ZONE TEACHING THOUGHTS
Hello, everybody. I have had a couple of GREAT experiences in zone teaching the last couple weeks that I wanted to share with everybody. We have been striving to really build upon the experiences missionaries are having in class, and not merely replicating them. Repetition is good, I feel, but so is stretching. So I have been doing the revelation through church attendance fundamental for zone teaching, and a couple of times I have had them teach their investigator (or an actual missionary) the gospel of Jesus Christ with church attendance incorporated into it and as the commitment. Obviously when they teach a missionary, they don't just invite them to attend church, but they invite them to attend church with inspired purpose. I have seen fantastic results from those that invest in it. It helps them to distinguish between DOCTRINE and the FUNDAMENTALS and see how the two complete one another. Just some thoughts and miracles to share!
CJ
Thursday, February 28, 2013
Friday, February 22, 2013
Experience from a Rookie
I have a though about the new curriculom as well as an awesome experience/ Lesson plan that worked beautifully tonight.
First of all, take my opionion for what it's worth. I have had 2 district. A 3 weeker and a 2 weeker. something I have noticed is that my 2 weekers have not grasped the consepts in the same time frame as my 3 weekers. For example, after the doctrine of Chirst in the first couple days, my 3 weekers GOT IT. my 2 weekers, on the other hand, did not! I was a little worried until tonight. they leave on tuesday and while, for the past week or so nothing has seemed to really "click," tonight it seemed to all come together. now, I am using a little hyperbally here, but I think I learned something important- with the 2 weekers, we are going to have to be patient becasue for thei first half of their experience it eveything might be a little fuzzy, but toward the end the lights will start popping on like a christmas light show in montana.
This observation could be a result of (a) us not teaching in increments or (b) falty data consdiering I have only had 2 districts.
Secondly, tonight. was. awesome!
On syllabuddy I was supposed to teach The doctrine of Christ, PI (obviously,) and Book of Mormon read.
My lesson plan was as follows (I don't now the exact time frames- sorry)
Ojective- Help missionaries learn that the doctrine of Christ and the missionary purpose are on and the same. help missionaries learn how to confidently invite investigators to be baptized, especially in the first visit.
Help missionaries see importance of Doctrin of Christ in Conversion by helping them recognize it in their own conversion.
5:15- PI
During PI I had all the missionares Diagram their conversion as suggested on P. 18 of our teachers manual. after laying out all the important experiences in their conversion I invited them to look for how faith, repentence, etc. was shown by them during or as a result of those experiences.
*this was really good for them all. it was hard for some, eye opening for others, but it got them thinking hard!
6:00- Lesson
After PI I talked about their experience and the expressed it was great, hard, eye opening, etc.
then we watched laura's conversion and looked for ways she had faith, repented, felt the spirit etc.
I put questions on tho board to prompt thought such as, "what ways does laura show faith" or "what evidence is there she felt the spirit" it was great! after mapping their own conversion they were pulling the Gosple of Christ out of EVERTHNG!
toward the end of the video I started asking questions that would bring all this info back around to them by asking them what role the missionaries played, how the sisters in the video showed their love, and what evidence is there they understood their purpose.
they really started to get it and understand the principle of love and eveything! so it set up very powerful baptisimal invite role plays.
at the end of the night we were going to read Alma 22 about king lamoni but instead we went to alma 7. I was really cooko because I didn't preface the activitty with anything but the fact that I was bot going to open my mouth at all and that they would have to run thw show. they were pulling the doctrine of christ out of every verse! it was AMAZING! ther insights were thought out and super purpose centered!
It was a great stinkin night people!
I hope you get something out of this, sorry for the grammer mistakes!
First of all, take my opionion for what it's worth. I have had 2 district. A 3 weeker and a 2 weeker. something I have noticed is that my 2 weekers have not grasped the consepts in the same time frame as my 3 weekers. For example, after the doctrine of Chirst in the first couple days, my 3 weekers GOT IT. my 2 weekers, on the other hand, did not! I was a little worried until tonight. they leave on tuesday and while, for the past week or so nothing has seemed to really "click," tonight it seemed to all come together. now, I am using a little hyperbally here, but I think I learned something important- with the 2 weekers, we are going to have to be patient becasue for thei first half of their experience it eveything might be a little fuzzy, but toward the end the lights will start popping on like a christmas light show in montana.
This observation could be a result of (a) us not teaching in increments or (b) falty data consdiering I have only had 2 districts.
Secondly, tonight. was. awesome!
On syllabuddy I was supposed to teach The doctrine of Christ, PI (obviously,) and Book of Mormon read.
My lesson plan was as follows (I don't now the exact time frames- sorry)
Ojective- Help missionaries learn that the doctrine of Christ and the missionary purpose are on and the same. help missionaries learn how to confidently invite investigators to be baptized, especially in the first visit.
Help missionaries see importance of Doctrin of Christ in Conversion by helping them recognize it in their own conversion.
5:15- PI
During PI I had all the missionares Diagram their conversion as suggested on P. 18 of our teachers manual. after laying out all the important experiences in their conversion I invited them to look for how faith, repentence, etc. was shown by them during or as a result of those experiences.
*this was really good for them all. it was hard for some, eye opening for others, but it got them thinking hard!
6:00- Lesson
After PI I talked about their experience and the expressed it was great, hard, eye opening, etc.
then we watched laura's conversion and looked for ways she had faith, repented, felt the spirit etc.
I put questions on tho board to prompt thought such as, "what ways does laura show faith" or "what evidence is there she felt the spirit" it was great! after mapping their own conversion they were pulling the Gosple of Christ out of EVERTHNG!
toward the end of the video I started asking questions that would bring all this info back around to them by asking them what role the missionaries played, how the sisters in the video showed their love, and what evidence is there they understood their purpose.
they really started to get it and understand the principle of love and eveything! so it set up very powerful baptisimal invite role plays.
at the end of the night we were going to read Alma 22 about king lamoni but instead we went to alma 7. I was really cooko because I didn't preface the activitty with anything but the fact that I was bot going to open my mouth at all and that they would have to run thw show. they were pulling the doctrine of christ out of every verse! it was AMAZING! ther insights were thought out and super purpose centered!
It was a great stinkin night people!
I hope you get something out of this, sorry for the grammer mistakes!
Thursday, February 21, 2013
Reflections on your first two-week group
I, like many of you, just bid farewell to my first two-week District. I was hoping to compile here your reflections on your first two-week District. As much as we talked about it prior to the "continental shift", what were some lessons learned from your first group? What differences did you notice? What changes will need to be made?
I'll go ahead and start:
1) Things felt "messy" with this first group. Beit the new order of the Fundamentals, the increased utilization of the Zone Resources, a few "different" sort of days near the end, or whatever, things with the missionaries just seemed a bit off throughout most of their time here. This was reflected in the missionaries' conduct, their teaching, and certainly their planning/study. Fortunately, on their last Friday, things finally seemed to click for most (if not all) of the missionaries. While, I was grateful to see them able to finish strong, I was concerned that they weren't able to have more time "firing on all cylinders." The previous "training schedule" for 3-week missionaries prepared them to have an entire final week wherein their teaching, studying, and planning were all sound so they could leave confidently. We need to figure out how to enable this same sort of thing to happen for our 2-weekers.
2) Working with the Zone Resources/the increased importance of Zone Teaching definitely complicates things. Whereas in-classroom teachers are pretty good about adjusting lesson to specific needs and backgrounds of their missionaries, that can be much more difficult in a Zone Teaching setting. For the Zone Resources, it can be difficult (though possible) to focus in on specific missionaries if there are concerns. On the other hand, it can be difficult (though possible) for Zone Resources to give feedback to classroom teachers on specific missionaries. I feel like their is a greater need and responsibility for Zone Resources to become very familiar with the needs, backgrounds, etc. of ALL of the missionaries in the Zone so that they can: 1) adjust their zone activities accordingly and 2) so that they can more readily give specific feedback to classroom teachers.
3) There are a few classroom blocks, especially at the end of the missionaries' time at the MTC and more especially if the missionaries stay until Wednesday, that are different than before. I'll admit that I loved the idea of revisiting all the Fundamentals with the missionaries at the end of their time at the MTC but really struggled when it came time to actually help them to effectively do so. There is a need here for greater creativity and mastery of the curriculum such that we can facilitate revelation as the missionaries revisit some of the Fundamentals they have already covered earlier in their MTC stay.
There's probably a lot more that I could write here about my thoughts and feelings and reflections from my first two-week group, but I think I'll stop there. I hope that as so many of you are floating this week, you can take the time to add in your own thoughts. As we gather as a group and counsel together, I think we'll more readily begin to see common areas in which we can improve and, in addition to that, equip Lisanne to better help us help our missionaries during this transition.
I'll go ahead and start:
1) Things felt "messy" with this first group. Beit the new order of the Fundamentals, the increased utilization of the Zone Resources, a few "different" sort of days near the end, or whatever, things with the missionaries just seemed a bit off throughout most of their time here. This was reflected in the missionaries' conduct, their teaching, and certainly their planning/study. Fortunately, on their last Friday, things finally seemed to click for most (if not all) of the missionaries. While, I was grateful to see them able to finish strong, I was concerned that they weren't able to have more time "firing on all cylinders." The previous "training schedule" for 3-week missionaries prepared them to have an entire final week wherein their teaching, studying, and planning were all sound so they could leave confidently. We need to figure out how to enable this same sort of thing to happen for our 2-weekers.
2) Working with the Zone Resources/the increased importance of Zone Teaching definitely complicates things. Whereas in-classroom teachers are pretty good about adjusting lesson to specific needs and backgrounds of their missionaries, that can be much more difficult in a Zone Teaching setting. For the Zone Resources, it can be difficult (though possible) to focus in on specific missionaries if there are concerns. On the other hand, it can be difficult (though possible) for Zone Resources to give feedback to classroom teachers on specific missionaries. I feel like their is a greater need and responsibility for Zone Resources to become very familiar with the needs, backgrounds, etc. of ALL of the missionaries in the Zone so that they can: 1) adjust their zone activities accordingly and 2) so that they can more readily give specific feedback to classroom teachers.
3) There are a few classroom blocks, especially at the end of the missionaries' time at the MTC and more especially if the missionaries stay until Wednesday, that are different than before. I'll admit that I loved the idea of revisiting all the Fundamentals with the missionaries at the end of their time at the MTC but really struggled when it came time to actually help them to effectively do so. There is a need here for greater creativity and mastery of the curriculum such that we can facilitate revelation as the missionaries revisit some of the Fundamentals they have already covered earlier in their MTC stay.
There's probably a lot more that I could write here about my thoughts and feelings and reflections from my first two-week group, but I think I'll stop there. I hope that as so many of you are floating this week, you can take the time to add in your own thoughts. As we gather as a group and counsel together, I think we'll more readily begin to see common areas in which we can improve and, in addition to that, equip Lisanne to better help us help our missionaries during this transition.
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