What is the Teaching Emphasis?

There are several talks that have really been monumental in the teaching of the youth of the church in the past 10 years.  These talks, as well as my personal experience as an early morning seminary teacher, have guided my thoughts about how technology can augment spiritual education.  I would like to first lie out a groundwork for what the teaching emphasis is, and then talk about how that technology can augment that spiritual education.  Here are a list of the talks:

Additionally, the handbook for CES teachers and leaders “Teaching the Gospel” is a great resource, and perhaps the single most conscise manual for teaching the Gospel ever created!   

In each of these resources there are several principles that are repeated again and again.  It is best summed up from Elder Eyring’s 2001 address. 

“The pure gospel of Jesus Christ must go down into the hearst of the students by the power of the Holy Ghost.”

All spiritual education is about getting the gospel into the hearts of the students.  It is not about horizontal learning where students learn facts, and superficially read scriptures.  It is about vertical learning where the gospel goes deep into the hearts of the students and changes them.  Where they really become converted to the Gospel.

How do we get the gospel in their hearts?

We talk about the role the teacher can play be being prepared, but the real learning can only take place when the learner is ready to learn.  Students can only have the gospel sink in if they can think critically about how the gospel has effected them in their lives, and then the the Holy Ghost can come in and testify to them of the truthfulness of principles of the Gospel.  When opportunities are given for students to critically think about their own lives, they ponder, and then they can exhibit faith and open the door for the Holy Ghost. 

Elder Bednar goes into some great detail about how to effectively ask questions in the classroom that will encourage this type of behavior and I strongly recommend you read that.  But what more can we do?  In almost every talk it is mentioned how the world is changing, and the things we have done in the past are not going to be enough for the youth of today. 

How Technology can Augment the Classroom

More Exposure to the Gospel
Universal access to coarse language and content is flooding the lives of the students outside of seminary and institute.  One of the wonderful things about church education is that students can regularly go to a place where the Holy Ghost resides and remember who they are and what some of their spiritual goals are.  Technology will enable students to more frequently access good content in the sea of immorality that worldly media is pushing on them.  Mobile technology will also facilitate this access.

Getting the Gospel into the Hearts of the Students through Technology
The real power of technology is that it engages students.  They are digital natives that have grown up with technology and many of them use consume it in an increasing variety of ways.  I will talk more about this in my Digital Spiritual Learners segment, but suffice it to say they are very comfortable with technolgy.

This same engagement can be harnessed to get students to think critically both inside and outside of the classroom.  It can engage students on an individual level.  It can help students write their thoughts out.  Because these students are comfortable with technology they also can critically think about their beliefs in new and engaging multimedia music and video.  Things that used to be reserved for the technically elite are now common place to anyone with a computer.  Students become content creators who can eventually disseminate worthy and uplifting material to lift others.

Collaboration and Social Learning
Although conversion to the gospel is a distinctly individual act, there is great power in learning from others.  These same creative activites above are now online, and with that comes a potential worldwide audience.  One of the great powers of missionary work is that as a missionary you have the opportunity to think critically about your beliefs every day. 

Technology can also help harness the power of peer groups.  Many students will go to their friends with questions long before they would approach a teacher and parent.  Peer groups can facilitate getting correct information, as well as encouragement for struggling members of classrooms.  They build one another up and again, have more opportunities to think about what the Gospel means to them.

Conclusion

These is just the tip of the iceberg when we begin to think about how technology can augment spiritual education.  It is all about providing more personal opportunities for students to engage with the gospel.  In future posts I will talk about these technologies in much more detail, but hopefully I have laid out an important guiding principle here. 

Thoughts?  Comments?  Feel free to add/correct/etc below!  After all, that is what the social web is all about! :)