The Morning Star Rising on the First Day

Read the truly amazing life story about how the forces of good and evil battle over a man and the vision that God gives him. Joseph W. Gordon’s Possess the Vision (Xulon Press, $12.95, 140 pages, ISBN 1-59781-205-6) tells about the mysterious spiritual experiences that occur throughout his lifetime.

Development of Course Ware in Support of Universal Christian Education

 

A few weeks ago we recommend that the universal Christian Community work together toward the deployment of a Christian Educational system. This system could be available to anywhere in the world by leveraging existing computer, communications and software technology.

A key component of all of this is the development of educational content. Content will be the very heart of the product that is to be delivered to the poor and disenfranchised peoples of the world. This course ware will be developed by Christians from across the world and then donated as a gift to all peoples of the world. In addition, processes will be established that enable continuous improvements to the course work as is appropriate. Educational materials will also be modularized such that good material can be reused in future course ware development.

The course ware will be displayed in a multimedia format much like television but will also have interactive components as well. Therefore, this material will require the interactive participation of subject matter experts to address student questions and needs for support. A major portion of this support is to come via on-line television that connects the student to the teacher via the Internet. The thought here is that subject matter experts can be made available much easier when travel and residency outside one’s native country are not a requirement. This strategy will also be very useful in areas of the world where Christian persecution is a problem.  

The Martydom of Saint Paul - Tintoretto in 1556


For cases where the physical presence of a subject matter expert is required, the recommended course of action will be to use local people who are trained to accomplish this mission. So, while I expect that there will be some cases which will require the physical transportation of subject matter experts and teachers, in all cases a plan to transfer this capability into the hands of local people must be carried out. Therefore, train the trainer programs will be developed to achieve this objective and in some cases practical experience must be achieved by transporting people to the host country.

In summary, the computer systems, networks and course ware will support existing missions with the capability to improve the living standards of the peoples of the world, while also spreading the word of Jesus where it is currently absent. They will be a demonstration of the love of the body of Christ for all people. It will help them be self sufficient, not relying on the handouts of others but rather instilling in them the confidence of their ability to adequately care for their families and lead their respective communities.

Undertaking such an initiative will require a tremendous amount of work. But we already have a treasure of religious educational services in place. Certainly there are educational programs deployed for child education that includes K-12 courses. There are religious colleges that specialize in both contemporary as well as religious programs. There are seminaries and religious programs designed to prepare people for ministry. There are also existing audio/visual materials that are teaching programs, bible studies and religious education. These are the places to start because much of the material is available, well though out and proven to be effective. The work to be required would be to transfer this existing material into a form where it can be made available to others through the facilities we have been talking about.  

One of the benefits of participating in such an effort is that there are several positive effects of developing such subject matter. First of all, it would enable these school systems to deploy this material in their own schools. This would provide teachers with a wealth of material to integrate into their own curriculum’s. This can provide the benefit of reducing the amount of time invested in developing this teaching material from scratch. This in turn could free teachers for other necessary activities like providing personalized tutoring, grading exams, preparing for future lesson plans or administrative paperwork.

The material developed for online course work can also be used by new teachers to reduce their class ware. In addition, since the material will be modularized, there will be times when pieces of material from one course can be reused. In such cases teacher productivity is improved. Other productivity improvements will also be provided such as self grading tests, templates for lesson plans, and student collaboration.  

Read the truly amazing life story about how the forces of good and evil battle over a man and the vision that God gives him. Joseph W. Gordon’s Possess the Vision (Xulon Press, $12.95, 140 pages, ISBN 1-59781-205-6) tells about the mysterious spiritual experiences that occur throughout his lifetime.