Software Lesson Help for Teachers
A Mid-Summer 2007 Resource from Sunday Software
and
Neil MacQueen,
www.sundaysoftware.com
Content on this page was originally posted in our
free email newsletter
For more teacher training and lab set-up help, look at our book at
www.sundaysoftware.com/book.htm
MENU TO THIS PAGE:
1. How do you Start a Software Lesson?
2. How to Start Your Software Lesson with a Bang!
3. The thing I constantly have to remind myself when teaching
4. Two handy references to print & post in your lab
5. Relational Teaching in the Computer Lab
6. Tips on Working with Teens in the Lab
--Christian Software for Teens
7. Tips on preparing to teach with software
8. Google Calendar... a great idea for your church ministry
We have two main types of customers using our software:
1. Those who teach in a lab-like setting, -with multiple computers.
2. Those who bring in their laptop to juice-up their traditional lessons in class or at home.
Those who teach in a lab setting let the kids run the computers and software. I prefer that method because the amazing thing which happens to the learner when they work hands-on. Those who bring in their laptops will often project their software and run it themselves, or invite students to come up one-at-a-time to help them. Not every church can afford multiple computers. Teacher-led software presentations can be a GREAT way to introduce ANY kind of lesson, in any kind of classroom, whether you bring in one computer, --or have many. More about that in a moment.
1. How do you start your Software Lesson?
I almost always start mine with Bible Study around the table. We take turns reading. We discuss key words, key verses and key concepts. For young children we may also act the story. It’s important to visualize the lesson because children are not great auditory learners. They need stuff to see and do. Then, I outline the lesson for the day on a whiteboard and talk about the software. At that point I also tell them what I hope they’ll learn and remember that day. I don’t wait until the end of the lesson for the conclusion! (This “outline time” is also for my helpers in the lab.) THEN, we jump into the software.
I address this subject in more detail in my latest book “Teaching with Computers in Christian Education, www.sundaysoftware.com/book.htm
2. Start Your Lessons with a BANG by taking your students to the Holyland
Here’s a neat way to kick-off your Bible Study or software use… "Teacher-led software presentations"
Gather your students around one large monitor or projector… then introduce the Bible verses by taking your students into the Holyland using Bible Atlas software or various “clips” of multimedia found in our software. Since we started carrying Holyland 3-D CD, I’ve “flown” my kids into the Bible location to kick off several lessons, and it never fails to grab their attention. You can also project the text of the Bible passage as well. While I prefer helping them work in a printed Bible, sometimes it’s a lesson-booster to project the text. (Sad to say, but text on a screen is more likely to get paid attention to than text on a printed page.) The multimedia creates a state of focus in the learner’s mind and that makes them less distracted and more likely to engage in conversation.
You can begin by projecting the software onto a screen using a data projector, or you can have the students gather-round one computer monitor for the introduction. After I navigate them through the introductory material, we jump into the software for the day –going to our various computer stations. It’s an impressive way to start ANY Bible Study for children, youth OR adults. And invariably, the older kids will ask to explore the introductory program after the lesson is over.
We have several programs which many Teachers use to introduce their lessons:
v HolyLand 3-D CD is my new favorite to use. It’s spectacular.
v Footsteps of Jesus is an old standby for Jesus locales.
v Sandals Bible Atlas has some great background content and videoclips.
v Ilumina Bible CD/DVD has terrific animations and virtual tours to select from.
v And for all things Jerusalem: Pathways Through Jerusalem CD.
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In HolyLand 3-D CD you can: v Buzz the Mount of Beatitudes & Sermon on the Mount v Cross the Sea of Galilee for any number of stories about Jesus on the water. v Climb up Mt Carmel to kick off your Elijah lesson. v See what young Jesus saw when he woke up every day in Nazareth v Circle Mt Tabor –the place where Deborah won the battle, and Jesus was transfigured. v Skim over the desert to find Abraham’s Beersheba v Zoom down the Jericho road on your way into the Samaritan story or Zaccheus. v Land on Masada. v Get a birds-eye view of Jerusalem. v Glide down to Philistia and Gath. v …and a whole lot more. The flyable terrain goes from Damascus down to the Negev, From the Mediterranean Sea to western Jordan (Moab and Edom). It even has Roman and Crusader ruins you can look into. As we fly in, I begin talking about the Bible verses. For example: where Jesus had been, the town he’s coming to, the things he’s seeing, etc.
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In addition to HolyLand 3-D CD, we have several other programs that are CHOCK-FULL of multimedia you can “excerpt” to grab their interest and be the Teacher-Techie Star.
They include: Ilumina Gold Premium CD/DVD, Walking in their Sandals Bible Atlas CD, and A Walk in the Footsteps of Jesus. I have created LISTS of the MULTIMEDIA in each of these programs which you can select out to kick-off your Teacher-led lessons with. See the lists at Ilumina, Footsteps, Sandals.
Footsteps of Jesus is familiar to many of our customers. It has 360 degree navigable “photobubbles” of Jesus locations as they look in Israel today. Buried among some of the tourist locations are great photobubbles, such as the one of Mary & Martha’s house, the Sea of Galilee. Over the years, I have often used it to kick-off one of my lessons before diving into other software.
Sandals Atlas features numerous narrated videoclips of Jesus locations, including the Sermon on the Mount.
Various versions of the ILUMINA BIBLE CD/DVD contain a wealth of Bible animations and virtual tours:
Ilumina Bible Animations: The making of the tabernacle, Scenes from the life of Moses, Jesus Heals the Blind Man, David and Goliath, Jesus Rises from the Dead, Angels Announce the Birth of Jesus, The Baptism of Jesus, Jesus sends Demons into Herds of Pigs, The Birth of Jesus, Jesus is Placed on the Cross, Jesus Dies on the Cross
Ilumina Virtual 3-D Tours: The Tabernacle, Jerusalem, the Nativity, Capernaum, Galilee Today, the Dead Sea region
Studying Jerusalem? Solomon, Herod’s Temple, Jesus in the Temple? Pathways Through Jerusalem CDs have a ton of great multimedia and animation in them.
Ilumina has maps you can show. And of course, you can PROJECT the Bible Text found in Ilumina. Personally, I like my kids to read text in their printed Bibles, but projecting text has it’s place too, and can be a nice change of pace, especially for larger groups.
To see a list of the animations and virtual tours in Ilumina, go to www.sundaysoftware.com/ilumina
3. The thing I need to constantly remind myself about when teaching…
After all these years teaching, I still need to remind myself that “these kids don’t know the basic story.” And covering it once is not enough. I think this is one of the biggest mistakes that most teachers and curriculums make –they move too fast. As an adult who knows the story, I sometimes forget how NEW these stories and concepts are to the kids. Thus, I have to remind myself to THOROUGHLY teach the story starting from square 1.
You can see this belief imprinted on a lot of our Sunday Software-made titles. The new Exodus Adventures CD, for example. It’s a huge story, and our kids come to it as novices. I could have gone off on a lot of teaching tangents in the game, but chose to stay on course with “first, teach the story.” You can see this “story first” belief in a lot of the quiz questions and story-order game in our Elijah-Jonah CD. You can hammer the story home through quiz software like Fall of Jericho. A simple “what comes next” question is far more helpful to their knowledge of the story than a trivial question. You can also see this belief in the importance of “knowing a story’s order” –played out in some of the basic Bible questions found in Bongo Loves the Bible.
Teach the story, and the meaning of the story goes with them.
Now….what if your “story” is not a story at all?
We just finished four weeks on Psalm 8. It’s not a story, so we have treated it like a memory verse. Teach the verse –and the meaning can continue to unfold in their minds for years to come. In my Psalm 8 lesson with the older children, we did the Bible study, zeroed in on key verses, then went into the “Talk Now” feature in Let’s Talk CD and had the students re-think the verses in their own language and experience (“where do you feel closest to God?”). Then we finished the lesson with 5 minutes in Cal & Marty’s Scripture Memory Game –working on remembering the key verses.
I often use more than one program per lesson.
BTW… Our non-reader class used Kid Pix, and we played a “red light - green light” type of game to help them remember the key verses in Psalm 8.
4. Two Printable Resources to Print and Post in Your Lab
If you’re like me, you need reminders of what’s in these programs, so here are two pdfs you can print and post.
A printable list of the 50 stories in the Play & Learn Children’s Bible CD.
We use that program a lot with our little kids, and this list reminds me WHERE each story can be found in the Play & Learn menu. www.sundaysoftware.com/resources/playand.pdf
A printable list of the 40 stories in Life of Christ CD
We use this program a lot too! Here’s a nice handout – www.sundaysoftware.com/resources/listof40.pdf
Print both and hang them in your lab, or keep them in your notebook.
For my complete Outline and set of Teaching Tips for both programs (and others) go to www.sundaysoftware.com/tips
5. How Teaching with
Computers Can Improve Relational Teaching.
Sunday School is about building relationships:
Relationships with Christ.
Relationships with scripture.
Relationships with each other.
We help build these relationships by sharing in a personal way. Sunday School is not supposed to be a mere recitation of biblical facts. Jesus is our model, not the schoolmaster.
One of the great fears about teaching with technology has been the degree to which it “might impersonalize” our teaching. Afterall, they aren’t looking at us, …they are looking at the computer. However, the secret many of us have discovered is that teaching with computers can be a VERY PERSONAL way to teach, if you do it right. …if you sit down by your students and go through the material with them.
Software helps remove obstacles to learning and sharing. Software allows the teacher and students to share, rather than putting the heavy burden of “content production” on the teacher. Software immediately gains the student’s interest. Software engages their senses, and sense of playfulness. Its creative content sticks in the brain. Software makes the learner and the learning more comfortable, and thus, makes it easier for teachers and students to relate to each other.
The quickest way to thwart the building of these relationships is to be BORING. Bored students don’t want to be there and don’t want to come back. Kids coming out of a computer lab CAN’T WAIT to come back!
Read the article Information to Transformation for more help on making your lessons more transformational and relational. www.sundaysoftware.com/transform.htm
6. Teens in the Computer Lab
Here in 2007 I’m kind of SHOCKED that more churches aren’t using technology to help their teens study the Bible.
Yet, my 8th & 9th Graders L-O-V-E coming in the computer lab. This is their medium, and they can use virtually any program you put in front of them. They make great lab teaching assistants too. And the fact of the matter is that pre-teens and teens NEED this medium more so than young children. Why? -because they are at a point in their lives where they are making their decision about church and about Jesus Christ. Thus, teaching in an attractive manner is more important for this age group than any other.
Computer Lab Tips about Teens…
GROW YOUR CHILDREN INTO TEEN STUDENTS
My teen class has been coming into our lab since they were kids. They’ve
grown up with the computers and they’ve grown very good habits. Yet, in some
churches, they force the teens out of the lab as they grow older. That’s a
BIG mistake. If you have to choose between teens and preschoolers in the
lab, choose in favor of your teens. This is their medium! And they are at a
time in their life when they need something special.
GETTING TEENS TO TALK
Teens may clam up in larger groups, but will talk in small groups around a
computer. So even though they need less help with the software and hardware,
I still keep my teacher-2-student ratio high, so we can do our talking in
small groups. We also use Let’s Talk CD quite a bit. It gives them an
indirect way to speak to the entire class, because the program speaks aloud
whatever they type.
GROW YOUR TEENS INTO TEACHERS
Teens love to help teach in the computer lab, and it’s a great way to keep
them involved.
Week One: Invite your teens to
learn with the software.
Week Two: Invite your teens to
teach the next class with the same software.
The book “Teaching With Computers in Christian Education” has a lot more advice on teaching with both Teens and Preschoolers. www.sundaysoftware.com/book.htm The book is spiral bound so you can lay it flat on a copier to create teacher training handouts.
View my article on Middle Schoolers in the Computer Lab at www.sundaysoftware.com/articles/teen.htm
Back in the 90’s a lot of the software topped out at age 11 by design. We at Sunday Software have made a conscious effort to expand the age range, knowing that pre-teens and young teens were a very important audience. Thus, we have made sure that a lot of the NEWER CDS are APPEAL to 12-15 year olds.
We have built-in higher design standards, more gameplay, and fun sense of humor.
Here
are a few programs that we’ve designed to be especially appealing to young
teens:
But
there’s a problem getting software into pre-teen/young teen classes…
At the risk of TICKING SOME PEOPLE OFF, here are two of several reasons why we don’t see more computers used with young teens in church:
1.
Computer labs are often run by the children’s ministry department, not the
youth dept. Two Kingdoms. Two turfs.
2. Many youth Sunday School
classes and youth LEADERS believe that TALKING is the way to reach this
generation. In fact, a lot of youth curriculum is VACANT of creative
learning activities. They rely heavily on discussion, flipcharts, lecture,
workbooks and more discussion. Yet if you ask young teens what they LIKE to
do, most will tell you “play on the computer.” And when they go home after
school they “talk” on the computer.
Some Solutions:
v Run some experiments with young teens coming into your lab.
v Create schedule space in your lab for your teen class.
v Invite teens into your lab as helpers to wet their appetite.
v Find a teen-friendly teacher willing to spend a few weeks in the lab using a newer style program with the teens.
v Review your teaching methods and curriculum to be sure it “isn’t all talk.”
v Forward this email to your youth leaders/teachers
7. Tips on Preparing to Teach with Software
1. Print the free Teaching Tips. They not only have lesson recommendations, they have age specific comments and teacher helps. I NEED THEM when I teach! …so I imagine you do too.
2. Test the software on the computers where the software will be used. Just because it runs on your home or office computer doesn’t mean it will run at church.
3. Preview in Class ahead of time. Some programs need to be played with ahead of time by your students. With Galilee Flyer, for example, teach them how to land the triplane during the last few minutes classtime, in preparation for the next time you use it.
4. Have a Teen Lab Assistant become the Expert. Let them take it home and learn the program, then come back and help your class.
5. If you’re ROTATING students into your lab, and are using a more complicated program, schedule your older students be the first to use the more involved software. They pick up trickier software faster than the younger kids and this takes a load off the teacher the first week into the rotation.
8. A Great Internet Idea for your Ministry
Google Calendar
http://www.google.com/calendar
The new free Google Calendar can be a godsend to your planning ministry.
Makes your church or program/meeting calendar accessible to anyone, 24/7.
Allows multiple persons access to make changes.
Very nicely done, free, and no ads. Google Calendar puts all your staff and volunteers QUITE LITERALLY “on the same page.” Can also be saved as a PDF for printing in your church newsletter.
<>< Neil MacQueen, neil@sundaysoftware.com
1-800-678-1948
This page copyright Neil MacQueen, 2007. All rights reserved. Permission granted for local teaching use.
