I can't make up my mind!

Bible!

Life of Christ! I was so looking forward to teaching it and it's been such a trial. The text from Lifeway (LifeQuest) is just mediocre. The school did not buy the student texts - probably because they also are mediocre, but the teacher text is based on the fact that the kids have them. There are multiple problems with it:

1. It's an awful lot like what they get in Sunday School and I'd like to go deeper on the factual side.
2. There is the textbook issue.
3. It's meant for 5 1-hour sessions and we only have 4 30-minute sessions (please don't get me started on that!).
4. It's a survey course. This is fine, but some of these kids are really hungry for some deep learning.
   

I've had to essentially write, make, and then copy everything the students have to use. I'm sure the guys in the copy center hate to see me coming, but 8th graders need something in their hands to help them organize themselves.

So, I'm digging around in the book room one day and I see what looks like a set of Twelve Ordinary Men behind some new office furniture. I climb over there to retrieve one of the copies and I read it. Now this is exciting! A classroom set of something that the kids can hold in their hands. I do some research and there is a study guide I can get. The book is on CD, so I can use that intermittently. This can take third quarter planned appropriately - good meaty material!

Except, when the furniture is put in the office, there are only three books, not the classroom set I was expecting. So I send out emails and find that there is indeed a classroom set. At least two teachers have seen it. One has used it in the past. BUT where is it. I send out another email. I get some of the silliest replies about me looking for men, but nothing tangible about the books.

Heavy sigh.

One day in the midst of all this, I get an email from one of my media center suppliers. For purchases of $35 or more - there is no shipping. I check and yes indeed, they do have Twelve Ordinary Men. And what's this? They have hardbacks new for $9.95 a book. A classroom set will cost $250. If I throw in the $100 that the PTF has allotted me, then the school only has to fork over, ahhh spend $150. WHAT a bargain! Email sent to principal in a flash.

No response.

Wait.

Ah, I know, she's just sent the order through the appropriate channels. Let me check that route.

So, principal passes me in the hall. Appropriate channel asked. Ain't gonna happen. Money won't be spent. Now I'm upset. Even if the school spent the whole $250, that's $3.50 per kid on some good material. As far as I can tell, nothing's been spent in quite a while.

So, I'm kicking this around with a friend. And she's got a Piper DVD. I love Piper too. This one is called Blazing Center and is based off of Desiring God. Eight sermons. It's got a study guide which I've now got in my grubby little hands. I could get a could quarter's worth of lessons off of it too. It's good stuff. But it's not exactly directly related to the Life of Christ.

I know - I'm wordy.

My choices:

1. Stick with the LifeWay teacher material and keep working up material for the kids.
2. Use what I have of the Twelve Ordinary Men. Which is a DVD with some re-enactments, an unabridged CD, but NO books for the kids. They are only 8th graders.
3. Use the Blazing Center materials which isn't related to the curriculum.

It's taken me all day to write this and I still don't know what to do. I've no clear guidance.

Writing for LifeWay

An inquiring mind at the BB *coughEdEdwardscough* wanted to know more about my writing years at LifeWay, so here is the story . . .

We were living in Marietta and I was a children's division director at a mega church and very active at the associational level. I had taken a group of preschool and children's teachers to Ridgecrest for training and one of the conferences was on writing. It was led by an adult editor. He did every thing possible to discourage anyone from writing as I recall. He made it sound grueling and boring and inconvenient and unrewarding. It is all those things - except for the unrewarding.

At the end of the meeting, he handed out cards for us to fill out for our age division if we were possibly interested. I think I was one of a handful. He was a very good discourager

Not too long after that I got a phone call from the editor of Bible Discoverers, Louise Hobson and was assigned to my first writer's conference. Lots of changes happened during my time writing, and I about 8-9 years ago, I made the switch completely to the Media Center, so now I'm completely out of the loop.

When I first started, the KJV was still being used, not too long after that, we got an NIV-KJV parallel and used both in all the lessons. I know they use the HCSV now but that was after my time.

At that time, there were two writers for each unit. The unit writer who worked with children in Bible study and a Bible background writer who was either an adult Sunday School teacher or a Pastor. I had the great fortune of always being able to write my own Bible background. I don't know how that worked out, but it did. Later, all writers got to write their own Bible background.
In the children's area, we would have a writer's conference. Bible Learners, Discovers, Searchers all conferenced together at the same time. Family Bible Series - Children usually conferenced at another time. We were given our assigned scripture and we had to come in with a pre-assignment which changed depending on the layout of the curriculum - but would include a variety of ideas that we charted to make sure that there wasn't too much overlap. Some overlap was inevitable, but we really did try to minimize it.

At the conferences, we would work in large groups, we would work one-on-one with the editor, and we would work in our quarter groups. All the time we were trying to eliminate duplication. Those of you who use the curriculum wonder what happened I know - it's hard. There are only so many things that can be done in a single Sunday, so many ways to present a lesson, so many ways to get the kids actively involved . . .

The first year I wrote, I'd write a lesson and send it in. Louise would make corrections and call me. We'd argue ( ), I'd fix what she'd told me to fix, and resubmit it. Because I worked so closely with her on that first unit, I was asked to immediately come back. And soon I was writing two units a year for Discovers. And then I started writing for two publications - Discoverers and Searchers and doing some work for Learners in other capacities, and then I started writing for Family Bible series and picking up pieces for the children's magazines.

Writing curriculum is not like other kinds of writing. You write it, you submit it, they do what they want with it, and it is published. You are very removed from the process after you submit your work. You also work a year or two in advance. I remember one year, for my Bible background I'd written an intro about Anwar Sadat and I didn't know it had been cut until it the material was published. When I called the editor to find out why, I was told that she had good reasons at the time. This is one of the drawbacks of this kind of writing. At the time, she was a new editor and I was an experienced writer. I remember how unhappy I was because it was a strong intro for the background.

One of the things I really enjoyed were rewrites. One year, the powers that be decided to redo the curriculum in the middle of the year. Six of us were brought in to rewrite two year's worth of curriculm in a week on computers in conference rooms to the new format. And a couple of times, I got to rewrite curriculum that was turned in but not usuable.

I always wrote on a computer, but at first, I still mailed in a manuscript, then I mailed in a manuscript and a disc, then a disc, then I emailed it.

Again, I haven't done this in 10 years, so I don't know what's going on now.

OH and when I started, it wasn't LifeWay, but the Baptist Sunday School Board. Now I feel very dated.