WIDE-ANGLE TEACHING - Christianity Today

Those who dream of being effective communicators run into an immediate obstacle: the people they teach are so different. Not everyone learns alike. Each person has different needs, questions, and ways of absorbing information. This challenge is addressed by Roberta Hestenes, who along with Howard Hendricks and Earl Palmer co-authored Mastering Teaching, the latest volume in the Mastering Ministry series, co-published by Multnomah Press and Christianity Today, Inc. This article is an excerpt.

John lays floor tiles for a living. He’s not much of a reader, but he’s eager to learn, and he’s looking for something from the class I’m about to teach.

Peter is a lawyer-driven, compulsive, and a bit of a snob. He is a reader, and a skeptical one at that. In fact, he’s vowed that if this class doesn’t grab him, he probably won’t bother with another.

Joanne’s husband left her a few months ago, and now she’s trying to support herself and her two children on a clerk’s salary at J.C. Penney. This is the first job she has had in twenty-five years. She doesn’t think she’s capable of anything better, and she feels absolutely powerless.

Michael owns his own small corporation; he’s pretty much in charge of his time. He talks flippantly about time pressures and taxes, but he knows he’s got it good. But he’s feeling a vague sense of guilt about what to do with himself outside of his job.

These people and more sit before me as I’m about to begin a church school class. Only some vague attraction to the topic, a Bible study on the Book of Romans, binds them together. For a brief moment, I despair: Each of these people comes with unique concerns and unique situations. How can I possibly communicate with all of them?

This great diversity is one of the most humbling realities for the teacher. So over the years, I’ve learned to depend increasingly on the Holy Spirit to touch the diverse lives of my students. I’ve also learned that by God’s grace some teaching techniques can address that diversity.

Variety in the classroom is of two types, and we must concern ourselves with both. First, people learn in a variety of ways: some absorb a lecture, others can’t remember a thing until they’ve talked about it; some are readers, others are not. Some are creative and learn by using their imagination, by seeing images; others require the security of rote learning.

Second, people have a variety of emotional and spiritual concerns as they enter a classroom. Some are actively seeking Christ; others take him for granted; others still are on the verge of checking out of Christianity.

Let me begin by showing how I deal with the variety of emotional and spiritual interests present in a class.

Putting Needs into Perspective

Before I become overwhelmed with the variety of needs present in a class, I try to put people’s concerns into perspective. That happens especially as I pray and reflect on these truths:

Only God knows people’s real needs. Only God knows where people are. Only God can judge the heart. This means two things.

First, I can draw on God to give me sensitivity to the real needs of people. That means I must pray for the members of my class. Praying for my class, person by person, not only lifts them to God, it sensitizes me to their situations. It helps me “see” them, so that they are registered in my mind as real persons. I’m not teaching a class as much as I’m teaching John and Peter and Joanne and Michael.

Second, as I immerse myself in prayer, I begin to trust God to work despite my ignorance of the private needs of people. I don’t have to work myself into a frenzy trying to figure out all the needs present. Naturally, I must learn as much as I can in conversation, interviews, and the like. But ultimately I have to recognize that I can’t possibly know everything necessary about people.

In fact, God often guides my thinking and planning so I end up meeting needs I’m not even aware of. All teachers have had people come up to them after class saying, “How did you know? That was just for me.” That happens more often when I’ve spent sufficient time in prayer before preparing a class.

Someone is looking for God. Over the years I’ve learned that no matter how blas or how committed the class looks, someone there is in the midst of making a major decision about God.

In one Bible class I enjoyed the presence of a school teacher; she was one of the most active participants. Only in a personal conversation some months later did I discover that she didn’t consider herself a Christian when she joined the class. She had never joined the church because she had never “gotten around to it,” but the real reason was she did not feel she had a personal relationship with Christ. She had prayed for that a number of times, but “nothing had happened.” She had sat through my class hoping that somehow God would touch her.

That insight led to a deeper conversation and reminded me that I must not take people’s faith for granted.

Someone is about to give up on God. The longer I’ve been teaching, the more I assume that life is beating hard on somebody in the room. Someone is concerned deeply about his marriage or a wayward child; perhaps someone has just lost a job. Whatever the cause, someone feels as if God is absent and wonders, Is this the time that I give it all up?

One pastor, a former student of mine, told me how he would watch men who had been active in the congregation move week by week toward the back row of the church, sitting more and more toward the back until finally they no longer came. They had finally decided the church wasn’t helping them deal with their lives, so they gave it up.

I constantly pray that I will be sensitive to the one or two in my class who are on the edge.

So as I prepare, I ask myself, Who is the most likely to be responsive to what I have to give this week? and then I teach to those people.

Illustrations that Cover the Canvas

Although I cannot hope to know and meet every concern in class, I can address a great variety. Naturally, the subject itself, whether Bible exposition or topical study, will answer a good many of the needs people bring to the class. But the other way I can insure that I touch a variety of people in a number of ways is by the effective use of illustrations. This means several things.

Use real situations. Illustrations will connect with a variety of people if they speak about real human situations. I try not to use hypothetical illustrations (“If I were fired, I would . . .”) because, though they show the relevant application, they never quite touch the heart. Nor do I often use dramatic examples, like Mother Theresa or Billy Graham, because their situations are so unlike those of my class.

I prefer that my illustrations come out of the life of the congregation. If I’m teaching on witnessing, I ask myself, What floes effective witnessing look like among these people?

In one class, for instance, I talked about a woman who started caring for her elderly next-door neighbor, bringing her lunch every day, doing some shopping for her. Eventually, she found herself sitting down with the woman and reading the Bible. She discovered that the woman had been active in the church some twenty or thirty years earlier. Slowly she was able to build faith into her friend.

Sometimes, of course, I may have to change some details to protect confidences. But I want the underlying story to be a genuine experience.

Slice them socially. The above illustration makes sense to many women, but it wouldn’t connect with many men. They are not likely to care about fixing lunch or doing shopping or sitting down in an intimate Bible discussion.

So in that class, I also talked about Bud, who did something similar with an 82-year-old woman in his neighborhood. Instead of fixing meals, he planted pachysandra in her front flower garden. He knew she had been an avid gardener and that she had taken great pride in that flowerbed. But age had caught up to her and prevented her working in her garden. So for two months Bud spent his Saturday afternoons planting and weeding pachysandra for her.

In addition to targeting both men and women, I try to include some illustrations that work for couples and others for singles, some for those employed outside the home, others for those who work raising children in the home. I want to touch those who have children and those who don’t, those in white collar and those in blue collar professions, whites and blacks and Asians and Hispanics.

In short, I want to use illustrations that come from the worlds represented in my classroom, for those worlds bear directly on people’s emotional and spiritual lives. The illustrations may be but two sentences long, but the protagonist in the illustration will represent one of those groups. I don’t have to touch every group at every point illustrated, but over the course of a class I want to hit all of them.

Slice them experientially. I also try to slice my illustrations to cover the variety of experiences people have.

If I want to illustrate how someone can be disappointed with God, I may be tempted to illustrate it mainly with the young mother of an infant and two toddlers who lost her husband to cancer. But not many people know that experience. So I may also mention other disappointments with God people experience: a young political activist who is upset about incipient racism, a man who didn’t get a longed-for promotion, the teenager who didn’t get accepted to the college of her choice.

Everybody experiences anger, grief, doubt, hope, pain, and love, but I can’t assume that one illustration will cover every person’s particular experience.

Keeping Methods in Their Place

In addition to their emotional and spiritual differences, people also learn in a variety of ways: some learn best by hearing, others by discussion; some by seeing, others by doing. Fortunately, we have a variety of teaching techniques that can connect with that type of variety. We can show a video or work with clay or break into small groups or do a “trust walk” to reinforce a lesson.

I don’t want teaching methods, however, to become mere gimmicks to entertain people. And the way I prevent that is by asking myself four questions as I think about what method I want to use.

Does it tie in with the lesson? I want people to enjoy learning, but I want the teaching technique to do more than help them appreciate learning. Any method I use must tie in directly to the goal of my lesson.

If I’m teaching Genesis 1, about creation, and I want people to experience the power of creativity, I’ll have them write a poem or work with clay. If I want people to recognize afresh the beauty of creation, I’ll pass around copies of National Geographic and ask them to pick out a picture that does that for them and have them talk about it. If I want people to get to know one another as a part of the lesson, I’ll break them into small groups to talk about the most moving experience they’ve had outdoors. If I try switching these activities and my purpose, I may have an interesting class, but the class will not find the exercises very meaningful.

I also want people to be clear about how the exercise connects. People are generally conservative about trying something new, and they’ll be thinking, Why are we doing this? So I usually tell them: “To help us understand some of what goes into creating, let’s try this . . .”

Sometimes, of course, to explain this ruins the exercise-maybe the point of the exercise is to feel frustration due to ignorance! But if I’ve built trust by using meaningful exercises in the past, they’ll trust me when they don’t know exactly where the exercise is headed.

Is it proportionate to its importance? I don’t want to play an exercise for more than it’s worth. If I do, I risk losing people, who will stop attending because they’ll feel the class is too gimmicky.

I was supposed to attend a denominational gathering at which everyone was encouraged to come in wheelchairs; the judicatory wanted us to identify with the disabled. The problem was that the meeting typically ran six hours and included a meal. I didn’t go. I think I would have gotten the point in about fifteen minutes, and yet the exercise was going to go on and on.

So, I want the exercise to be proportionate to the point being made. For instance, in studying Jesus’ healing of the blind man, it may be helpful to have people identify with the blind man. If the lesson is finally about the light of Christ flooding our lives, it may be worthwhile to take twenty to thirty minutes to do a “trust walk,” where people break into twos and take turns leading one another around the church, the led person being blindfolded. Then people can grasp in a fresh way the transformation Christ works in us.

If, however, I want to emphasize the obedience of the blind man following his healing, spending so much time on identifying with his affliction would be inappropriate, distracting the class from the main point.

Is the class ready for it? The number and type of teaching methods I employ depends on the nature of the people I’m teaching.

For example, if I’m teaching a class composed of men and women in their fifties, somewhat conservative, I’m not going to work with clay or write poetry, even if it fits the goal of the lesson. That group’s traditional expectations for what is supposed to happen in a class would get in the way of their enjoying the new technique.

If I’m teaching singles between the ages of 25 and 35, who want to build relationships and enjoy being creative, I can be much more innovative-in fact, I have to be. They would find traditional teaching unchallenging.

I can often shape an exercise so that it fits the group I’m working with. I’ll ask myself, What would I have to do to make this work in this setting? If most of the class wants meaty lecture, I will shorten the discussion period so they won’t get bored. If I know that a number of parents will leave the class ten minutes early to pick up their children from Sunday school, I’ll offer the discussion at the beginning of class. If my “conservative” group happens to be composed of many choir members, I may be able to get away with using music in class. But I will work hard at making sure the exercise and the group fit.

Is it dessert or the main course? People enjoy being surprised, and one of my goals in teaching is to remain somewhat unpredictable. That’s been especially important when I’ve been in a church for more than five years. If I’m not careful, people will be able to finish my sentences for me.

But, in an effort to keep people alert, I don’t want to offer so many creative exercises that they become the main course of the class. I usually use no more than one new exercise in a class and may not introduce one for four or five weeks.

I know I’m beginning to depend on exercises when I feel I need to do something to fill time. Instead, I want to have two hours of content prepared for every hour I have to teach, and I want the exercise to be so vital that I really can’t go on with other material until the point I’m driving at is made clear in some fresh way. That’s when I know the new method is the dessert and not the main dish.

When I offer variety without gimmicks, I’m able to present a class in ways that will touch people of different learning styles. I employ many exercises, especially group discussion. Here are a few others I have also found helpful.

Visual Variety

Because we live in a culture dominated by the visual, I rarely fail to include some visual element in a class.

For me, that usually means using overheads or printed lecture outlines. First, I can prepare some overheads at home-I don’t have to slow down the teaching by writing during class. Second, when I do want to write during the session, I never have to turn my back to the class; I can maintain eye contact. And third, using overheads helps people see what we’re talking about; that way they can keep more ideas in mind as I teach.

For example, I may ask the class what they think when they hear the word “justification.” If I write their answers as they give them, they can keep all of them in mind, comparing and contrasting as we go. That’s especially helpful when we begin talking about Paul’s views.

Visual can also mean using a video tape in class, although I don’t find it helpful to use videos for more than five or ten minutes; otherwise they tend to jar the dynamics of class interaction, making people a little more passive than I’m comfortable with. But I’ve sometimes used brief portions of commercials or TV shows to drive home a point.

I also use handouts, either material I’ve prepared or magazines or articles. For instance, I was teaching from 2 Corinthians on making every thought obedient to Christ. So I passed out sections of the newspaper-real estate, fashion, front page-and asked people to discuss the Christian implications of what they saw.

Tactile Teaching

Many people don’t learn well unless their sense of touch or smell is put to use. So when the subject is conducive, I will include a tactile exercise.

In studying the creation story once, I had the class try to make a human figure out of clay. Then I asked them questions like “What goes into creating?” and “What do you have to do to create?” Having worked with the clay, the class was much more sensitive to the dynamics of creation.

Writing is the simplest tactile exercise. So I often ask people to write something in response to a question. Other times I’ll ask people to circle the most significant words in the passage we’re studying. I don’t know why, but there is something about writing that focuses the mind.

I once brought in perfumes when teaching 2 Corinthians 2:16: “To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life.” And in order to grasp better Paul’s discussion of the veil in chapter 3, I’ve had the class experiment seeing through a veil.

As I mentioned, I don’t do this type of thing often lest it become gimmicky. But when used appropriately, it not only adds variety to the class, it helps those who learn best through their senses.

Tuning in with Music

I was teaching 1 John at a week-long family camp for members of our church. I wanted people to memorize key verses and ideas of the book, so as we went along chapter by chapter, I taught people a hymn or Scripture song that summarized the teaching or helped them memorize a verse. In fact, we sang them as we moved through the week.

People from that retreat still tell me how helpful those sessions were. Some come up to me and just start singing, “Behold what manner of love the Father has given unto us . . .”

In a class on world missions, we adopted a theme song of challenge and commitment. The stirring words and music sealed the course content in our hearts.

Music is a vital part of worship because it helps us give praise to God, the main point of worship. But music can be used in a classroom as well.

Use of Imagination

Actually, nearly every creative teaching technique requires people to draw on their imaginations, but sometimes the attempt is more direct.

For instance, I’ve had a friend draw a cartoon, but I’ll ask the class to write a caption for it. And even though three-fourths of the class doesn’t come up with anything, we end up with two or three captions that illustrate the point wonderfully.

I’ve also used guided imagery, or guided imagination. Again you have to know your audience and have to be very careful with it, but it can be used effectively to help people identify with a biblical situation.

Once when teaching about the healing of the blind man outside of Jericho, I said, “Now close your eyes and imagine you are a member of the crowd. What does it feel like? Is it hot or is it cold? Hot. Okay, it’s hot. Is it rainy or, no, it’s dry and it’s dusty. Well, what does it feel like when a lot of people are milling around? Now you hear a cry, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.’ What are you thinking?” And on it goes.

I want to do more than just talk about healing but also help people experience that reality. Imagination helps do that.

The Power of Silence

Some people can grasp new truths only when they have time to reflect on them silently. So in some classes, I use silence as a teaching technique, especially carefully guided biblical meditation.

When I’ve taught from Psalm 62, “For God alone my soul awaits in silence,” I’ve asked people to take five minutes and meditate on the word wait. “You can use the time in any way you want,” I’ll say. “You may move off to a corner of the room or stay where you are. Write your thoughts down if you want. If you have no idea what to do, let me suggest you think on these things: How well do you do at waiting? What do you think it means to wait for God?”

Before that, we’ve talked about waiting for the check in the mail, waiting for Prince Charming to rescue us, waiting for Christmas, despairing while we wait. So they’ll have mental furniture to work with during the exercise.

Meditation can be a moving exercise for some people, so I don’t want to end it abruptly. At the end I will close with prayer and gently move that class back into the normal ebb and flow of conversation, beginning the prayer softly and slowly, ending in a normal pace and tone of voice.

There’s power in silence. There can also be anxiety. If there’s anxiety, I hear it in coughing, fidgeting, moving. I will shorten the period, and then after class I’ll think of a way to help people handle it better the next time: perhaps introduce it more thoroughly, explain the biblical base for meditation, or use a less threatening meditation.

Creating Learning Space

Recently, I was speaking with a group of students at Eastern College, when one of them asked me, “Shouldn’t everybody on this campus have the same view about how Christianity relates to justice and lifestyle in American culture?”

“No, I don’t see it that way,” I said. “We all need to be centered in Christ and under the authority of Scripture, but within those boundaries we have the freedom to ask questions and wrestle with the shape of our obedience to God.”

When the meeting broke up, a student approached me and said, “I’ve come from a background where everybody told me what I had to think and believe about everything, including politics and lifestyle. Frankly, it was starting to make me less of a Christian. I cannot tell you what it means to hear you say that here I am given space to explore what I really believe. Thank you.”

I not only want to give people space to ask questions but also space to seek answers in a variety of ways. Just as there are no biblical directions to some aspects of our faith-like whether to part our hair on the right or left-so there is no one right way to learn about Christ.

I think that’s why Jesus constantly employed variety in his teaching. He cursed fig trees, knelt, drew in the dirt, made mud, pointed to the lilies, among other things. He knew that not everyone learns alike.