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Article 1: In Their Own Language --Kids, Computers and Christian Education Article 2: How & Where to Use Computers in Christian Education Article 3: Nope, we're not drunk --educators share their computer success stories. Article 4: They All Laughed --A list of great ideas that were first scoffed at. |
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"In Their Own Language: Kids, Computers and Christian Education" At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit gave the disciples the gift of speaking in a different language, -the language of the hearer. In today's church that includes sharing the Gospel through the language of multimedia and computers.
I first began experimenting with computers in my Sunday School back in 1990. The computers were slow and expensive, and the software left a lot to be desired. But after class, we couldn't get the kids out of the room. They hovered around the computer, -eyes wide open. And when their parents arrived and hovered, they became part of our wonderful problem. I'll never forget the day one of my teachers said to me, "Imagine what this is going to be like when we learn how to actually teach with these things!" Yes, computers and Christian software are more expensive than construction paper and popsicle sticks, but they also get better results. The most expensive type of Sunday School is one that drives away families, and bores young people into membership oblivion. Denominations pay for boring Sunday School with decreasing membership, budgets and mission. Worse, children are raised without a biblical foundation that can help them know God more fully. Barna Research did a 2001-2003 study of spiritual formation and the church. George Barna admits that going into the study, he vastly unappreciated the importance of children's ministry to both the child's need, and the church's future. The 3 year study concluded that we have until age 13 to make our best faith impressions. Yet, as their study pointed out, 7 out of every 8 dollars in the church are spent on adults. You can read their poll and summary conclusions at www.sundaysoftware.com/stats.htm. The results of not attracting and teaching our kids are far more expensive in the long run for our churches than software. Computers in Christian Education are one great way to attract and teach. Getting started often easier and less expensive than most people realize. 1. Our pews are filled with computer
literate members. Today's families immediately understand why computers in Christian education make sense. They are using computers in unprecedented numbers and ways. They have them at home, use them at work, and support their use in the schools. They are eager to support a Sunday School experience that puts smiles on the faces of their children. Few want their children to go through the kind of Sunday School they themselves experienced. But this isn't just about attracting kids. If it were, cable tv and donuts would be cheaper and just as attractive. It's about teaching them with an attractive tool. I've spent a lot of time with kids at the computer in my Sunday School. Something special happens when students begin to interact with software. They are eager, they are cooperative, they are intrigued, and they ready to open up. And because they enjoy software, they will happily go over the material more than once. Software is a tool for the teacher and students to use together. It doesn't replace the teacher. At the computer, the teacher becomes the "guide by the side." We go through the software with our students. The software does not replace us or the lesson plan. We begin every class with Bible study, and after using some software often find ourselves in discussion or some other related activity. Typically, we have two or three students per computer. Any more and they become passive observers. My small church has four computers in our lab. My co-teacher and I will each sit between two computers. Usually we're all working on the same program. That means we have to have four copies of it. That's a bit expensive, but you can't copy the software, and it would be very difficult to lead one class using four different programs at the same time! Each week a new group of students is rotated into our lab. We might have preschool/early readers one week, teens the next, and grades 3-5 after that. It depends on the schedule and the software we have. Other than the "lab" model, many churches simply support a teacher who has a computer in their classroom, or brings in their laptop from time to time. Some pastors bring software into their Confirmation programs. Others provide software for families to take home. Software is one type of Christian education material that families are eager to use. We use interactive Bible story software which often has discussion questions built right in. These are kid-friendly, animated and interactive multimedia programs. We also use scripture memory software, creative writing software for reflection, and Christian game software that has content. Many pastors and educators are surprised such software even exists. The denominational catalogs and corner Christian bookstores rarely carry much of a software selection. Back in 1996, that prompted several of my Sunday School teachers and I to form a ministry educating people about the use of C.E. software and providing churches with a consistent source that was reviewing software for theological content and quality. We also began developing our own software in 2000. Ours is the first Christian software designed by educators who also TEACH with the software. You can visit our website mentioned at the end of this article.
Like the disciples at Pentecost, every teaching innovation has its nay-sayers standing off to the side slinging arrows. Some say we are drunk on technology. But those of us who have experienced computers in the classroom are reveling in a new language that connects with this generation. Like Peter we say, "No, we're not drunk. It's only Sunday morning. A time for amazement and astonishment. A time for our sons and daughters to dream dreams, and the old to see visions...." (Acts 2)
A Few Recommended Titles Here is a range of popular titles that also demonstrates the wide variety of content styles found in Christian software. Each of these can be found on the Internet at our website, www.sundaysoftware.com. We're picky about our own software, and about including other people's software in our catalog. We're even more persistent about providing free teaching materials for most titles we carry. You can view outlines and graphics and video demos of all these and more at sundaysoftware.com.
How & Where to Use Computers in Christian Education Finding computer equipment these days is pretty easy. In most churches, someone has a laptop, a spare computer, a used computer, or unused church office computer where you can start teaching God's word using software.
Some labs begin when an enterprising Sunday School teacher wants to do something different with their bored class. After the other teachers hear how well received the material is with other classes, they want to use it with their own, and a "lab" project begins to take shape. Occasionally the lab starts in the church office because those computers are unused on Sunday morning. Other churches make use of computer already in the building's preschool or Christian school. Many churches begin using Christian software to supplement their Wednesday Kids Fellowship. Read the book, Teaching with Computers in Christian Education for more discussion about HOW and WHERE to use computers in Christian education. "Nope,
We're Not Drunk" (Fourth in a Series on Computers in Christian Education for ALERT magazine, November 1997) By Neil MacQueen It has been something of a secret until this year and this ALERT series. A growing number of Presbyterian churches are successfully using computers in their Sunday Schools. This fourth article about computers in Christian education describes this exciting grassroots movement in the words of several of its pioneers. Their comments are representative of those coming from educators and pastors around the country. The word is out! Computers are proving to be powerful tools in attracting students and improving Bible literacy. They are part of a fresh wind of education ideas and innovation stirring in local congregations coast to coast. No other comment so typifies the reaction churches are getting to computers in Christian education as I wish there had been something like this when I was in Sunday School. "This is the one comment I hear over and over and over again in my congregation." says Linda Beckham, D.C.E. at the Palma Ceia Church in Tampa. "We have experienced a lot of excitement about our Bible Computer Lab among the kids and parents. Even our adults are clamoring to get a crack at some of the software. Our staff, teachers and church leaders have been very encouraged by the response and the results. Linda's church isn't the only one experiencing the warm reception and support for computers in Christian education. Diane Jones, D.C.E. at First Presbyterian Church in Circleville Ohio has also been pleasantly surprised. "Our parents have expressed their appreciation at our willingness to risk being innovative and creative. We haven't had one negative reaction and there is a general sense that we are moving in the right direction by modernizing our teaching methods. And of course the kids think it is very cool." Kitty Dobbs, Church Educator at Shepherd in the Hills in Lakewood Colorado almost literally missed the bus on teaching with computers. She attended an APCE convention only to find that the computer workshop she wanted to attend was full. A last minute open seat on the bus trip out the workshop site, however, became the "beginning of something new and exciting." "Frankly, our kids were shocked by the introduction of computers. Soon, so were we. They grew quite attentive, willing to learn and happy to share. Our parents were impressed by our commitment to their children's education. Our computer lab drew a whole new group of people to help teach." Bill Allbright at St Croix Valley United Methodist Church in Lakeland, Minnesota sent me this terrific success story about his computer lab....
One of the popular misconceptions being dispelled about computers in Christian education is that they are beyond the means of the average Sunday School. In the Dayton Ohio area, a number of small and medium size Presbyterian, Methodist and Lutheran churches are using computers in their programs and have found hardware rather easy to get. Jo Doelker's church in Middletown Ohio was one of the first. "At first, we requested a computer only for the church Library and the Trustees were less than enthusiastic. When we looked into using the computer in our Sunday School as well, the Trustees approved the money without hesitation."
With computer skills becoming ever more
prevalent in our congregations, educators are finding help and
support readily available, --even from quarters you might not
expect. Carol Davis at First Presbyterian in Beavercreek Ohio
began computing over a year ago in her Sunday School. A number
of her Bible Computer Lab teachers come from the retirement center
next door to the church! Other churches have their specially
trained teachers assisted by Sr. High "Bible Lab Buddies."
Youth are eager to help with a tool they understand and enjoy
using. The new recruits not only bring their enthusiasm and technical
expertise, but new teaching insights as well. Says Ron Friedman,
computer techie and teacher at the Presbyterian Church in Park
Ridge Illinois, "with computers we are learning to be the
‘guide by the side' rather than the "sage on the stage.'"
This grassroots revolution in teaching technology comes at a providential time in the educational ministry of our Church. Amid a growing sense of frustration with traditional methods and curriculum comes a tool that kids (and adults) love to learn with. Computer hardware is coming within reach of the average church. Computer skills are becoming ubiquitous. Christian software suitable for Sunday School is growing in quantity and quality. Like the disciples at Pentecost, those of us teaching with computers believe the Spirit is leading us to speak not in our own traditional language, but in a language that appeals to others, the foreigners in our midst, the children, youth and adults of the electronic age. Those locked in the past, laboring under misconceptions, or afraid of the future may say we're drunk on technology. But like the Apostle Peter in the second chapter of Acts, we declare "its only 9 o'clock on Sunday morning! ...a time for amazement and astonishment and an outpouring of the Spirit, ...a time for dreams and visions." If you'd like to know more about teaching with computers in Sunday School contact Neil MacQueen at 1-800-678-1948. Neil is a Presbyterian minister and founder of Sunday School Software Ministries, a validated ministry of the Presbytery of Scioto Valley. Neil has been a seminar leader at the annual APCE conference and in Presbyteries around the country. He works with educators and pastors to evaluate software for C.E. He also maintains a select catalog of recommended titles and teaching materials. Neil's website is www.sundaysoftware.com
Compiled by Neil MacQueen, Sunday Software, from various sources I love stories like these.... "The telephone has no direct practical application." --from an article appearing in The Telegrapher, the top technical journal of the late 1800's. "It is now definitely established that a rocket can function in a vacuum as well as in the atmosphere." --Retraction/Correction printed by the New York Times correcting its January 13, 1920 ridicule of Robert Goddard's liquid fueled rocket experiments. The retraction was printed 49 years later --three days before the 1969 moon landing. "No." --Western Union's response to Alexander Bell's offer to sell his telephone patent to them for $100,000. "IBM, RCA, and GE." --Three of the several companies which turned down Chester Carlton's invention of the photocopying machine. "The automobile has practically reached the limit of its development." --quote from the Scientific American, January 2, 1909. "They're junky." --Henry Ford II's reply to the British government after World War II when offered Germany's Volkswagen plant and all related patents. "Worthless." --What people thought about the by-product of grease found on oil rig pump rods, until Robert Cheesebrough bottled it and sold it as "Vaseline." "In the future, computers may have only 1000 vacuum tubes and weigh less than one and half tons!" --Popular Mechanics, March 1949. (All of the above quotes come from Ira Flatlow's book, They All Laughed...the stories behind great inventions, and Roger Bruns' Almost History) "Radical and strange." --The education world's initial reaction to The McGuffey Reader when it first came out. McGuffey was a professor who had some strange new ideas about how children learn to read. They were so different that he didn't think it would sell -so he practically gave it away to the publisher. The McGuffey Reader become the best selling book and standard of its time. -from Ohio magazine. "They're drunk on new wine." --What the naysayers said about the Disciples at Pentecost. "Surely life was better in Egypt." --a former slave on the Exodus. "It's a fad." ..and.. "Churches won't be able to afford them." --Comments heard about computers in Christian education. "We're not interested." "It won't amount to much." "It's a fad." "It's just fun and games." --Comments heard coming from denominational staff about the Rotation Model. |
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Many churches have begun supplementing
their curriculum with Christian software. The children of the
electronic age love computers. They are eager to learn in Sunday
School when the teacher pops in a CD, and they want to come back
to do it again. This movement merely recognizes some simple facts:
you can't teach a kid who isn't there, doesn't want to be there,
or isn't coming back. In a world of competing attentions and
alternatives, Christian software is a language that attracts
and keep kids.
Most Christian education software
is traditional and ecumenical in nature.
About 70% of Christian software runs on both Windows and Mac.
But the 30% which is Windows-only is a significant set of titles,
so we recommend starting with PCs. Start with something that
has at least a 500mhz processor, 96 mb of RAM, and an 8 mb videocard
MINIMUM. (Please note: this recommendation has a date of 2004.
With each passing year, this minimum goes up as new software
comes out. It is not going up fast, but it is moving.) A good
quality graphic card or chip with at least 8mb of RAM memory
is a must for running multimedia software. Quite frankly, if
you want your equipment to take you into the future, you will
want PCs with a higher minimum. Older PCs are easy to find, but
"making do" is rarely a good philosophy where computers
and multimedia are concerned. They end up wasting precious volunteer
and student time when they do not work right. And PCs that are
too antiquated limit the software you can run.
Many churches create a "computer
workshop" or "computer lab" in a spare room with
two or more PCs. They rotate a new grade into the lab each week
(or every two or three weeks depending on your software and needs).
They purchase software that dovetails with the list of stories
they want to teach. A key piece of advice: recruit a special
person to be your lab teacher for all your classes. Don't expect
your traditional curriculum teachers to go into the lab and know
what to do!