Up first is a volume written by Elaine Cooper entitled The Power and Neglected Voice of Charlotte Mason: A Coherent, Holistic Approach to Education for Our Times. Her thesis is many ways is captured by the two adjectives in the subtitle: coherent and holistic. I could see this book being a centerpiece for introducing parents and teachers to Charlotte Mason who may have only a passing acquaintance with her life and work due to the far-reaching scope of such a succinct volume.

Cooper has been at the heart of the Charlotte Mason revival since the 1970s, working alongside Susan Schaeffer Macaulay to establish the Child Light Trust to promote Charlotte Mason education in England. In 2004, Cooper edited the book When Children Love to Learn (Crossway), bringing together leading voices in the US and England to provide practical applications for Mason’s philosophy. Cooper was also involved in the start of Heritage School in Cambridge, England, which opened its doors in 2007.

Biography

Cooper begins her work with a succinct biography of Charlotte Mason. The contours of this biographical sketch of Mason follows the work of Margaret Coombs, who published Charlotte Mason: Hidden Heritage and Educational Influence in 2015. I appreciate how Cooper retraces the hidden childhood of Mason without dwelling on her birth out of wedlock or the potential influence either parent or their families might have had on her subsequent achievements. Mason rarely mentioned her upbringing, which could be due to her embarrassment of that upbringing. But equally, she could have just as easily viewed those years as irrelevant to the person she became as an educational thinker. To that end, Cooper’s sketch devotes the bulk of the section to her experiences in teacher training schools and posts at Birkenhead, London, Worthing and Chichester.

One of the important points Cooper brings out pertains to the collapse of the positivism of late Victorians progressivism. World War 1 had swept away much of this positivism, and with it many turned to modernist views of education. Cooper writes:

“But the horrors of the First World War and the disillusionment with western civilisation sent shock waves through society. Many educators and leaders at the time felt that old ways of thinking and doing needed to be swept away, and the new be emphatically implemented for the 20^th century. Mason’s educational vision and model for a full and abundant life binding knowledge and virtue and shaping Britain as a righteous nation no longer fitted in.” (19)

From this we may derive two insights. First, this factor demonstrates how in the height of Mason’s reach within British culture—she had established the House of Education in Ambleside, she was a respected author, moved in important circles in society, and a growing number of state schools were adopting her methods—she became almost anonymous and forgotten in history. It wasn’t due to a deficiency in her educational philosophy or pedagogical methods, but rather to a radical turning away from traditional values. A turn, one might add, that demonstrably was for the worse not only in Britain but throughout the world, as a Second World War so soon after the First would confirm.

Second, Cooper hints at the fact that Mason is well grounded in the liberal arts tradition. This is something that Cooper identifies at various points in the book. Many advocates for educational renewal, particularly in the classical educational landscape, doubt Mason’s compatibility with classical education. Cooper spells out that at a fundamental level, Mason shares convictions with proponents of a renewal of the liberal arts tradition.

Philosophy of Education

Cooper next develops Mason’s philosophy of education by highlighting the core tenets of her work as well as spelling out interactions she has with numerous other philosophers of education. She grounds Mason’s philosophy within a Christian perspective, meaning that Mason’s “understanding of the world and the person” fit squarely “within a Christian metaphysical framework” (22). I think this points to an aspect of the coherent and holistic approach Mason provides in her approach to education. In a modern world driven by technology and economic outcomes, grounding education in scripture and a vital connection to God is essential.

The singular foundation to Mason’s philosophy of education, according to Cooper, is the personhood of the child. After quoting Mason, who views the child’s mind as complete—“his mind is the instrument of his education and his education does not produce his mind” (Mason, Philosophy of Education, 36)—Cooper expands upon this view of the personhood of the child:

“In her view—Mason’s understanding of identity and personhood—someone, rather than something is located in the imago dei, bearing the image of a personal, creator God. Children are separate and complete beings even in their dependency, capable of reflecting some of God’s attributes. They have language and reason and imagination. Each one exists as a real physical and metaphysical entity—an embodied self, a spiritual being with a soul and the powers necessary to appropriate knowledge, beauty and goodness.” (Cooper 24)

Grounded in the biblical concept of the image of God, the personhood of the child means that we are not educating blank slates and manipulating them to become something of significance at a later stage in their lives. They are born with capacities to learn and grow, and thus our job is to provide suitable means for them to acquire knowledge and wisdom. The respect due to the child as a learner with a powerful mind well equipped to assimilate what is to be learned is not only a foundational aspect to Mason’s work, but sets her apart from other modern educational theorists. After quoting Martin Marty, University of Chicago professor, regarding the shortcomings of modern approaches to childhood education, Cooper concludes regarding the personhood of the child that there is a “need for thoughtful and critical evaluations of popular developmental and educational theories, suggesting there is much more to understanding the child and person than hitherto assumed.” (27)

To this end, Cooper segues into a series of educational theorists with whom Mason grappled in the development of her own educational philosophy. The list of interlocutors is substantial—John Locke, Johann Friedrick Herbart, Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, Friedrich Fröbel, Maria Montessori, Herbert Spencer, and William James—and indicates a wide range of thought and power of mind on the part of Mason. Cooper’s development of each interaction is succinct yet helps develop in compelling ways Mason’s concern with “the increasing influence of intellectual rationalism and scientific reductionism flowing out from the Enlightenment.” (27) Seeing Mason in light of this series of educational theorists makes it difficult to simply categorize her as an educational reformer in the progressive mold of Rousseau or Dewey, and yet she is not merely a traditionalist unwilling to take on board, for instance, Pestalozzi and Fröbel’s insistence on the natural capacities of the child. In fact, Mason proved herself quite capable of incorporating modern research into psychology and neurology while also breaking the mold of traditionalist conceptions of class, making a liberal arts educational available to all.

A thorough educational philosophy relies not only on a the quality of the anthropology—a high view of the child in Mason’s case—but also on a sound epistemology. For Mason, the mind does not emerge as a property due to education, the mind is what acts upon knowledge to produce the education person. There is a “spiritual nature of mind” that “requires the food of ideas for its daily bread” (45). The mind is active and seeks out knowledge, according to Mason. This differs from the empirical views of philosophers such as Locke and Herbart who view children as empty slates or sacs to be filled with knowledge. Mason abhorred predigested information and desired children to read books full of living ideas that would feed not only the minds of children, but also form their character. The goal of education, therefore, is to give every opportunity for the child to experience the wide array of insights available in a rich and generous curriculum.

To that end, the qualities of the materials Mason sought to present to children are in keeping with the best cultural artifacts produced across generations. Cooper connects this with the classical liberal arts:

“Mason ([Philosophy of Education] 1925) was passionately concerned to education all pupils broadly in the classic, liberal arts tradition—‘the joy of the Renaissance without its lawlessness’ (p. 9)—a holistic tradition which could cultivate imagination and good habits, train judgement and engender wide interests, after which anyone would be able to master the intricacies of any profession. (Cooper 50)

Methodology

Having established the main contours of Mason’s educational philosophy, Cooper then develops the key elements of Mason’s educational methods. The two keystones here are narration and habit training. What I like about Cooper’s work here is that she connects the dots, so to speak, between philosophy and method.

For instance, with regard to narration—the ability “to individually narrate back, in their own words, what they had heard” after a single reading—Cooper connects narration to the power of the mind, or the high view of the child explored in Mason’s philosophy:

“Narration was founded on her belief in the intrinsic and natural power of mind, through attentive listening, to recall knowledge gained from a single reading or seeing or doing, and the fact that such direct recollection makes so deep an impression on the mind that it remains for a long time and is never entirely lost.” (60)

Thus, narration is an active outworking of the high view of the child. Not only do we view the child as capable of assimilating knowledge, we place those capabilities in the driver’s seat of the child’s learning. Cooper shares a delightful quote from Comenius, the Czech reformer and educational philosopher, “teachers shall teach less and scholars should learn more.” (61 quoting The Great Didactic (1907), 4). In other words, the energy of learning is rightly placed within the sphere of the child, rather than energies being wasted by a teacher who overprepares and overdelivers materials that the learner can access directly through living books.

Regarding habits, Cooper again connects method to the high view of the child. Each child is naturally equipped to follow certain pathways when the parent or teacher rightly guides them along those pathways. There are physical habits (cleanliness, tidiness), moral habits (obedience, kindness), and intellectual habits (attention, accuracy), which must actually make life easier for the child. The temptation exists for parents and teachers to consider these habits as burdensome and therefore neglect to properly instill them, yet worse habits will be fixed within the child, making life ultimately harder for the child.

The rich curriculum of living books gives feet to Mason’s epistemology since the mind craves living ideas. Cooper notes how these living books are “written in literary language” or in a “narrative style.” (63) Some of the hallmarks of a Charlotte Mason education are the inclusion of nature study, picture study, composer study, and architecture, all of which Cooper situates within the methods of Mason.

Conclusion

Cooper wraps up her volume by evaluating the legacy of Mason. As someone who has been part of the Mason revival, she suggests an exciting potential outcome in the flourishing of homeschools and schools that adopt her philosophy and methods:

“It is possible that widespread interest could spearhead both a faithful and contemporary understanding of her applied Christian philosophy of education, backed up by the practical evidence of thousands of children educated in over 300 of her schools and many home schools in early 20^th-century Britain and beyond.” (69)

I for one agree that this revival of interest in Mason is having profound effects in North America. I am grateful that Elaine Cooper has put this very readable book together. For anyone wanting a clear and concise overview of Mason, this book is essential reading. If you provide leadership at a school using Charlotte Mason’s philosophy and methods, this is a great book to give to new faculty as part of their onboarding.

The post A Coherent and Holistic Education: Book Review of Elaine Cooper’s The Powerful and Neglected Voice of Charlotte Mason appeared first on .

While we know that Aelius Theon used written narration to train future orators in memory and invention, and that Quintilian saw it as a core practice connected to the ability to learn, it is not really until Comenius that narration is a central teaching method. Erasmus too recommended the narration of a teacher’s lecture, thus shifting the focus to knowledge of content and away from rhetorical style and fluency. But only Comenius made of narration a golden key to unlock the doors of knowledge to the student.

In my article on The Great Didactic we saw how Comenius envisioned teaching as opening founts of knowledge, and the process of students narrating to one another as part and parcel of the nature of knowledge itself: it must be shared! Developing his analogies from the natural world, Comenius advocated for narration under the analogy of intellectual nourishment through collection, digestion and distribution. The teacher first collects and digests knowledge, and then distributes it to others; then, in an ironic transformation the student becomes the teacher to do the same for his fellows. Thus, Comenius recommends a process of repeated narrations of content given by the teacher (or his book) with corrections by the teacher.

In this article we will explore how Comenius developed his thinking about the teaching method of narration or the student becoming the teacher in The Analytical Didactic, which is really a section of a longer work (The Methodus) that he wrote much later in life. In The Analytical Didactic Comenius “reinterpreted the principle of nature that he had described in The Great Didactic as a principle of logic” (John E. Sadler, “John Amos Comenius” in Encyclopedia Britannica; accessed January, 2021). While his translator found in this a movement away from the fertile and imaginative quality of his first didactic (see the Introduction), my impression was of the bracing winds of truth blowing steadily through Comenius’ treatment of teaching method. Where some of Comenius’ insights seemed strained and overwrought in the analogies from nature in The Great Didactic, the crystal clarity of Comenius’ principles and applications in The Analytical Didactic leaves little that can be objected to. I encourage you to find a copy and read it yourself; it’s a book that I anticipate coming back to again and again.

Narration as Review and Examination

First of note in Comenius’ recommendations for what Charlotte Mason called narration is his focus on the importance of reviews and examinations. The whole passage that most concerns practitioners of narration comes at the end of The Analytical Didactic in a section on “how to teach rapidly, thoroughly, and agreeably” (171). His comments on review and examination reminded me of my own statements in A Classical Guide to Narration about how narration serves both as a method of assimilation and of assessment. In other words, when students narrate, they store what they are learning in long term memory, AND teachers learn what students know and don’t know.

Comenius begins by claiming that “the more anything is handled, the more familiar it becomes; consequently, if we would have our students well acquainted with anything and ready to use it, we must familiarize them with it through reviews, examinations, and frequent use” (191). He goes on to say that these “reviews and examinations” should occur “even during the process of learning”. Comenius reinforces the importance of continual review and testing through the analogy of a traveler becoming acquainted with a road through the process of going backward and forward on it, retracing his steps through narration, and then digressing along different alternate routes along the way (191-192).

Narration, Analysis and Practice

For Comenius, then, narration is not to be opposed to analytical discussion, but is complementary to it. He sums up the natural progression of learning, review and examination through three questions:

1. Has the student learned something? This will be apparent if he can repeat it.
2. Does he understand it? This will be discovered by a variety of analytical questions.
3. Does he know how to use it? This will be revealed by prescribed but unrehearsed practice. (191)

Narration is the first step in a process. This view finds expression in the Narration-Trivium lesson structure that I developed based on Charlotte Mason’s narration lesson for young children. By following up narration with dialectic or analytical discussion, teachers can help deepen students’ understanding from a bare recital to fuller comprehension. This functions like the digressions down alternate routes in Comenius’ analogy. Practice then corresponds, to some extent, to the rhetoric phase or response to the rich text.

The Student as Teacher

Comenius’ practical application of this principle involves the same ironic transformation of student into teacher that he advocated for in The Great Didactic:

We can do this by urging him not merely to pay constant heed to the demonstrations and explanations of the teacher but also to reverse the role and to demonstrate and explain the same subject to others; furthermore, he ought to see and hear others besides his teacher give these demonstrations and explanations. I must make my meaning clearer by quoting a set of verses well known in schools:

                        Often to ask, to retain what is answered, and teach what remembered,

                        These are three means that will make the disciple surpass his own master.

The third part of this advice, that about teaching what we have retained, is not sufficiently well known, nor is it commonly put into practice; yet it would be highly profitable if every student were required to teach others what he himself has just learned. Indeed, there is a great deal of truth in the saying, ‘He who teaches others educates himself,’ or, as Seneca puts it, ‘Men learn while they teach.’ This is so not merely because teaching strengthens their conceptions through repetition but also because it offers them opportunities of delving further into the subject. (See Sec. 85.) (191-192)

What Comenius adds to this discussion from his previous treatment is a new articulation of the value of teaching for deep learning. In claiming that the conceptions are strengthened through repetition, we are on the solid ground of what modern learning science calls retrieval practice. But in describing the “opportunities of delving further into the subject” we seem to add on to bare retrieval the value of elaboration or making further connections to what one already knows. Acting as the teacher doesn’t just store memories, it improves and develops insight or understanding.

Comenius then expresses this method as “a practical rule” to the effect that “every pupil should acquire the habit of also acting as a teacher” (193)—an idea that is both stunning in its simplicity and also revolutionary in terms of common teaching practice. Every student? Really? Acting as a teacher to the others? Adopting this practical rule would upend how most classrooms operate in terms of their daily practices. For the teacher who imagines that it can’t be done with any efficiency in time, remember that this passage is from Comenius’ section on rapidity and thoroughness in teaching and learning. He is not unaware of time constraints. His detailed method in the Analytical Didactic greatly resembles what he had previously shared in The Great Didactic:

This will happen if, after the teacher has fully demonstrated and expounded something, the pupil himself is immediately required to give a satisfactory demonstration and exposition of the same thing in the same manner. (If there are several pupils, they should do so one after another, beginning with the more talented.) Furthermore, pupils should be instructed to relate what they learn in school to their parents or servants at home or to anyone else capable of understanding such matters. (193)

Comenius again wants the students who are more likely to have understood correctly to give the first exposition, so as to avoid the wasted time and confusion likely to result from incorrection narrations. He adds the practical expediency of having students share their knowledge at home. Assigning students to narrate stories or explain concepts in detail to their parents is not an impossible homework assignment, but one that might further several purposes of the school, especially if a school has a strong vision for parental involvement and support like many classical Christian schools.

Rationale for Narration

Comenius’ reasons for this narration practice with repeated tellings of a teacher’s demonstration or explanation are more succinct than in The Great Didactic but express the same basic thoughts:

In the first place, pupils will be more attentive to every part of the teacher’s exposition if they know that presently they will have to repeat the same matter and if each one fears that perhaps he will be the first to be asked to do so. (See Sec. 86 above.)

Second, by restating exactly what he has been taught, everyone will imprint it more deeply in his understanding and memory.

Third, if it appears that something was not understood quite correctly, this practice will offer an immediate opportunity for correction (on the great value of this see Axiom XCVII).

Fourth, it will enable teachers and pupils to make certain that they have grasped what they were supposed to grasp, for the mark of knowledge is the ability to teach.

Fifth, such frequent repetition of the same material will bring it about that even the slowest pupils may finally grasp the subject. Thereby (sixth) everyone will make swifter and sounder progress in every respect.

And thus (seventh) every pupil will become a teacher, in some degree or other; consequently, the opportunities for multiplying knowledge will be mightily increased. (193-194)

Then it will be clear how apt is the playful remark of Fortius: ‘I learned much from my teachers, more from my fellow-students, but most from my pupils.’ Or, as someone else has said, ‘The more often we impart learning, the more learned we become.’ Therein lies our enduring pleasure.[1] (194)

Comenius expresses many of the same reasons for narration that have been endorsed by more recent proponents, like Charlotte Mason. Using narration as a regular practice habituates students to pay attention, because they know that they will be held accountable. It also “imprints” the content “more deeply” on the understanding or memory, thus functioning as assimilation. And then retrieval practice with immediate feedback or correction provides the most effective way to ensure true learning. While this may seem to disagree with some of Charlotte Mason’s statements, her concerns about over-correcting young children or those new to narration have probably been misunderstood. The “bracing atmosphere of sincerity and truth” that she advocated for seems in full agreement with Comenius here, even if she emphasized the infrequency of correction needed for students trained on narration over years.

Finally, Comenius’ universal vision for the increase of Christian learning spills into his pedagogical considerations, as he imagines an army of irenic students-become-teachers advancing the cause of knowledge into every sphere of life and fighting back against the ignorance and darkness of a fallen world. And this is not just a duty or a burden to be borne, it is in our learning that we experience “our enduring pleasure,” Comenius says with a wink as he ends his treatise. I cannot help but hear resonances with the flow experience and the joy of learning that I have explored at length in my book The Joy of Learning. For Comenius this method of learning through teaching is not just logical, reasonable, thoughtful and humane, it advances the cause of knowledge itself and brings delight.

[1] Comenius writes this sentence in German: “Und so bleibet man immer bey der lust.”

“Why the History of Narration Matters” series:

Part 1: Charlotte Mason’s Discovery?

Part 2: Classical Roots

Part 3: Narration’s Rebirth

Part 4: Charlotte Mason’s Practice of Narration in Historical Perspective

Expanding Narration’s History with Comenius: Narration’s Rebirth, Stage 2 – The Great Didactic

The post Expanding Narration’s History with Comenius: Narration’s Rebirth, Stage 2 – The Analytical Didactic appeared first on .

(See Jason’s article on CSI “7 Steps to Narrating the Bible”!)

In biblical studies we seek to cultivate the habits of reverence, humility, submission to the text, and other qualities of faithful scholarship. But I propose another goal should rise to the top: enjoyment. The enjoyment that students have in reading a novel, or an eerie poem, or an adventure epic. 

When students are engaging with the Bible, we should hear laughter and gasps. We should see quizzical eyebrows and wide-eyed shock. I love to see students jumping out of their seats to be picked to identify a ‘hidden’ motif of Joshua. To see awkward blushes and grins, in unfolding the romance of Ruth and Boaz. To see shock and dismay over the violence of Genesis. And I had to laugh at my student’s obvious frustration, annotating her way through the book of Judges, with its noted cycle of idolatry: “Oh no… This is so wrong… Oh why? … That was cruel… This is just sad… Be smart and think!… Not again!”

My students read through the entire biblical canon in community, and their literary enjoyment of it is a memory that will last. Whether visually depicting the imagery of a Psalm or orally narrating the downward spiral of Genesis, students will remember Scripture as profound, holy, and artistically compelling. St. Augustine quipped, 

“Perhaps someone inquires whether the authors whose divinely-inspired writings constitute the canon, which carries with it a most wholesome authority, are to be considered wise only, or eloquent as well. A question which to me… is very easily settled. For where I understand these writers, it seems to me not only that nothing can be wiser, but also that nothing can be more eloquent.” 

 On Christian Doctrine, section 9

Why have we often missed the literary beauty of the Scriptures? Why do we move so quickly to “personal application,” while failing to linger in the episodes and the larger, sweeping narrative? Many a theologian has noted that we throw out good reading skills when it comes to the Bible—cutting the text into bite-size daily chunks, reading without context in mind, failing to find the author’s key themes and motifs. 

We have our modernity to blame. Theologian Peter Leithart depicts the Enlightenment and subsequent theological disputes as having moved evangelicals toward only half of the equation: unfolding the literal meaning and the moral application. But in Rehabilitating the Quadriga, Leithart explains that modern readers have missed out on the riches of Scripture by overlooking the medieval fourfold approach. We have ignored allegorical (or typological) reading and anagogical (or forward-looking reading, in light of final things). He urges us to recover more ancient ways of reading Scripture. 

Many modern advocates of theological interpretation of scripture are seeking to revive the more ancient, literary and typological approach to Scripture, and the good news is that we can implement this in K-12 Bible classes, even without personal training in the field. We can apply best-practices from teaching other literature as we study the canon. Here are 5 practical tactics to cultivate an enjoyment of scripture through a literary approach:

1. Annotating a Reader Bible 

This methodology revolves around close-reading and annotating of the text, so it is crucial that students have their own copy of a simple pew Bible or reader Bible to serve as their consumable textbook. Most reader Bibles are published in 4-6 volumes to complete the canon, and they are available in most translations. Students will build a personal library of the whole biblical canon. The embossed hardcover on these reader Bibles simply say “Pentateuch” or “Poetry,” but inside, the Bible looks like a novel or set of poems. 

Students are taught to treat this book as the valuable resource it is—to mark it, underline, and annotate neatly in pencil. A black-and-white composition book completes the required resources. Students will add quotes to this commonplace book over the six years that they read through the canon. It is a solid setup for a literary approach: a hardcover “novel” plus a growing journal of quotations. 

2. Seeking Simplicity: Multum non Multa

In keeping with the classical principle of “much, not many things,” we should cultivate long-term focus on a text rather than jumping between many resources. Students can sustain attention through a whole book or whole canonical section.  

To strip away distractions, students are asked to read with a pencil on the text, annotating their way through a full book. But there are two ways to practice sustained attention: 

1) Close reading of dense chapters, full of meaning. (Read at least twice.) Or

2) Longer periods of reading through several chapters in one sitting. 

“Long form reading teaches the students to follow a plot, poem, or letter from start to finish,” noted Zach. “It also sharpens the students’ attention span by requiring them to work and remain focused. Long form reading isn’t done every class period, because we take time to dive-deep at key moments, but either way, students should interact with the text first-hand prior to the teachers dispensing information.”

It is best to read in a good translation, to follow-along on a hard-copy as a skilled reader reads relatively swiftly, and then stop and do a close reading at key moments. Since they wouldn’t stop after every paragraph of the Iliad (because it’s lengthy), they keep up a similar pace with much of the Bible’s historical narratives. Otherwise, it can be hard to finish! 

Both reading methods seem . . . basic. Does this reduce the role of the teacher or eliminate direct instruction? By no means. But it does mean that the teacher’s role switches from lecture to hands-on coaching in skills. “Students benefit from habits and routines,” Zach explained. “Learning to read Scripture is like apprenticeship. The teacher is the lead learner and should model habits that the students will acquire over time, after much repetition. Good biblical reading should be seen as training.” 

3. Embracing Literary Skills 

Students at Veritas Christian Academy (the school where I teach Pentateuch and OT historical books) quickly learn that they will utilize literary skills daily in Bible class. There is no way to follow a complex text without using tools of genre, structure, precise vocabulary and synonyms. 

Precise attention to language is also how biblical theologians do their work. Many insights found by scholars are missed by average readers only because one’s literary understanding has to be increased to see the connections. Bible study tools that have been discussed for decades (“Listen for repetition”) only work when students understand the range of synonyms for a given word. 

4. Connecting with Ancient History

Since the canon is a collection of texts written in ancient Hebrew and Greek, we need to spend more time entering into the world of ancient history. Zach notes,

“Those who authored the biblical text had many similarities to us, but they also saw the world differently and we should learn from their worldview. It requires the reader to take on an ancient imagination.”

But discussing ancient history doesn’t have to be a dry, scholarly affair. In fact, since Veritas’ reader Bibles don’t contain scholarly footnotes or commentary, students have to use class discussion to work out their existing knowledge of ancient cultures and enter into “what this probably meant.” 

And don’t underestimate how much ancient knowledge is gained simply through broad reading of the Old Testament. The importance of land, agriculture, fertility, offspring, local gods, and differing gender-social roles is evident directly in Genesis.

Unleash your students’ creativity in wondering what life was like before the modern era! How did the ancients pass on writing, produce needed goods, utilize power, or reason about natural and supernatural forces? Even a bit of ancient background and ancient imagination goes a long way. 

5. Unleashing a Hunt for Imagery

Recurring words and images create through-lines across the Bible. Teach students to listen for repeated ideas, even if they don’t use the exact same word, and even if they seem like a minor concrete detail. These details will add up to a richer, more beautiful story when we keep track of them. But because motifs lie under the surface, we have to act like detectives. Have you heard repetition and wondered, “Is this a whole-Bible motif?” Check a scholarly work like the Dictionary of Biblical Imagery. Then do some thinking: What would this image mean to ancient people? Where did we see this motif earlier? Does it run all the way from Genesis to Revelation?

“We can be a lead learner, training students as apprentices,” Zach encourages. “Equip them with skills they need to be those with ‘eyes to see’ and ‘ears to hear’ God’s words, and then let them experience their own journey. My students often see aspects of the biblical text that I haven’t even noticed. I appreciate how we get to journey toward truth together.” 

A literary approach to the Bible lays a rich feast of manifold, complex meaning. What better could we spread before our students? Yes, they will have the choice as they grow, whether to go on believing. But I don’t think people want to walk away from a feast of meaning that is so very rich. When you start to see everything in existence illuminated by the light of Christianity, with all these layers of meaning—every concrete thing having a deeper, poetic, symbolic meaning. That is very hard to walk away from. It would constitute a loss to move from sacred, poetic living into non-meaning. Bare atoms. Nothingness. The richer the theology, the more lasting the faith. The imagery of the Bible can fuel new imagination for a kingdom way of living.

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