What’s Inside?
Article — The Keys to Developing a Positive Classroom Environment — Part One
Why Do We Study This Subject? Math
Developing Better Thinkers Through Writing
Poetry
(I apologize for not writing this past month. I have been really sick. When my church reinstituted the common cup during communion, I took part, but my immune system was not ready for it. I’m glad to be well again and back with y’all:)
The Keys to Developing a Positive Classroom Environment — Part One
In my last newsletter, I wrote about the importance of a teacher’s personality in leading a class of students and how his/her personality could be used positively in creating a positive classroom environment conducive to learning. I am not a naturally organized person, but I realized quickly when I became a teacher that a classroom has so many moving parts because of all the different personalities present, that a plan and organization in a classroom are imperative. I did not think about classroom atmosphere until older teachers challenged me think about how I interacted with my students. Once I was challenged to think about how I approached my students as their teacher and as a Christian, I realized that a lot of prayer and thought had to go into my approach. As a Christian teacher, I was not responsible for merely teaching academic subjects, but also for character and spiritual development. I was a model of Christ to my students, and I had to figure out what that should look like.
Developing classroom atmosphere is rarely discussed in teacher training. Actually, I have only heard it discussed once in nineteen years of teacher training. That is unfortunate, because it is so important in developing an overall school culture. I do not believe in applying a cookie cutter approach in schools for anything, but developing important principles and training teachers to consider the different ways to develop positive classroom environments is important if you want your school to unify and to thrive.
So, how does a teacher develop a positive classroom environment? You have to think about the best way to work with young people who are being taught academic subjects in groups by teachers who are Christians. Will you be the teacher who hugs every student as they walk in? the one who ignores each student as they walk in but talks to them once they are seated? the teacher who lays down the law and takes no prisoners? the one who gives in to every request because he/she wants to be liked by his/her students? Are you a teacher or a youth worker? What is the right approach to classroom management? Well, the best answer lies with the best model we have -- the Lord. How does God deal with us in His training of us? When I think of the Lord’s training, I see a balance of justice and grace. What is at the center of God’s approach to training His children? Love.
Showing all kinds of students love, justice, and grace while trying to teach academic subjects is a hat trick. It takes years to develop these skills and you spend much of that time on your knees in prayer. Are there also earthly models to whom we can look for aid? Yes, I think so. Hopefully, we have all had people in our lives who were authority figures who balanced love, justice, and grace consistently. These folks were likely kind and loving, but they did not let us get away with anything and they held us accountable for our behavior and our moral and spiritual development. I have found that different people in my life have modeled for me different virtues that I use as a classroom teacher.
One model I have followed is that of my father. I remember my father was fun, kind, and loving, but he was also a disciplinarian. When I and my sisters would disobey, like when we would steal candy from his dresser and then lie to him about it, we would get disciplined for it. I could endure the discipline and the feeling of disappointment for being disobedient, because I knew what was coming afterwards. After the discipline, he would put all three of us in his lap and hold us and tell us how much he loved us. My father died when I was five years old, but I still remember his model of discipline and restoration. I have learned how to implement my father’s model of discipline and restoration in my classroom through the years. I have designed my classroom atmosphere based on what I learned from the Lord, my parents, and other mainly older and wiser people whom I have been fortunate enough to know.
Through the years, I have become convinced that the two most important aspects of developing a positive classroom atmosphere are love and consistency. (I wrote about the importance of consistency in the previous newsletter.) I have worked in Christian schools and classical charter schools and no matter where I have worked, love and consistency have been the keys to a peaceful classroom. Loving students while balancing justice and grace consistently has led to some of the most beautiful relationships with groups of students that I have ever enjoyed.
Jesus said the two greatest commandments were to love God and to love our neighbor. As Christian teachers, if we receive God's love then we are capable of loving our neighbors, and loving our neighbors is important in establishing a positive classroom atmosphere. Now, I am not an ooey gooey kind of teacher who fawns over children when they get boo boos. I do not have to be to show love (and that is the reason I mainly teach upper school students;). I can show love in the ways that God has gifted me while accepting that other teachers will show love in the manner in which they are gifted. In addition, showing love does not mean that you are a pushover and that you allow students to do whatever they want. In fact, that style of showing love would contradict how the Bible teaches us to love.
We can look to I Corinthians 13:4-8 to understand what love is: “Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.”
In Proverbs and Ephesians we learn how fathers show their children love through discipline and training: “Proverbs 22:6 - Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it. Ephesians 6:4 - Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”
Micah 6:8 tell us how we are to conduct ourselves as Christians: “He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?”
When we find a good balance, between love, justice and grace, and we display humility, then our students will want to be in our classrooms, they will want to learn from us, and they will trust us to be fair and to teach the truth. Developing that level of trust in relationships between students and teachers takes time and a tremendous amount of effort on the part of the teacher. The investment of time and effort is worth it, because the dividends yield incredible results in terms of children’s academic, moral, and spiritual development.
Why Do We Study This Subject? Math
1. Define the term being analyzed from Webster’s 1828 Online Dictionary:
Mathematics — The science of quantity; the science which treats of magnitude and number, or of whatever can be measured or numbered.
Arithmetic — The science of numbers, or the art of computation.
2. Define key terms in the definition and key terms associated with the subject
Science -- a collection of the general principles or leading truths relating to any subject; In a general sense, knowledge; the comprehension or understanding of truth.
Principles -- In a general sense, the cause, source or origin of any thing; A general truth
Truth -- Conformity to fact or reality; exact accordance with that which is, or has been, or shall be; purity from falsehood
Knowledge -- A clear and certain perception of that which exists, or of truth and fact; Learning; illumination of mind
Understanding -- Comprehending; learning or being informed.
Number — The designation of a unit reference to other units
3. Find Scripture that supports the basic principles of Math and relate the Scriptures to the subject.
Number — The designation of a unit reference to other units
“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness” Genesis 1:26
“let us go down, and there confound their language . . . “ Genesis 11:7
God revealed counting numbers to mankind by referencing the Trinity in the first chapters of Genesis. “Let us…” — God is the first one, two, three.
*In the May 23rd edition of “The Classical Teacher,” I laid out an extensive discussion regarding the biblical study of science.
God did tell men to take dominion over the Earth in Genesis 1:26. “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.”
Dominion is defined by Webster’s 1828 dictionary as “Power to direct, control, use and dispose of at pleasure.” Men have taken this commandment to mean that understanding the world God has made is a part of taking dominion over it.
Mathematics is a language that was developed to count, to number, to add, subtract, multiply and divide, but also to explain observable phenomena on the earth and in the universe. Mathematics has been used to help men take dominion of the earth by discovering the principles that govern creation. Math has been used for practical reasons such as weighing, measuring, and counting. The language of mathematics has aided in the development of scientific uses for natural resources and to make things to help us live in nature easier such as homes with central heat and air, automobiles, and airplanes. Mathematics has been used for scientific discovery and speculation about phenomena that cannot be observed. Mathematics has been used to put a man on the moon and to explain shifting plates just under the surface of the Earth. Mathematics has been used to help us discover and to wonder and to ponder the truth, goodness, and beauty of the Earth and the universe we live in, and consequently, to learn more about who God is. Think of the lovely images we have of the universe from the Hubble and Webb space telescopes.
Mathematics teaches us to think logically and it also increases our faith in God. We continue to do mathematics, because we believe we can know truth. We believe that truth exists when we believe that God exists. In fact, truth exists whether we believe in God or not. In seeking to know God, we can study mathematics to learn about His creation and exercise faith that we can find the answers, because we believe in Him and He is Truth and He will reveal Himself to us when we seek Him with all of our hearts.
Developing Better Thinkers Through Writing
Read the following and answer the questions below.
Job 38:4 — "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?”
38:6 — “To what were its foundations fastened? Or who laid its cornerstone?”
38: 22 — “"Have you entered the treasury of snow, Or have you seen the treasury of hail?”
38:33 — “Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you set their dominion over the earth?”
38:41 — “Who provides food for the raven, When its young ones cry to God, And wander about for lack of food?”
39:1 — “"Do you know the time when the wild mountain goats bear young? Or can you mark when the deer gives birth?”
39:19 and 22 — “"Have you given the horse strength? Have you clothed his neck with thunder? He mocks at fear, and is not frightened; Nor does he turn back from the sword.”
39:26-27 — “Does the hawk fly by your wisdom, And spread its wings toward the south? Does the eagle mount up at your command, And make its nest on high?”
42:1-6 — “Then Job answered the Lord and said:
"I know that You can do everything, And that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You. You asked, 'Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?' Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, Things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
Listen, please, and let me speak; You said, 'I will question you, and you shall answer Me.'
"I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, But now my eye sees You. Therefore I abhor myself, And repent in dust and ashes."
Questions:
What is God’s point in asking Job so many questions? Read Job Chapters 38-42 to get more context.
Why did Job repent?
Good Timber
The tree that never had to fight
For sun and sky and air and light,
But stood out in the open plain
And always got its share of rain,
Never became a forest king
But lived and died a scrubby thing.
The man who never had to toil
To gain and farm his patch of soil,
Who never had to win his share
Of sun and sky and light and air,
Never became a manly man
But lived and died as he began.
Good timber does not grow with ease,
The stronger wind, the stronger trees,
The further sky, the greater length,
The more the storm, the more the strength.
By sun and cold, by rain and snow,
In trees and men good timbers grow.
Where thickest lies the forest growth
We find the patriarchs of both.
And they hold counsel with the stars
Whose broken branches show the scars
Of many winds and much of strife.
This is the common law of life.