will conclude posts on this site, although previous posts will be able to be accessed at this location.  If you have enjoyed reading Nurturing Faith, I will continue blogging at the following sites:

danbeerens.com – my personal website

CACE – as a CACE fellow, I will blog periodically on this site.

SCS Community – as a convener of these conferences, I will also be blogging on this site.

Blessings on your work and let’s continue the dialogue!

If we saw God in each face

Do we see God in each face we encounter as we walk through our days?

If we saw God in each face, would we take more time to understand the pain we see in the face of another?

If we saw God in each face, would we pass by needs so quickly?

If we saw God in each face, would we do a better job of listening?

If we saw God in each face, would we see past race? Age? Deformity?

If we saw God in each face, would we speak of kids as problems to be managed, as just names and grades?

If we saw God in each face, would we verbally shred any student in the faculty lounge?

If we saw God in each face, would we accept the bullying or destruction of any person?

If we saw God in each face, would we find a way to bless those we meet instead of rushing to our next task?

If we saw God in each face, would we help them understand who their Father is?

If we saw God in each face, would we want each one to understand how this world belongs to God?

If we saw God in each face, would we desire to help all students understand why they are on this earth?

If we saw God in each face, would we desire to help all students identify and use their gifts to worship?

If we truly saw imagebearers, how would it change us?

A few things that caught my eye

Best way to take lecture notes – can you imagine everyone in the hall using this technology? :)

Here’s a RSA Animate style video explaining Common Core State Standards:

For over 180 videos of lesson ideas for teaching Common Core, check out this resource.

Still struggling to “get” Twitter? Are you a “Lurker”, “Participant” or “Author”? Here is a good intro video that explains the stages.

If you have tried Twitter and gone away from it, maybe this video from a University of Alaska professor will be helpful.

I love helpful visual diagrams! Katie Ritter has put together three very helpful ones. The one below that she calls Backwards EdTech Tool Flow Chart starts with the question “What do you want students to do?” and then moves to a guiding question. Depending on the answer you can move to a link to an appropriate web tool for them to use. Click here to access the chart. The other two tools that she created for her teachers at her school are also in PDF’s with clickable links. You can access them here.

Excellent interview/article: Coming Out in the CRC: YALT’s Interview with Ryan Struyk – for those of you reading this and wondering about the abbreviations – the CRC stands for the Christian Reformed Church – the founding denomination of many schools in CSI (Christian Schools International) and YALT stands for the Young Adult Leadership Task Force.

Image of God – self perception vs. perception by others – does this get at why it is hard for us to accept grace and see ourselves as God sees us – as lovable and redeemed? Dove put together this video that has become the most watched online video ad ever according to this source.

Is this why glass ceilings persist and women are still paid less than men for the same work? Sheryl Sandburg, COO of Facebook, talks about if a businesswoman can be competent and nice in their work.

Here is a link to a commercial demonstrating the double standard that exists, as well as references to the full study done at Harvard.

The influence of grandparents on faith development –   interesting research results from USC sociologist Vern Bengston.

Great perspective piece on what Christmas is all about – A Christmas Apology, and the Seeds of Hope from Rachel Held Evans.

Write your own caption for this pic below from Paul Shirky which he calls School vs. Life! In any case, it speaks to the significance of our task as educators – helping kids make sense out the mess and at the same time connecting things back together in beautiful ways – blessings on your new calendar year ahead!

Bringing shalom to our teaching

Source: Beth Chatto Gardens by antonychammond via Flickr

When I returned to Christian education in 1993 as a building principal, I was faced with the challenge of articulating the distinctiveness of a Christian education to present and potential parents. To that point, as a student in K-12 schools and as a teacher in two Christian school settings, I had not really thought a great deal about how Christian education was different. I had simply experienced it. I was aware of differences having gone to a public university and having served in public education for seven of my twelve years to that point, but had limited mental models to work from for further work.

My first exercise was to think of as many areas of difference in the experiences I had, to analyze what type of category it might fit into, and then to synthesize the differences into categories of distinctiveness. What I arrived at is the concepts of curriculum, classroom, and community to describe how Christian schools should be distinctive. These concepts appear in the tagline for this blog and I wrote about them in one of the first posts.

One of the reasons I felt we needed to have language around these concepts is to provide a way to discuss and further improve what we were doing in Christian education. Without such language we could basically talk in circles for days and not know where to begin or how to consider in focused ways what we are really talking about, let alone look for ways to improve distinctiveness.

Over the past year I have written in this blog about the idea of flourishing as our desired outcome for Christian school students. I have explored ten possible aspects of flourishing in a series of blog posts. We can work toward these aspects with students in the areas of curriculum, classroom, and community in a Christian school.  While the areas of how to nurture student faith in classroom and community are clearer, I believe that our greater challenge is to consider how we nurture faith and flourishing in the area of curriculum.

I would like to suggest that if we go back to Wolterstorff’s definition of flourishing as a person being in harmony with nature, God, self, and neighbor we can also then use those categories to consider how we might develop Truth revealing curriculum units. I suggest the following correlation of the aspects of flourishing with possible curricular emphases.

Flourishing is accomplished in a curricular emphasis through:

Harmony with nature – I suggest the word “Wonder” to capture this aspect. Here we are helping the student to understand the “ABC’s” of God’s great creation:  A- Awe, B – Beauty, C – Complexity, D – Design, E – Excellence, and so forth.  As we consider the Wonder of nature, we are driven to our knees in worship of the Creator. True wisdom begins in wonder as we creatures consider our Creator and his marvelous creation – “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”

Harmony with God – I suggest the word “Wisdom.” In this area we consider our purpose for being, what is wrong with the world, and how it has been made right through Jesus’ work. We help students to know the Truth so that in “your light we may see light” and knowing the truth they may discern what is true, lovely, good, and right. We cultivate the discomfort that believers feel as they are in, but not of the world. We encourage students to raise prophetic voices against the brokenness of sin and alienation from God that is present in culture and society.

Harmony with self and man – I suggest the word “Work.” There are two aspects to this word – first of all we must educate in ways that help students identify whose they are, who they are, and what passions/gifts they have been given. Our learning processes must allow students to naturally unfold their “wiring” and help them discover their life call. Secondly, in the area of work we must help them understand that they are part of Christ’s work of the restoration of creation/mankind. Our learning experiences must serve to develop compassion for mankind at both the local and global level. “Work” then involves students understanding their passion to respond with compassion.

I hope these can be helpful terms as we work toward encouraging flourishing students and developing distinctive curricular units. In Christian schools we are able to begin our teaching and learning experiences with worship of the Creator; lead kids toward harmony with nature, God, self, and man; and end with the student’s desire to “offer their life as a living sacrifice.”

Flourishing – Determination to bring joy and hope into the lives of others

Source: Beth Chatto Gardens by antonychammond via Flickr

Tenth and final post in a series that delves deeper into the characteristics of a flourishing student – click here to read the original post on flourishing.)

One of the most significant flourishing outcomes that we hope for our students is our last item- a determination to bring joy and hope into the lives of others. In order to do this, we must be able to bring together all aspects of head, heart, and hands – our cognition, passions, and behaviors. It is not that a people with this determination are saccharine sweet, out of touch with reality, or constantly smiling; rather, they know what they believe, who they are, and have a sense of their impact on others as they go through life. This determination comes from a sense of deep faith, gratefulness for God’s gracious gift of salvation, and a desire to live out a life of grateful service to others, to be Christ to them in small and large ways.

What we are really talking about is what attitude we choose to demonstrate each day, in each situation and circumstance. One of the most helpful quotes that speaks to the significance of a positive attitude is this famous one by Chuck Swindoll:

“Attitude is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, money, circumstances, than failures and success, than what other people think, say, or do. It is more important than appearance, ability, or skill. It will make or break a business, a home, a friendship, an organization. The remarkable thing is I have a choice every day of what my attitude will be. I cannot change my past. I cannot change the actions of others. I cannot change the inevitable. The only thing I can change is attitude. Life is ten percent what happens to me and ninety percent how I react to it.”
― Charles R. Swindoll

Swindoll is saying that attitude is more important than most anything else in life:  it is a critical issue to address with our students. We can help students realize is that they have a choice about their attitudes. A broken or difficult past may haunt us, but we have a choice about whether we forgive and move on or not. We have the opportunity to choose our attitudes each moment and in each circumstance. We see this modeled by Paul and Silas (Acts 16:25-28) as they were imprisoned for preaching the Gospel and chose to spend their time praying, singing, and eventually giving witness to that hope and joy that was spilling out of them. All students have the potential to flourish in this way – it is not dependent on intellect – in fact, some “special needs” students often can be the best bringers of joy and hope.

Our ultimate hope for our students is summarized in this final Flourishing Index statement – that they learn to become Christ-like – giving evidence of the hope that they have through Christ, being grateful in all circumstances, being humble in times of blessing, and living selfless lives of service to others, which is the faithful presence of Jesus Christ in the world.

“No more hurting people – Peace”

One of the most poignant images from the recent Boston Marathon bombing was 8 year -old Martin Richard’s sign. The bombing was the largest of several stories of hurt in the month of April. People deeply hurt by gun violence were testifying in front of Congress. A video surfaced at Rutgers University showing a coach hurting players by his physical actions and harmful words directed at his players. It struck me that Martin, by his sign, was not only hoping for an absence of pain by his choice of his first four words, but also a pro-active state of peacefulness by his next. If we seek peace, we must not simply embrace it as an abstract concept, but consider how peace may be attained in our daily lives and at what cost.

Mulling over all these events, I found myself wrestling with the situation of the fired coach and what implications it might have for all those who seek to nurture faith in students.  I found myself wondering about how we define the line he crossed. I am a sports fan and regularly see coaches display intensity, passion, and anger – how similar are they to the Rutgers coach and where is the line of unacceptability drawn? As I considered this I began to think of not just coaches, but teachers and other adults who work with kids.  Where does “helping and discipline” turn into hurting? Does it just have to do with volume or is quiet sarcasm to control and manipulate kids just as deadly? Is sarcasm ever acceptable in working with kids or is it a lazy way for an adult to maintain control, to be cool with the cool kids, to keep the classroom pecking order intact so that equilibrium and order can be maintained – at whatever cost?

I also wondered how some adults who refrain from using any objectionable methods with youth get stellar results year after year. The ones we should be emulating are the best coaches and teachers who demonstrate by word and deed that they truly see the person in front of them as an image-bearer of the God of heaven and earth and therefore worthy of the same respect they would expect to receive! They do not need to shout at or put down a student in front of the peers of the student or later in front of their own peers. They seek to build up students, and in return, the students are secure in the love of the teacher.  Students will take and even seek correction and advice from them. Why do some teachers and coaches get not only results but respect and lifelong admiration from those in their charge? And why do we put up with anything less if we are truly serious about emulating Jesus and living out our school missions?

My belief is that in Christian education we should be holding ourselves to a higher standard – we seek to serve the Prince of Peace who says “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called the children of God.” (Matthew 5:9) Our children’s faith is nurtured or discouraged by the words and actions of adults around them – it will take courage for us to confront each other if we see hurting happening by an adult – but it is what we are called to as children of God working with God’s children.

Flourishing – thinking divergently and creatively about problems/solutions

(Fifth in a series that delves deeper into the characteristics of a flourishing student – click here to read the original post on flourishing.)

Are we fogging the mirror? The statement,“We believe all children are made in the image of God,” has powerful consequences that I invite you to think about related to this aspect of flourishing. Are the ways we teach our students encouraging them to be more creative and divergent thinkers and therefore increasing their flourishing? A flourishing student is certainly one who demonstrates a developed sense of thinking divergently and creatively about problems and solutions. How can this capability be developed and enhanced over the course of a student’s educational experience? One of the things that we grieve in the process of the education of children is the loss of creativity. In his well-known video, Sir Ken Robinson alludes to the book, Breakpoints and Beyond ,and a test of creativity. The gist of this study, and his point, is that creativity diminishes each year from kindergarten forward. Robinson wryly suggests that the common denominator in life for children is that they have attended school. A sad commentary!

Robinson is not alone in his concerns. In a recent blog post entitled “My Son is 8. He is a Maker,” professor Scott McLeod, writes about his 8 year old son, lamenting that the process of “making” is getting squashed out of his son’s life by school. Others who have had a similar personal experience share their stories in the comments to this post. I especially was touched by the woman writing about her 16 year old daughter’s experiences and the comment by a teacher who is attempting to teach her AP English class creatively.

School has wounded some learners and damaged their creativity and divergent thinking. In fact, wounds of creativity are one of the several types of wounds listed by author Kirsten Olson in her book Wounded by School. This controversial book says that the way we educate millions of American children alienates students from a fundamental pleasure in learning, and that pleasure in learning is essential to real engagement, creativity, intellectual entrepreneurship, and a well-lived life.

As Christians, we believe that each person bears God’s image and that we reflect his goodness, beauty, and creativity. I have asked the question previously in this blog: “If we ‘kill creativity’ through teaching that puts kids to sleep (physically or mentally!) and don’t encourage/allow children to be creative, have we limited their opportunity to image God?” This is a very sobering thought!

We have an unprecedented array of both technological tools and global awareness/opportunities today as we work with students. In his new book, Brain Gain – Marc Prensky, best known for his “digital native, digital immigrant” language, argues that technology actually complements and frees the mind for greater creativity. It is up to us as teachers and administrators to build an encouraging environment/opportunities, give permission/encourage students, and create a culture of expectation for creative work.

A word about standards and creativity – they are not in opposition to each other – it is not an either/or scenario. In the McREL (Mid-Continent Research for Education and Learning) paper Five Things That Make the Biggest Difference in Schools, Bryan Goodwin suggests: “Standards should not be the ends of education, but rather the beginning, the platform for creativity, innovation, and personalization.” As we now recognize, creativity is at the top of the revised Bloom’s taxonomy – how perfect that the highest thing we can do is to image our creator’s creativity!

Some creativity links for you to explore:

What would happen if we “Let Kids Rule the School”?

Creative cities are happy cities – towns where learning is held highly and creative work is valued.

A creative young maker demonstrating creative things kids can do: Sylvia

Curriculum of Creativity – a compilation of ideas.

What might be done to produce different learning environments that stimulate creativity?

Will Richardson blog post: “How do we help our students establish themselves as a “node” in a broad, global network of creativity and learning? Shouldn’t that be one of the fundamental questions that drives our work in schools right now?”

Video creation –  by Rushton Hurley – Next Vista for Learning – five minute videos created by students about things to be learned, global study and service.

Careful – this video is just for fun, but you may recognize something you have said to stifle creativity: “Anti-creativity checklist” created by Youngme Moon, Donald K. David Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School.

And to close, some wonderful creative student efforts happening at two of our CSI schools in Canada:

Toronto District – Unique Programs

Abbotsford Christian – Student Showcase

Identifying “take-aways for life:” using Essential Questions to nurture faith

If one accepts the idea that our main focus in Christian education needs to be nurturing student faith in the educational context, then it is vitally important that we engage students with questions that 1) cause students to stop dead in their tracks with intrigue, and 2) cause the students to deal with a Biblical perspective on issues of life. This is easier said than done! How can we develop such questions?

If I want to drive to a destination, I put into my Google Maps the destination I am hoping to arrive at – beginning with the end in mind. So, we first must ask the question: What kind of students do we seek to produce? My answer to this question is: “A flourishing student!”  and that is why I have been trying to spell out what that means in the series of blog posts that I have been writing in this space on the idea of a flourishing student (list of blog post dates).

If we accept Wolterstorff’s definition of flourishing as being in harmony with God, neighbor, creation, and self then we can begin to see how we must shape the questions we ask in our curriculum and what conceptual qualities they must possess. Our curriculum outcomes must deal with God, neighbor, creation, and self. The things we are trying to do in our teaching relate to one of these four areas. I see the connections as follows:

• Creation and wonder – this is where we begin as learners and we should never lose it! We wonder about the micro and macro aspects of creation and the magnificent design behind it all. To whom should we give the praise and glory? We continue to wonder about creation’s mysteries that we learn have not been unlocked and are intrigued by the wonder and beauty of creation as we seek to live in harmony with it and learn how to use it well. Example questions in science class: Why are trees important to God’s creation? How does the structure of a DNA molecule exemplify order and creation?
• God/Christ and knowledge and wisdom – all knowledge and truth exists because Christ brought it into existence and continues to hold it together. This is why we marvel at gravity and 2+2=4 and how our bodies work. So our essential questions can be pretty straightforward and need not be simply “God questions” that are painfully superficial, but should include a discussion of a God-centered starting point and a worship ending point. In non-Christian schools, knowledge is presented as if it can stand on its own, or praise is ascribed to man without any reference to a Divine Creator – this is a huge difference. We need to ask our students to apply knowledge in areas of study toward questions of discernment as informed by Biblical perspectives. Example question in math class: Do you think there is such a thing as ‘chance’?  Why or why not? Example question in social studies: Is capitalism in America successful?  Why or why not?
• Neighbor and compassion – a Christian school should motivate students toward a desire to serve and make a difference in the world. It should produce true empathy as students understand people and situations in the world, and should inspire a compassionate response out of love for other people God has created. The student understands that each person is loved and cherished by God, having been made in his image. The student understands then that life is not just about themselves, but that they have a global responsibility to respond to the needs of our world. There may not be easy answers to questions that juxtapose two competing interests and Christians may disagree about the best ways to respond. Example question in social studies: As a Christian, what is the difference between needs and wants? Example question in English: Does having a shared experience make a person better able to provide true comfort?
• Self and image-bearing/gifts – how can one be in harmony with one’s self? Harmony with one’s self might mean acceptance of how God has created you – your physical, mental, emotional, spiritual self and an ever increasing understanding through the years of how he has gifted you, wired you, and what makes you “tick.” It also means that you take seriously care of your body as a temple of the Holy Spirit: you eat well, sleep well, exercise well, develop positive habits, virtues, and a generous and gracious spirit. As you grow in Christ, you more and more are able to let the light of Christ shine through you, and to truly bring joy and hope into the world, into the lives of others. Example question in music: Why do we respond to God with music? Example question in art: How can art be used to redeem culture?

This model may help us in our thinking about producing effective “take-away” Essential Questions. As we engage students with questions and help them construct good questions, we may find these categories helpful as a way to balance areas of focus within a classroom setting.

Made for goodness

Admittedly, I read a fair amount of books in a year. So, when one sticks in my mind and continues to provoke my thoughts, it moves to my mental list of “exceptional books” and I tend to talk to others about it. Recently I picked up Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s book, Made for Goodness: and Why This Makes All the Difference, written with his daughter, Rev. Mpho Tutu. What a compelling and inspirational book!

I was curious how Tutu might hold this view of goodness in the face of all the evil that he has seen and heard. Yet Tutu argues that, being made by God in his image, we are both attracted to good and outraged by evil. God holds us in life, and we can face evil squarely because we know that evil will not have the last word. We are lovable and capable of good because God has loved us since before eternity. The Tutus encourage us to live into the goodness that God has hardwired into us, as opposed to “doing good” out of fear that we are not doing enough to please God. One of my favorite quotes in the book is the following: “The invitation to Godly perfection, God’s invitation to wholeness, is an invitation to beauty. It is God’s invitation to us to be life artists, to be those who create lives of beauty.” (p. 48) In teaching, we have so many opportunities to be life artists, instruments of God’s goodness, impacting the lives of our students around us.

The Tutus do not deny the power and pervasiveness of evil. They recount personal experiences and the horror stories of other’s suffering. As the leader of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa to investigate apartheid era crimes, Archbishop Tutu heard stories reflecting the worst of human evil, yet is able to affirm that even in suffering, God sees and stands with us in all that we experience and endure in life.

I was struck by, and very appreciative of the Tutus’ description of forgiveness:

“We miseducate ourselves and our children with the trite phrase ‘Forgive and forget.’ Forgiveness is not a form of forgetting. It is, rather, a profound form of remembering. When we forgive, we remember who and whose we are. We remember that we are creative beings modeled on a creative God. When we forgive, we reclaim the power to create.” (p.150)

The authors remind us that we all long for goodness, for a return to Eden. They encourage us in closing to be much in prayer, to be listening for God’s voice: “God can help us choose, from among the plethora of paths that are spread out before us, the one that leads to flourishing.” To begin, we must see ourselves as God sees us, as the crown of his creation, created for his joy and beloved. This has implications for how we view others: “As we allow ourselves to accept God’s acceptance, we can begin to accept our own goodness and beauty. With each glimpse of our own beauty we can begin to see the goodness and beauty in others.” (p.198)

This book caused me to wonder if sometimes we focus too much on the shortcomings of ourselves, our students, our colleagues and allow ourselves to become negative, discouraged, cynical, and even bitter. The hard lessons learned in South Africa would point us in the direction of not ignoring the reality of evil, and certainly not letting it have the last word. We live in the hope of Eden and have daily opportunity to exude the goodness and beauty of our Creator, to image him and to celebrate it in other image-bearers before us.

Disability Awareness: A gift for your use!

I have been amazed by the amount of progress that has been made during the last thirty plus years in our approaches with special needs students. I feel I can make that statement because, as a student seeking a special education degree those many years ago, I remember when laws such as Public Law 94-142 (Education of All Handicapped Children Act), also known as Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), had just been passed. We were in the beginning stages of learning how to best educate students in a “least restrictive environment.” I believe that in the Christian education community we are making significant progress with both educating students in inclusive settings and building understanding and appreciation for inclusive students with our entire student populations.

I am delighted to pass along a gift to you and your schools from a former colleague of mine, Dr. Kathleen VanTol, education professor at Dordt College in the areas of Special Education and Teaching English Language Learners. Her students have put together a 24 page Disability Awareness Unit suitable for use in K-8 schools. Each grade will study a different disability and there are devotionals and a 15 minutes a day lessons that include teaching ideas, video links, and interactive activities.

This unit is very timely – below is the introduction the students included with the unit:

Inclusive Schools Week is the first week of December. Inclusive Schools Week is an annual event that celebrates students who have disabilities while encouraging all students to acknowledge that students are more alike than different!  Making our students more aware of disabilities is one way that they can see things from others’ perspectives.  Working to make our schools more inclusive is a constant goal.  Knowing more about different disabilities will help students become more prepared to be inclusive of children with disabilities within their own classrooms as well as through daily interactions outside of the classroom.

Many thanks to Dr. VanTol and Dordt students for sharing this great resource!

Flourishing – a desire to serve and make a difference

(Second in a series that delves deeper into the characteristics of a flourishing student – click here to read the original post on flourishing.)

While all schools in North America do some type of service projects with their students, it is in the Christian school that a deeper foundation for service can be laid. At the heart of our beliefs is the truth that, as Jesus’ followers, and out of deep thanksgiving to him for our salvation, we are given a desire by the Holy Spirit to model after him and emulate his life of self-sacrifice (John 21:15-19, Matthew 20:28, Luke 22:27, Phil. 2:7). Simply, if we truly love Christ, we should desire to love others created by him in his image and help to meet their needs. Because we can tie service to our deepest beliefs, we might hope that it has more staying power than something that is done seasonally or as part of high school graduation requirements. Instead, it is our hope that our students seen service modeled and practiced in such a way that it becomes a way of living out one’s faith.

An essential part of helping students learn to serve others is to help them identify the gifts that God has given them. We experience joy when we get to use our “natural wiring.” In order to help students discover more about themselves, they will need to do some projects that flow from their passion areas as well as some that may not be immediately joyful. However, I think we could do a better job of identifying kid’s “wiring” at an earlier age and I commend the listing of the Throughlines concepts (see graphic) as helpful ways of assisting students to see how they are bearing God’s image and how to imagine using that in service to others.

Motivation to serve may be existent in some of our students and not in others. Some children are compassionate and have a high motivation to make a difference because of a personal experience of loss or grief. Others have had parents who built empathy into the life experience of their children or parents who have modeled compassion well. “Feeling-focused discipline” is an approach that turns the child’s attention to the pain caused by the child’s inappropriate behavior. Other specific strategies to build empathy (Johnson, quoted by Stonehouse) include: care for extended family, creation care, connecting hard circumstances of life experienced by people you know, comparing/contrasting different needs/wants of global people groups, and showing hospitality by welcoming others into your home. There are many opportunities for service today and for helping to build that desire into students as a habit.

We must make manifest the vision of Christ for our world in our schools. This vision and our consequent desire to serve is not for profit, for self-advancement, for personal satisfaction, not to win a service award. In the end, a desire to serve and make a difference is rooted in our desire to worship God. Frederick Buechner states it eloquently:

“To worship God means to serve him. Basically there are two ways to do it. One way is to do things for him that he needs to have done – run errands for him, carry messages for him, fight on his side, feed his lambs, and so on. The other way is to do things for him that you need to do – sing songs for him, create beautiful things for him, give things up for him, tell him what is on your mind and heart, in general rejoice in him and make a fool of yourself for him the way lovers have always made fools of themselves for the one they love.” (Cited in May, Scottie. Children Matter: Celebrating Their Place in the Church, Family, and Community. Grand Rapids, Mich: William B. Eerdmans Pub, 2005.)

We have the opportunity to help students flourish by equipping their heads, hearts, and hands to worship God through serving him and a world in need. What an amazing opportunity and challenge!

Seeing and being seen: a devotional for a new school year

One of the things that summer does for us in the education profession is to restore our sight. We can easily lose our perspective as we near the end of the year – it is a challenge just staying focused as the tasks mount up. Summer gives us time to reflect – to see into the future, to look back, to see through some past problems/people, to soul search about any “blind spots” and “logs” (see Matthew 7:5) and to “look into” things that help us gain our balance and give us new hopes and dreams.

At the beginning of a new year, I encourage you to think about seeing. Will you take the time to truly see your students, parents, and colleagues and enter into their worlds? Will you recognize Jesus when he shows up in your school? Are you seeing the good or the bad in others? It likely depends on where you are focusing. Are we seeing beauty all around? It is essential that we help students see it, as beauty engages us and entices us to learn more – beauty is critical to the learning process. Will you take the time to see the needs of the world around you and through your keen sight provoke the missional imaginations of your students – to help them truly see as Jesus saw? Do you have a vision for the future impact, the ways God can use, each of those whose hearts and lives you have the opportunity to deeply impact?

At the beginning of the year, I encourage you to think about being seen. Not in the showy, attention-getting way that we first think about when we use the words “being seen.” Let me give you an example of what I mean. In his wonderful book, Nudge, Leonard Sweet tells this story.

Many decades ago some men were panning for gold in the state of Montana. The prospectors organized themselves into an informal cooperative and agreed up front that if they should strike gold they would tell no one about their find.
    After weeks of hard panning and digging, one of them found an unusual stone. Breaking it open, they were excited to see that it contained gold. Soon the prospectors discovered an abundance of the precious metal. They began shouting “We’ve found it! We’ve found gold! We’ve struck it rich!”
    They then proceeded to go to a nearby town for additional supplies. Before leaving camp, they reminded each other of the pledge of absolute secrecy. While they were in town, none of them breathed a word about their good fortune. However, when they were getting ready to return to camp, they were horrified to discover several hundred of the local townsmen preparing to follow them. And when they asked who had revealed the secret of their discovery, the answer came: “No one had to. Your faces showed it.”

How do you wish to be seen this year? What will students, colleagues, and parents see in you?

A Flourishing Index – Part 1

For those of you new to reading this blog, at the end of last year I proposed that Christian schools consider adopting a Flourishing Index – a list of outcomes that we desire for our students. I also think that this index could provide helpful targets that we could measure ourselves against.  For more information, you may wish to read the two blog posts that were written last year as a way of gaining familiarity with what I am suggesting.

While I did not consciously realize it at the time I was creating a Flourishing Index, I have since discovered two wonderful resources: one from a Christian perspective and one from a secular perspective. I would like to start with renowned Christian philosopher and Christian education thinker Nicholas Wolterstorff this month and discuss the other author next month in this blog.

As someone who has thought a lot about developing distinctively Christian curriculum, I was encouraged to read that Wolterstorff had also puzzled about what makes a curriculum distinctively Christian, and this led him to the idea of flourishing as a unifying concept:

“It became important for me to figure out what holds a curriculum together. You’ve got sciences and arts and my own passion, justice. What holds it all together? It eventually became clear to me that there is a biblical category of flourishing, of shalom. [It is] “peace” in the New Testament, but eirene in Greek is a pretty weak translation of what the Old Testament means by shalom. It means flourishing. That’s what a Christian college should be about. Not just planting thoughts in people’s heads and getting them into professional positions but flourishing, in all its dimensions. Source: Faith and Leadership, 2012

He defines flourishing and elaborates upon the idea of flourishing as shalom in this video:

In a review of Wolterstorff’s book, Educating for Life, reviewer John Shortt highlights this definition of flourishing, which I believe captures the essence of flourishing: “Shalom is not merely the absence of hostility for, as he memorably puts it, ‘to dwell in shalom is to enjoy living before God, to enjoy living in one’s physical surroundings, to enjoy living with one’s fellows, to enjoy living with oneself’ (p. 101).” I am particularly struck with the Joy aspect of living in harmony with God, neighbor, and self – a deep sense of happiness and contentment.

As we spend the next months unpacking the concept of flourishing through discussion of the elements of The Flourishing Index, I invite you to consider how flourishing is really the ultimate outcome of a truly distinctive Christian education.

What bothers me about the current state of teacher evaluation

Here are some of the issues that concern me about the recent efforts to ramp up the teacher evaluation process in the U.S.

• The current discussion largely ignores research on the adult learner – we can intensify motivation, but cannot make people change unless they want to. So, how do we increase the “want to” without resorting to high accountability/sticks all the time?
• The current accountability situation in the U.S. has the cart ahead of the horse – we are in the midst of a quantum change around Common Core and in the meantime politicians have asked for educators to use a true “value-added” assessment before effective instruments have been put in place.
• There are very few true “value-added” tests and the concept itself is being questioned. (For more on this viewpoint see this excellent article by Linda Darling Hammond.)
• Student achievement is only part of the equation – we should seek not minimum competence but flourishing – for students to desire to learn and to be creative and curious – not the regurgitation of information from their short-term memory that will be forgotten next week. (see following post)
• We can and ought to do better in Christian education – we should be seeing each teacher as an image-bearer who needs encouragement and appropriate direction, not simply a producer of great student test scores. How will we choose to work with our teachers – toward student growth/flourishing and their own growth as individuals?

For further reading:

A comprehensive overview of the issues in the field by Charlotte Danielson – author of the Framework for Teaching – still the best description/rubrics of effective teaching practice that I have seen.

Here is a helpful and insightful blog post by Kyle Hunsberger written from a teacher perspective.

Deficits or possibilities?

Image: flickr.com/photos/kretyen/2628104710/

As a educator who began my career in special education, I was trained in the diagnostic-prescriptive approach: identify the problem, find an effective strategy, and try to remediate the deficit. A focus on deficits can become a problem – we are trained as educators to always be on the lookout for deficits, for problems, and not for the larger picture of abundance and possibility. My question then is: is it right for us as Christian teachers to always be focusing on what is wrong, finding flaws, identifying misunderstandings, and critiquing performances?  Will we ever be happy anyway? Are we monitoring ourselves so that we keep this in balance with seeing gifts, possibilities, and focusing on the good, the lovely, and the true?

Many of the professions are trained to deal with problems: dentists with cavities in teeth, physicians with disease and malfunction, social workers with emotional scars, and attorneys with sins of omission and commission. Teaching is unique in the amount of time that can be spent in focusing on encouragement and possibilities. As Christian teachers, we need to intentionally point out to students the abundance of God’s great creation, as well as the abundance of his grace and love to us. We will also want them to know the possibility and promise we see in them as image-bearers, and in the lives and opportunities they have been given.

Tough Question #2: What services should Christian schools provide?

Source: Andreas-photography via Flickr

A set of key questions has arisen as schools in the CSI community, founded largely by the Christian Reformed Church in North America, have moved from schools that served an immigrant community to being schools that serve the broader community. That question is: “What is our identity and given that identity, what type of student do we serve? What kinds of services should we be providing?”

Schools have taken several approaches to answering that question. In the early days (pre-1970’s), students with special needs were often sent to public schools, to self-contained boarding schools (Elim Christian School being one example), or kept at home in the case of more intense special needs. For the purpose of this discussion we will define special needs as those students who, due to physical, cognitive, emotional, or social/behaviorial issues demand additional services and support beyond that of the average student. This could include students on either end of the academic spectrum whether impaired or gifted.

The current approaches fall into these categories:

1. The Christian school community in a given area should share the extra cost to educate children from Christian families to the greatest degree possible.
2. The Christian school draws an arbitrary line as to what services can be offered and borne by the larger parent community. This may vary from school to school; the line typically may include students with mild cognitive impairments, for example.
3. The Christian school operates with a selective admissions policy in the academic and behavioral realm and only allows students within a prescribed band to be admitted.
4. The Christian school community accepts students with special needs, but the additional cost for services is borne entirely by the parents of the students.

My hope in writing this post is that we might have a broader discussion of this issue, not to provide answers. As you read the four categories above, you may have found yourself raising certain questions:

• How can schools make it financially feasible when they take all students? Doesn’t that raise tuition to an unaffordable level for the average parent?
• But, aren’t we supposed to be our brother’s keeper? Isn’t it the job of the entire Christian community to function as a whole, as a body?
• How do we draw an arbitrary line that doesn’t feel arbitrary to parents? What about parents of students who are just on the other side of the line? When do we make exceptions?
• Was Christ’s ministry just to the best thinkers or to all? Shouldn’t we be emulating him in our ministry to students?
• But, isn’t it more honest to say we are not equipped to take on students that we can’t service? Isn’t it unethical to take students for their tuition dollars and then not service them appropriately – on either end of the spectrum?
• Do we need services for gifted students? Won’t they just do well anyway?
• Is it fair to penalize parents for the needs of their students? Why should a Christian education be less possible for those who are blessed with children who have special needs?
• How does the broader community view our schools in the light of the categories that were described above? Does it challenge or affirm the stereotypes they may already have about Christian schools?
• What would Jesus do if he were the head of your school?

What do you think?

Competence, coherence, and creativity

“What makes young people catch fire, work hard, and persist despite difficulties?” This compelling question and succeeding answers are spelled out in a new book, Fires in the Mind: What Kids Can Tell Us About Motivation and Mastery, by Kathleen Cushman.  Cushman suggests it is helpful to consider the differences between student experiences and what their elders report. She does this by citing evidence from the 2009 MetLife Survey of the American Teacher.

Cushman reports: “Four out of five teachers and principals in our 2009 survey told us that they believe connecting classroom instruction to the real world would have a major impact on student achievement. They also held that addressing the individual needs of diverse students is necessary to student success. A school culture where students feel responsible and accountable for their own education, they said, would greatly affect student achievement.”

Cushman goes on to say: “In that same survey, however, a majority of students reported that their teachers very rarely – or never – speak to them personally about things that matter to the students. Over a quarter of secondary school students said their teachers do not connect the school curriculum to its applications in the outside world. And only one in four students felt strongly that school let them use their abilities and their creativity.”

Cushman wonders: “What should we conclude from such disparate perspectives?” Hmm…great question!

As I have pondered this question, it appears that in this time of educational change there are three principles with which we should be concerning ourselves as Christian educators as we engage students in the learning process.

Principle #1: Competence – we are responsible for ensuring that students grow in understanding and wisdom that allows them to thrive as adults. Simply put, what should kids learn?

Principle #2: Coherence – we must help students make connections between what they are learning and how things fit together in a bigger picture. In Christian education we desire for our students to image Christ, in whom all things cohere. (Col. 1:15-20)

Principle #3: Creativity – there are many ways that we can learn something and express our understanding. Creativity is today considered to be the highest level of thinking, as evidenced by the fact that it is now placed at the top of Bloom’s taxonomy of thinking. As Christians we understand that we are made in the image of God. Likewise our own creativity is a reflection, in a small way, of the Creator of All.

My suggestion is that we value all of these areas equally in our educational process. It is easiest to get overbalanced in the competence area. As teachers, it is fun to tell others what we know; even though there is plenty of evidence today that telling is not the best way for students to learn. Consider how much fun it is for us to personally discover something instead of being told, yet we often persist in taking the easier “telling” route with our students. Here is one example of what could happen when we turn over some control.

Our greatest joys in the learning process come when things “connect” with our students and they “get it!” It is the joy of coherence that we are experiencing – helping others to see how it all fits together. Why settle for kids getting bits and pieces when we can help them to see how learning impacts their lives?

If we “kill creativity” through teaching that puts kids to sleep (physically or mentally!) and don’t encourage/allow children to be creative, have we limited their opportunity to image God?

A Common Core for Christian schools?

In these past few months, something remarkable happened across the United States: many states adopted a set of national standards called the Common Core State Standards.  (Those states are shown in yellow in the graphic to the right.) The adoption of the standards was sped along by the fact that any states applying for Race to the Top monies were required to have previously adopted the standards.

It is also remarkable that there has been a lot of praise for the content of the standards. Experts have even stated that the standards are stronger and more helpful than the current standards of 80% of the states. The standards are currently completed in language arts and math, with other areas still in the works.

As a “curriculum person,” I am always excited to have greater clarity around what we view as important for students to know and do. Yet, this set of standards lacks the kind of perspective toward wisdom that we are seeking to achieve with our students in Christian schools. I am not arguing with the content of the standards, just their completeness, as they are not wholistic in their current form, nor do they recognize the source all truth.

Would it be beneficial to have an amended Common Core standards for Christian schools that include an articulation of the kind of student outcomes we are working toward with our students?

Ending well? – part two

http://www.flickr.com/photos/heraldpost/ / CC BY-NC 2.0

One of the joys of writing a blog is to read the responses that people take the time to write. I was really hoping for some response to my post of last time entitled – “Ending well” and was hoping it encouraged some lively discussions in faculty rooms.  One concern I have is that while there are some really thoughtful comments written, I wonder if readers of the blog take the time to go back and consider them as well. Well I hope to correct that in this post on this topic!

I really appreciated Fran VanderMeulen’s comments and her suggestion: “A celebration of talent which we do with year end concerts, art fairs, science fairs and other sharings of the the learning are really much more conducive to the types of cooperation we are trying to encourage in our Christian schools.” If God created us to praise him through learning, how good that we would take the time to celebrate the wonderful gift of learning – of together making meaning from the creation around us and using the minds he has given us!

I also thought Jon Postma’s response to my post on awards ceremonies bore repeating and so I quote it in its entirety:

“Every year I have the privilege of standing in front of the school to present an academic award for my subject area. This is an award given after spending three, roller-coaster years with students during their 6th, 7th, and 8th grade years. I also have had the difficult task of collaboratively deciding on three graduation awards given to 8th grade students–Christian Leadership, Christian Service, and Fruit of the Spirit awards.

When I think about these awards, it is never done in the context of a purely academic perspective. I look for a student who enjoys and engages with the subject area. I look for the foot-washer, one who follows the servant leadership of Jesus and has served their fellow students. I take input from students themselves through yearly spiritual self-assessments and surveys. Lastly I keep my eyes and ears open to the Lord’s leading.

This year my award is going to a student who has a learning disability in my subject area. Even so, the student has engaged, persisted, served, and blessed those around him or her. Earlier this year the student said to a younger student who was struggling in this subject area as he or she studied for a test, “Would you like me to help you study. There are so many things I have learned that could help you.” Will there be some students who are troubled by this decision, thinking they deserved the award for their better grades? Yes, I can imagine some might feel that way, but all the students will recognize the deserving qualities that this student has displayed for all to see.

Last year my award went to “the entire 8th grade class.” There were a lot of talented students in that class. But their greatest accomplishment was being open to God’s leading as He changed them from “my little piranhas” as 6th grade students, constantly picking each other apart, to a class that cared for each other and worked collaboratively with each other in my class. I struggled with the decision to give it to the entire class. There were parts of me that felt it wasn’t right. Were there those that may not have deserved it? Probably. Were there those that thought they alone deserved the award? Probably. I got a few raised eyebrows from my colleagues. But that is the direction that I felt God leading.

Each year as I present the award, I have found myself with tears in my eyes and a voice that trembles and shakes. Not because of what the students have accomplished, not because of the long hours working with and for these students, but because of the awesome privilege of highlighting to the community what it is that God has done in the lives of these students and waiting in eager expectation for what God will do in the years ahead.

Maybe these thoughts will help others as they consider how awards are presented and recipients chosen for awards ceremonies. I still see value in these ceremonies if what is being celebrated comes from these types of attitudes and perspectives.”

Well said, Jon! (and thanks to Fran and Jon for taking the time to write!)

Ending well?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/heraldpost/ / CC BY-NC 2.0

It’s nearing the end of the school year and time for the annual award distributions. We hand out certificates, trophies, and compile lists of achievements in almost any and every category. Whether in the early grades or at graduation, we seek to point out accomplishments of students. I am guessing that if we could sit down and talk for a few minutes, dear reader, that we would share some mixed feelings about this end of year ritual.

This is an area of our school life that poses potentially large risks to our mission. It is an area that goes largely unexamined and one where we quickly adopt the practices of other schools. It is what we get excited about that speaks the loudest message to our students. I am concerned that sometimes what we do in awards assemblies may actually contradict the kinds of thoughtful work that we have done throughout many previous months and years.

I don’t have the answer to this, but am providing some questions below that might be useful in generating conversations within faculties.  I’d be delighted to post your responses.

1. If we are presenting awards to encourage students, are there a larger number who are actually discouraged by this process?
2. What are we recognizing, and what related values are being held up to our students? Is what we are highlighting in alignment with the mission of our school?
3. If we truly believe that all students are gifted and loved by God, how do we determine which gifts to highlight?  Could we, or even should we, recognize students for growth in discipleship and becoming more Christlike?
4. If we take a “broad recognition” approach and recognize every student for something, is it worth doing?
5. Are we distinctively different in our award ceremonies than any other school?
6. Do our awards truly celebrate the joy and creativity of learning or a narrowly defined competition that sorts out winners and losers by subjective standards?
7. Are students motivated or punished by rewards and recognition? Do we essentially crucify Christ again when we put kids into camps of “winners” and “losers”? Is this a matter of the rich becoming richer and the poor becoming poorer?
8. What was Jesus’ response to his three closest disciples when they were concerned about recognition and who was going to be first, second, and third? What was Paul’s response about who should get the credit for helping bring others into the kingdom?

A poem about leadership

Leadership is . . .

Leadership is not about speed, ideas, efficiency, or power . . .

It is about knowing your own limitations and celebrating the gifts of others,

It is growing in wisdom, understanding the number of our days, and seeking to understand rather than be understood.

It is caring for people, always hoping for, and expecting the best.

It is being brave enough to be vulnerable in front of others.

It is seeing the big picture of where things are, and building a road to the future with limited casualties.

It is helping each person to sing their song from the heart, and leading the band in praise to their Maker.

by Dan Beerens

Encouraging faith through beauty

As I walked by the bookstore flower box, the beauty and color astounded me. The brilliance of the colorful pansies that were blooming in this warmer climate seemed to shout to my eyes to wake up, to jump for joy, to drink it in deeply. You see, my eyes had grown accustomed to only the white of snow and the gray cloud cover.  How could such simple flowers in such a pedestrian area, bring so much joy to my soul? I felt a bit self-conscious gazing on the flowers. After all, there didn’t seem to be similar appreciation from those around. Yet I decided to run the risk as they lifted my soul to consider the God who would put so much detail and brilliant color into something so common, which led me to say a prayer of thanks.

Our opportunity to connect creativity and beauty to its source is one we should not take lightly as Christian educators. We must teach the youth in our care to respond to beauty, and consider the ultimate Creator of all things. Creativity is now acknowledged to be the highest skill on the revised Bloom’s taxonomy – how appropriate that humans’ highest aspiration is to image God through creativity. Yet, in our modern society we grow alienated from creation and fail to even connect every day things back to their source.  This has an impact on our soul – we conveniently buy products, not considering what has gone into them and what choices were made along the way.

Helping us to step back and to see the beauty contained in the natural resources around us is the intention of the 100 Mile Art Project by Christopher Van Donkelaar. Christopher is an iconographer and also works in technology for the Ontario Alliance of Christian Schools. He created a painting by collecting all materials from local sources, painstakingly making everything needed to paint the picture from a 100 mile radius around Cambridge, Ontario. Christopher explains what he was trying to accomplish through the project:

Six months of work in creating colours which could have been bought at an art store for less than $200!  But, this project was not about the finish; rather it was about a journey.  Ultimately, the answer to this question is found in the iconic prototype I chose to paint as the culmination of the exhibition: Adam naming the Animals.  Let me summarize:

Adam Naming the Animals by Christopher VanDonkelaar. This painting is the culmination of the 100 mile ART Project.

God creates everything.  Then, He calls Adam to come and appreciate the especially beautiful animals.  Adam’s appreciation is more than just a hands off, nod-of-the-head; his appreciation is participation.  God asks Adam to add something beautiful to His work by giving it a name (as anyone who has had children will attest to, naming is a very special work and I am never sure if such naming is a response to what I see, or newly shaping/changing of what I see by circumscribing it; I suspect both are true).  There seems to be an unconscious shift in our thinking today, in response to the abuses of the industrial model, which nature is at her best when left alone.  But with this scriptural example as proof, we know that our calling, even before the fall, is to interact with our environment and shape it through appreciation.

Beyond this original premise, I really learned a lot from doing this project: The place of convenience in our culture has reached a level that is very problematic and seems to be the root of many of our current issues.  I learned that working hard to achieve something makes it impossible to waste the achievement.  My family and I have many old-order Mennonites where we live, and I think their quilts point to the same truth.  When creating a shirt requires you to grow a crop of flax, process it into linen (a very arduous process), and dying it using herbs, the worth of such cloth is guaranteed.  And, when the shirt can no longer be worn, it will inevitably be reused and cut into smaller strips to create a beautiful quilt.  Likewise, each colour I created during this project became unthinkable to waste.  Lastly, it was a lot of fun giving worth to something considered worthless.  There are many other thoughts and reactions that have come from a broad range of people, from scientists, teachers, environmentalists, etc., and each has brought with them a little revelation of their own.

The project isn’t finished, either!  I am continuing to explore different regions and reporting what I find through my website.  These self-collected coloured pigments are also becoming increasingly the backbone of my commissioned art works.

You can view how Christopher made each color as well as his beautiful icon paintings at his website.  (Please pass this information on to your art teacher!) Christopher is prophetically teaching us and our students to understand creation more deeply and appreciate it more fully – helping us to praise our Creator in the process!

Do you believe? A review of the movie: Henry Poole is Here

Here is an interesting movie for you to watch over your upcoming spring break! Our family watched it and enjoyed it – it has the potential to lead to some very good discussion around faith, hope, miracles, and belief. Below is the trailer:

(Review contributed by Mark Eckel, educational consultant and director of the Mahseh Center.  Thanks, Mark for sharing!)

Hope does not always come in forms we expect or can explain.  Sometimes the face of Jesus must appear in a stain on a stucco house.  Other times, the house literally has to fall on a person to wake them up.  It is no mistake that words for hope, trust, and faith are so closely aligned with each other in religious frameworks: each is dependent on a world beyond our own.  It is this outside world that we cannot see, that we cannot explain, that invades inside our world.

Hope can come in many forms, but always from outside ourselves.  Luke Wilson stars in a movie to ponder just such an idea: Henry Poole Is Here.  The inexplicable occurs to give hope to the hopeless.  Full of Christian imagery and truly caring believers, Henry is altered when he is forced to confront that which he cannot explain.  Coke-bottle glasses worn by the grocery store check out girl are unnecessary after touching the stained house wall.  Mute no more, a child next door speaks; a result of the same.  Church-goers line up around the house because they believe what they cannot describe may transform what they cannot change.  Henry himself has been diagnosed with an undivulged illness.  Believing his own death to be imminent, “It doesn’t matter” and “I won’t be here very long” are phrases Henry uses to deflect attention away from commitments, away from people, away from life.

Characters enliven the tale.  The won’t-take-no-for-an-answer next door neighbor (Adriana Barraza), the Catholic priest (George Lopez), Millie whose eyes mesmerize (Morgan Lilly), Dawn (Rahda Mitchell) the romantic seeing inside Henry’s shell, and the cashier (Rachel Seiferth) all add flavor to a sweet story.

Albert Torres wrote the original screenplay for Henry Poole.  After failed attempts at penning scripts in Hollywood, Torres quit trying.  He changed course.  Two years later he realized his “undefined sadness” was because he was not writing.  “Rather than write a movie I thought I could sell or one I thought others would like, I wrote a movie I wanted to see. I emerged from a desperate time, looking for a little hope and Henry Poole was born” (source).  After suffering the devastating death of his wife, Mark Pellington created a film to reflect upon the realities of life lived after loss (source).  Henry Poole Lives Here is an example of reflection leading to hope.

Both Pellington and Torres maintain that the movie is not “pushy” about faith.  References to Jesus’ face, miracles, and Catholicism are simply to move the story along.  Henry Poole indeed succeeds without preaching.  But there is no mistaking a movie which depends on its most prominent character, who is invisible, other-worldly, unexplained but always there.

Rated PG for a few uses of profane language and adult situations.

By any measure – unattractive (A Christmas poem)

Emptying self?
Forsaking family?
Losing our life to gain it?
Why do you ask such hard things, Lord?

How do we figure out needs and wants in a Wal-Mart world?
What sort of foolishness is loving enemies and forgiving 70 times 7?
How do we market teaching this in our schools?

How can we see what you want us to see?
Both delighting in ecstasy and bearing brokenness as you modeled for us,
We are simultaneously overloaded and underfed,
Trading the moments of our days for time on screens,
Avoiding the times of loneliness, searching and longing,
Opting instead for hours of mind-numbing activity.

Are we ready to give up our control in a glutted and indulgent society?
Are we lamenting the brokenness we see?
Are we hungry for you, Lord?

Your “good news” asks too much,
It is not attractive or popular,
It makes us a peculiar people, definitely “not cool”
“Be not afraid” you have told us again and again,
Yet as much as we run into dead ends of our own making,
We are reluctant to give up much of our imaginary control of our lives,
Teach us Lord to “cry from the heart and laugh from the belly”* with our world.

We are truly awed at your incarnation – your birth was most unattractive,
Creator of all encapsulated in an uninitiated virgin delivering a bloody birth in a barn.
You have turned our world upside down,
Give us hearts and minds to truly see you,
To reflect on your beauty,
To live and teach your unattractive ways.

You are “the good news to all who would believe. . .”
The foolishness that must be gained by all who would truly live.

*Phrase borrowed from Richard Rohr in Everything Belongs.

Graphic created via Wordle.

“Lord, when did we see you…?”

This compelling video “Mankind Is No Island” could be used effectively with a class or in a chapel. It was the winner of Tropfest New York 2008 – “The World’s Largest Short Film Festival.”

What does it mean to “be Jesus?”

As Jesus pointed out in Luke 6:41, our natural human tendency is to point out the brokenness in others, yet ignore our own brokenness. We repeatedly fall prey to the temptations of pride as we set ourselves apart from others in ways that make us appear we have it “more together.”

There is probably nowhere a greater need for the balance between standing for truth and practicing grace than in dealing lovingly with issues of sexual orientation in our schools. At a recent CSI Critical Issues Forum held at Trinity Christian College, Christian educators grappled with the issues around student sexual orientation. A key question in our discussion became: how can we care well for both individuals and our community in these situations which can be so uncomfortable for those involved and so divisive within our communities?

Attendees at the workshop acknowledged that all of us experience brokenness in our sexuality, originally intended as a good gift from God. It is difficult to even discuss these issues at times. We recognized that for some students sexual orientation is not a choice, but that we play key roles in helping students deal with their own questions, confusion, anger, grief around this topic, as well as helping them deal with family and church relationships. Most of all, we play a key nurturing role as we encourage kids by helping them make choices related to their sexuality as they live out their faith in obedience to Christ, and in the context of Christian community. How can we “be Jesus” to them?

(If you are a member school and are interested in learning more about this topic, please visit our Member Community Center to view student guidelines and information submitted by other schools.)

The sexual minefield our girls face

Girls by many measures are doing better in today’s world than boys, according to statistics related to academic achievement levels, college attendance rates, professional and career opportunities, or even crime/death rates. There is one notable exception, which Carol Liebau contends in her new book Prude: How the Sex-Obsessed Culture Damages Girls (and America Too!). She believes that the area of sex “is a minefield more challenging, difficult, and pressure-filled than ever before” for girls. She shares some very frank and brutally honest examples of sexual misconduct in our schools and society that she backs up with voluminous research. Here are some examples from the research cited in the book:

• Between 1943 and 1999, the age of first intercourse among those sampled, dropped from nineteen to fifteen for females. During that time period, the number of sexually active young women grew from 13 to 47 percent. As of 2005, 46% of high school girls surveyed had engaged in intercourse.
• Between 1969 and 1993 the percentage of female teens and young adults having oral sex went from 42 to 71 percent. More recent figures estimate that 54% of girls between the ages of 15 and 19 have engaged in oral sex.
• 12% of females approved of premarital sex in 1943, by 1999 73% did. 61% of girls aged 15-19 agreed or strongly agreed that it was all right for unmarried 18 year olds to have sex if they had strong affection for each other.
• “Hooking up” or “friends with benefits” – reportedly half of adolescents are having sex in a casual relationship or with someone who is “just a friend.” More than one third of sexually active teens have had sexual intercourse with someone who they were not dating.
• It is estimated that the average 12 year-old girl is exposed to about 280 sexy images in the course of a day. The Parent’s Television Council estimates that in reality based shows there are 3.9 instances of sexual content per hour with some shows nearing 7 scenes with sexual content.
• 77% of prime time shows include sexual content and the sexual content in general has doubled in less than a decade.
• Teens watching TV away from their families had a rate of intercourse 3-6 times higher than those who watched with their families.
• The age of children first viewing pornography has dropped due to the Internet. 90% of kids between 8 and 16 were exposed through online access.

Liebau points out that while there is more information available than ever, the most significant deficit is that the overwhelming majority of information on the Internet and in the media is presented without any moral, ethical, or religious context. She points out that in our postmodern culture there is no value judgment made – all answers are presented as equally valid. In line with the title of her book, she is concerned that the only answer, sexual restraint and premarital virginity, is portrayed by culture as “out of vogue” and “prudish”. Youth are encouraged to do “what is right for you.”

The author points out four key developments in our culture that have created a problematic culture of sex for girls:

• The elevation of self-expression over self-restraint: feeling justified in indulging impulses without restraint.
• The privatization of religion and sexual morality: “…the marginalization of religious faith in public debate and the identification of chastity as nothing but a religious issue have one result: The pro-sex messages directed at young girls go largely unchallenged…rebuttal is limited to adverse health or economic consequences of giving too much too soon. And such arguments are woefully incomplete.”
• The rise of moral relativism and the death of shame: “…there’s no objective criterion…different ways and different truths…are entitled to equal respect…the primary evil becomes exercising judgment about the behavior of others.”
• The advent of the “cool mom”: Moms who want to be “buddies” give their children minimal or no supervision and treat them as little adults. Girls are left to decide by themselves what morals they will base their decisions upon because the mom has abdicated her role.

I appreciate that Liebau closes her book on a positive tone, noting that there are kids and parents who are doing the right things and pointing to a number of concrete programs that are making a difference. This book is a strong call to action and one that is helpful in framing the problem and encouraging good solutions and dialogue.

In our over-sexualized society, this issue needs to be a major focus in terms of our curriculum choices in our schools and our discussion topics with youth (and parents) in our churches. Our girls (and guys) deserve our strong stance and support so that they can be strengthened and encouraged to do the right things, letting the Bible and not the culture guide their actions.

Vying for the minds of our girls

Here is another brilliant short video by Dove and a follow-up to the Evolution video (see my post of March 17 – Seeing on multiple levels.) My apologies to you if any images offend, but this so acutely points out the bombardment coming at our girls/young women – my college age daughters found it very compelling and truthful. Those of you who are old enough to remember it will be struck by the music used at the beginning of the video – the opening tune is obviously inspired by the Rolling Stones 60’s song “Here comes your 19th nervous breakdown.” Comments posted relating to the video raise excellent questions around whether Dove is making a great statement of truth about our cultural values or whether this is just all part of a bigger campaign to increase their “brand” recognition. Unilever, the larger parent corporation of Dove also runs ads by Axe which are 180 degrees in the other direction in terms of presenting inappropriate male views of women as sexual objects. The complexity of the issues involved in this short video and the questions just mentioned compel us as Christian educators in schools and churches to move beyond simple, moralistic answers in challenging our students to apply their faith.

What do we believe about nurturing faith?

I was very heartened that on a day tailor made for golf and other outdoor activities that a couple hundred administrators and church leaders sat together and discussed what they believed about the faith nurture of youth. I am speaking of the recent July CSI convention held in Michigan at Boyne Mountain and the work done on the Covenetwork Manifesto document. We sat together in table groups of 8-10 and worked on the “Whereas” and “Therefore” statements, suggesting revisions. After a time of discussion, we merged our comments and then 8 groups reported out their suggestions. Taking into account all of the suggestions made by the convention attendees and doing some wordsmithing we present the final document below:

A Covenetwork Manifesto

Covenetwork – relationships that work between home, church,
and school, term coined by Miller in The Millennium Matrix

Manifesto – public declaration of policy and aims, declaration, platform

Whereas:

• We value all of our youth as image bearers of God and uniquely designed for Kingdom purposes,
• We desire to nurture a personal faith walk with Jesus Christ in youth,
• We affirm that Scripture mandates nurturing faith in youth,
• We believe that youth is a critical time for faith development,
• We recognize that current realities in culture and institutions (government, business, media, etc. and sometimes in family, school, and church) mitigate against faith development,
• We believe that the family fosters initial faith development and that parents, church, and school each have unique and complementary roles to play in the maturation of that faith,
• We reject the concept that the head (worldview), heart (values, beliefs, attitudes), and hands (decisions, actions, behaviors) of each child can fully develop independent of each other, and we encourage methods that engage youth in a continuous, consistent, and coherent manner,
• We believe that the importance of the kingdom of God requires that home, church, and school work in concert on faith nurture,
• We believe that relationships are foundational to faith nurture,
• We believe that adults who engage with youth over extended periods of time have a significant impact on their spiritual formation,
• We affirm that young people need the desire, ability, and opportunity to articulate what they believe,
• We believe that faith nurture encompasses the individual and all of creation.

Therefore:

• We commit to working together around the faith nurture of our youth in order to complement each other and maximize effectiveness,
• We commit to investing time, attention, and resources toward the faith formation of youth,
• We will strive to maintain healthy dialogue with our faith nurture partners,
• We will seek to explore best ways to communicate, collaborate, or co-plan,
• We will encourage the development of spiritual disciplines in our youth,
• We commit to knowing our youth at a personal level, knowing them at a developmental level, and understanding their changing cultural context through better communication between church and school,
• We will seek the help and guidance of the Holy Spirit for direction and leading as we nurture faith development in our youth,
• We will provide learning experiences that will develop youth engagement in cultural redemption and reconciliation,
• We commit to model and encourage Christian discernment and lifestyle,
• We commit to pray faithfully for our youth.

The intention of this document is to promote dialogue between those responsible for the nurture of the faith of our youth. What are ways you could use this document in your setting to help focus on faith nurture? Please take a moment to report back how you are using this document to engage others in this dialogue – we will report this information in upcoming blog posts along with looking at parts 2 and 3 of the Covenetwork Manifesto.

 

Speaking of sex and God

The headline in the latest Education Week caught my attention: “Abstinence Programs Don’t Work, Largest Study to Date Concludes.” The article went on to say that students who participated in sexual-abstinence programs were just as likely to have sex and had the same number of sexual partners as those who did not take part in the program. Both groups had a median age of first intercourse of 14 years and 9 months – yikes I said to myself as I recalled my state of maturation when I was 14.9! I began to ponder why abstinence programs didn’t seem to be making a difference in student behavior. I also began to consider why some teens I know are keeping their vow of abstinence before marriage. What is different in the lives of the teens who are abstaining?

Barna’s research has found that Christians with a well developed Christian worldview, are more likely to have their beliefs impact their behaviors than the general population, including evangelical Christians. One of the best places to develop a Christian worldview is within the Christian school setting. I would love to see the data in the report mentioned in this article disaggregated by students and their connection to a Christian worldview. I do believe that students who have a more mature development of a Christian worldview and see the connection between their beliefs and actions would show a more positive abstinence rate result. If the concept of abstinence is not connected to a larger worldview that helps students see themselves as imagebearers of God and their bodies as temples of the Holy Spirit, it is easy to understand why abstinence is ineffective. In other words, if as a student my stand on abstinence is grounded in a larger belief system or worldview, then I have larger reasons for remaining sexually responsible.

When meting out consequences for the misbehavior of middle school students in a public school, they used to ask me, “Why should I be good?” In the absence of being able address that question from a spiritual perspective, the best answers I could come up with were limited and not as compelling. Rob Bell states in his latest book, Sex God: Exploring the Endless Connections Between Sexuality and Spirituality: “And when we begin to sort through all of the issues surrounding our sexuality, we quickly end up in the spiritual, because this is always about that…you can’t talk about sexuality without talking about how we were made. And that will inevitably lead you to who made us. At some point you have to talk about God.” I really appreciate his thought that we live between the animals and the angels: “When we deny the spiritual dimension to our existence, we end up living like animals. And when we deny the physical, sexual dimension to our existence we end up living like angels (a being with a spirit but without a body.) And both ways are destructive, because God made us human.”

We desire in Christian schools and churches to show kids who they really are in God’s eyes. They are imagebearers of great worth as Bell reminds us using Paul’s statements from the book of Ephesians: “…they’re blessed, chosen, predestined, given, redeemed, forgiven, included, marked, been made alive, saved, raised up, seated with, created, brought near; they are fellow citizens, they are members, they are being built together.”

Sexuality is a precious gift, a gift God designed to be saved and given exclusively to the person with whom one chooses to enter into the sacred bond of marriage. If we are able to help our students connect how they are viewed by God with how they live their lives, I cannot help but believe that we will see a more positive abstinence result.

Other links I have run across recently which may be of some help with understanding our students better are:

(Girls growing up too fast) Sexualizing Girls: Liberals and conservatives can agree that this is no good at all by Mona Charen, National Review, February 23, 2007.

Hooking up is the rage, but is it healthy? by Barbara F. Meltz, Boston Globe, February 13, 2007.

Sexually Active Teenagers Are More Likely to Be Depressed and to Attempt Suicide by Robert E. Rector, Kirk A. Johnson, Ph.D., and Lauren R. Noyes on The Heritage Foundation website, June 3, 2003

Carolina-led study examines sexual content of several media, affect on teens’ sexual behavior, University of North Carolina, April 3, 2006.

A Cock-and-Bull Story: Explaining the huge rise in teen oral sex by Tim Harford, Slate, Saturday, Sept. 2, 2006.

After Hours on Campus: The Sexualization of the American College by Vigen Guroian, Breakpoint, March 27, 2007.

Sex in the Body of Christ: Chastity is a spiritual discipline for the whole church by Lauren F. Winner (one of our speakers at our summer convention), Christianity Today, May 2005.