I have the best seminary class ever this year. Seriously ... the best. I just love them to death. They are enthusiastic about seminary. They all get along. They are smart and funny and talented, and they put up with me and my foibles. They are practically perfect in every way. This is an interesting year for me teaching. I have two brand new converts in my class along with a Muslim from Kazakhstan and (occasionally) a Hindu from India (foreign exchange students living with two of my students). Interesting. Challenging. But super fun.
We just had the best activity we have ever had in my seminary class. The best. It'll be a weekly thing, and I think it will be super beneficial for my class in so many ways. I have to explain how I came up with it before I tell just how amazing it was.
I have one of my seniors who is an excellent young man. He is making plans to go on a mission. He is a leader in the class and with the young men at church. He's great. With seminary he is always involved. He doesn't sleep in class or blow off reading assignments. He does what he needs to do, but it was always the bare minimum. He never took any extra time to memorize or learn scripture mastery. He didn't really have a good grasp of the scriptures. He was indicative of most of my class ... an excellent young man, but not driven to search the scriptures on his own very often (at least when it comes to seminary). But this young man had been going out with the missionaries each week, and one week they visited an investigator who had tons of great questions about the gospel and why we believed certain things. My seminary student realized as he was sitting there that he didn't really have a good enough grasp of the scriptures to answer the man's questions. As he heard our full time missionaries using the scriptures to explain basic doctrine he realized that he needed to step it up and learn the scripture mastery verses as well as basic doctrine found in the scriptures. When he came to seminary the following week he was on fire. He wanted to learn all of these things for himself so that he could be prepared to teach others. It was amazing! He was amazing!
I thought of him and that experience this summer. I thought about how being forced to explain doctrine using the scriptures in a missionary setting was a driving force for this young man. Then I thought about my daughter, Laney, who is out serving right now, facing those same questions and having to be a representative of the Lord as she offers answers to some important questions every single day. And Laney is not alone. We have tons of young men and women serving missions from our area. All of them are all over the world, and they are all facing the same basic questions about the gospel and the Plan of Salvation and all that encompasses. It made me think of this idea of how to help my students see that the scriptures have the answers to all these questions. They just need to learn how to find them. And that led to this AMAZING activity this week.
I started out by sending out an email to about ten missionaries who are currently serving all over the world ... Idaho, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Russia, Germany, etc. This was my explanation letter. I told them about our seminary class and asked them if they would be willing to send one question that they were asked by an investigator that week pertaining to the gospel. It could be super basic or super complicated. Either type would work. Each Sunday I would simply send out an email that said, "Any questions???" Then they would only have to respond with their question. It wasn't meant to take any more than 30 seconds of their P-day. Super simple. Super easy.
The missionaries responded super positively. They were all excited to participate, and several asked if we could send the answers our class came up with back to them. I refined my plan a bit more, and here is how it went ...
On Monday I had received about six questions. I put them on little sheets of paper and stuck them in a cup. Then we drew one question out. The question we got this week came from Adrienne, who is serving in Russia. Because most of the class knows Adrienne it made the question seem real and relevant to them. It was, "If I am a good person, why does it matter which church I attend?" It was the PERFECT question for this week since we are talking about The Great Apostasy and The First Vision. A perfect question. On Monday I wrote that question on the board and asked the class to ponder it for a few days. Because of our school's late start on Wednesday we have a longer seminary class, so on Wednesday we took some time in class to answer the question. I REALLY wish I could have devoted way more time to the activity because it was so effective, but I need to follow the curriculum and stay on target there, so I only really gave them about ten minutes to work on this activity, but it was so wonderful to see how it played out.
I divided the class into four groups of four or five people, and I put my four strong class leaders in charge of the groups. They were to first talk about what they thought the answer might be to that question and then open up their scriptures and see if they could find scriptures that supported that idea ... or maybe they would find, after looking in the scriptures, that they needed to refine or edit their idea a bit. We talked about how to use the index and topical guide to find answers. We talked about using the scripture mastery verses for basic doctrinal answers. And they went to work. Everyone participated. Everyone. We didn't end up having enough time to actually come back together and talk about the individual answers on Wednesday. They were so involved in talking and searching the scriptures that I didn't want to break that up.
Today we came back together and I took just five minutes at the beginning of class to discuss their answers. I asked the group leaders to represent their group (or delegate a spokesperson) and share one idea and one supporting scripture for that idea. Then I asked one student to be our scribe. He would record the answers we received and put it together for the emailed answers we would send back to the missionaries. The four answers we got were insightful and spot on. I thought they would all be about the same and use the same scriptures, but they weren't. Each group had a different emphasis, and each group pulled from a different book of scripture. We had Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and two New Testament scriptures that were used as examples. Everyone was quick to add additional thoughts as we were recording our answers to send to the missionaries. It was magical, truly magical.
This Sunday when I send out my "Any questions???" email I will stick this information at the end of the email for them to print off, if they are interested. It will say that our question came from Adrienne, a missionary serving in Russia, and our answer was compiled by Jordan, a sophomore at Waynesville High School. Who knows? Our answers might be a blessing to those serving in the field right now.
What I LOVED about this activity was that it showed my students that there are real answers to real life questions in the scriptures. We just need to learn how to find them. They were able to test this and see that they don't have to just ask someone else for the answers. They can search and find for themselves. This was the perfect activity to lead into our lesson today .... Studying the Scriptures. I shared this amazing quote from Boyd K. Packer:
"If [you] are acquainted with the revelations, there is no question -- personal or social or political or occupational -- that need go unanswered. Therein is contained the fulness of the everlasting gospel. Therein we find principles. of truth that will resolve every confusion and every problem and every dilemma that will face the human family or any individual in it." ("Teach the Scriptures" [address to CES religious educators, Oct. 14, 1977], 3-4).
And what was wonderful was that after reading the above quote, the students were able to bear testimony of the truth of that based on what we had just done. They had seen that they could find answers to questions through the revelations and principles found in their scriptures. They weren't just taking my word for it. They knew.
AWESOME!!!!!
So I adored this activity. We'll be doing it every week this year. I don't want it to dominate each class. I imagine that as the year continues the students will get better and better at knowing how to find answers in the scriptures, so they won't need as much time to complete the activity.
I really, really love the opportunity I have to wake up each morning before the birds so that I can come to church and have opportunities to watch the light bulbs light up in the spirits and minds of these great youth. It really is the best calling ever.
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