If you want to help your students to better connect God’s world and Word, meet their learning needs. “Learning needs” are anything your students need in order for learning to happen. Watch this video about meeting 5 learning needs students have:




Want to work with your colleagues to better meet student learning needs? If so, then purchase Meet Your Students’ Learning Needs (US$25), a discussion-based kit with 7 sessions. As a result of completing these 7 sessions, you will…

1. Define and meet your students’ learning needs.
2. Help your students better understand the importance of connecting God’s world and Word.
3. Help your students better understand that God’s Word can be connected to the part of God’s world they are studying.
4. Help your students understand more biblical principles that connect to what they study.
5. Provide the engaging instruction your students need in order to connect God’s world and Word.
6. Provide time during class for your students to reflect on how God’s world and Word are connected.
7. Demonstrate your commitment to meeting your students’ learning needs.

Download a sample session.

Purchase Meet Your Students’ Learning Needs (US$25). This kit is 1 of a 4-part series:

1. Help Your Students Connect God’s World and Word
2. Use Assessment
3. Use Questions
4. Meet Student Learning Needs

Here's a set of DRAW questions you can use for a discussion of “How can you help your students understand what effective application of a Biblical perspective looks like on a classroom assessment?”
 
Define: Get the facts defined.
What do your students think effective application of a Biblical perspective looks like?
 
Respond: Get the facts responded to in terms of feelings/experiences.

1. What’s encouraging/discouraging about your students’ understanding of what effective application of a Biblical perspective looks like?
2. What’s easy/hard about helping your students understand what effective application of a Biblical perspective looks like?

Analyze: Get the facts, feelings, and experiences analyzed.

1. To what do you attribute your students’ current level of understanding?
2. On a scale of 1-10 (10 being high), how clear are you on what effective application of a Biblical perspective on a classroom assessment looks like?

What’s next?: Get next steps considered.

1. What are 3-5 ways you could help your students understand what effective application of a Biblical perspective on a classroom assessment looks like?
2. What will you do?

Your students’ objective is to better connect what they study and God’s story of creation-fall-redemption-restoration. You want to help your students achieve their objective. Good.

Now what? Help your students achieve their objective by meeting 1 of their learning needs.

Question: What are you students’ learning needs? To identify your students’ learning needs, review the list of 10 questions below. Note which questions you think you need to answer in order to meet your students’ learning needs:

1. How can you help your students see the importance of creation-fall-redemption-restoration?
2. How can you help your students understand that creation-fall-redemption-restoration can be connected to course content?
3. How can you show your students what connecting course content and creation-fall-redemption-restoration looks like?
4. How can you help your students understand how you teach using creation-fall-redemption-restoration?
5. What vocabulary words do your students need to learn?
6. What engaging instructional strategies will help your students?
   
7. How can you give your students opportunities to think through answers for themselves?
8. How can you provide time during class for reflection?
9. How can you design assessments so that your students connect creation-fall-redemption-restoration with their lives?
10. How can you give your students more practice?

Take action: Answer 1 of the questions you noted. Then use your answer. You might be tempted to answer more than 1 question. Don’t. Keep it simple and doable. Just answer 1 question—then use your 1 answer.

Remember, the goal is not to have an answer. The goal is to use your answer to help your students connect what they study and creation-fall-redemption-restoration. Today.

It’s the end of your English class, and you assign a 750-word essay in which your students are to evaluate a theme from Hamlet, from a Biblical perspective.
 
Then the bell rings. One of your students, Ian, approaches you and says, “I don't know what it looks like. I know what telling others about Jesus looks like—we read missionary biographies at school and I go on mission trips with my church. What does doing a good job on using a Biblical perspective look like in an essay?”
 
Question: How can you help Ian? (How can you help Ian understand what using a Biblical perspective in an essay looks like?)
 
Answer: Kim Essenburg, English 10 teacher at Christian Academy in Japan, responds:
 
I want my students to connect the Bible and what they study in English 10. As a starting point, I have to get my students to see that this is possible. I have to get my students to see that the Bible can be applied, for example, to the literature and grammar that they study.
 
Two strategies I use are:

1. Having my students read and discuss an article that evaluates the subject from a Biblical perspective. When my students read Elie Wiesel’s Night, a Holocaust memoir, I have them also read “Justice in an Unjust World” by Gary Haugen.
2. Showing my students sample essays in which students apply a Biblical perspective, for example: There are many ways to define the word peace, but the Biblical concept of peace or shalom has a round meaning, relating all beings in the universe and outside the cosmos. Genesis 1 describes the perfect creation God had made in the beginning as He said, “It was very good” (New International Version). However, as man marred his image of God through sin, the relationship between God and man, God and creation, man and creation was broken. Fear and sorrow entered the universe, and every human being needed to go through such pain in the world. Henceforth, humans needed to pray for redemption and the restoration of the intimate association with God, so that this may someday lead to the restoration of creation. Romans 8:21 expresses the hope for this restoration when “creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.” This is a place where all living creatures and humans live in harmony without pain and suffering, which is referred to as the New Jerusalem mentioned in Revelation 21. This concept of Biblical shalom in elucidated by Alan Paton’s book as the “ideal justice.” Beginning with Stephen Kumalo, one finds the broken relationship between God and man and creation in the tribe, and through much adversity and sorrow, Kumalo attempts to build shalom by restoring the broken relationships.

Show your students what using a Biblical perspective looks like. Today

You’re ready. You have 3 sample student essays that demonstrate effective application of a biblical perspective to course content. You’re ready to show the essay samples to your students. You’ve carefully planned your lesson. Your goal is to help your students increase their application of a biblical perspective by addressing 1 of their learning needs.

You’re feeling confident that showing your students sample essays will really help, in part because you used a good process. The IDEAL process:

1. Identify the problem and ask God for help.
   
2. Define the problem.
   
3. Explore ways to address the problem, pick one, and make a plan to address it.
   
4. Act.
   
5. Look at the results.

Here’s how you used the 5-step IDEAL process:

(1) Identify the problem and ask God for help: You noticed that your students were not doing as well as they should on applying a biblical perspective. You prayed about this.

(2) Define the problem: Rather that reading a book or going to workshop, you talked with your students and reviewed their work. As a result, you determined that they had 2 key learning needs:

• They didn’t sufficiently value applying a biblical perspective.
  
• They didn’t know what applying a biblical perspective in a classroom assessment looked like.

You thought about both needs, and you talked again with some of your students. During the conversation, Ryoko shared, “I don’t know what it looks like. I know what telling others about Jesus looks like—we read missionary biographies at school and I go on mission trips with my church. What does doing a good job on using a biblical perspective look like in an essay? And what does this look like in the computer world?”

Ryoko’s comment clinched it. You decided to help your students understand what applying a biblical perspective on a classroom assessment looked like.

(3) Explore ways to address the problem, pick one, and make a plan to address it: You brainstormed a total of 1 way to address the problem—show them samples of student work that demonstrate effective application of a biblical perspective. Show them samples of the type of assessment they are going to do. Show them sample essays, projects, presentations, and test answers. Show them samples of student work.

You decided to show your students samples of student work. And since your students were going to write an essay, you decided to show them 3 sample essays before assigning the essay.

(4) Act: You’re ready. You have your work samples. Your students are seated, the bell has rung, and you say, “Being able to apply a biblical perspective is really important. Today, I want to help you understand what using a biblical perspective in an essay looks like.”

(5) Look at the results: That’ll have to wait until you complete your lesson. Meanwhile, you’re hoping that, as a result of doing this lesson, your students will effectively apply a biblical perspective on the essay—and that you can use their work samples when you do this lesson again next year.

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Teachers, to what extent does the following describe your thinking? Principals, to what extent does the following describe your teachers’ thinking?

I’m not sure what applying a biblical perspective to course content looks like. I know what telling others about Jesus looks like—I read missionary biographies and I go on mission trips with my church. What does teaching a biblical perspective look like? How do you assess student understanding and use of a biblical perspective? And what does quality student work look like when students are applying a biblical perspective to course content?

If the above describes your thinking or the thinking of your staff, what are 5 things you could do? Pick one and implement it. Today.