Introduction to the Teacher

By Stafford North

INTRODUCTION TO THE TEACHER

PRACTICAL LESSONS FROM 1 CORINTHIANS

13 Lessons for eBibleStudy.org

By Stafford North Professor of Bible Oklahoma Christian University 2005

1 Corinthians is one of the most studied books of the Bible because it is a book Paul wrote to Christians who had many of the same needs that Christians today have. These eBibleStudy lessons are built around thirteen practical lessons Paul gives these Corinthians which we also need today. While there are many other things in 1 Corinthians to study, this series focuses on applications to our daily life. As you teach, be sure you keep your eye on “application,” very direct application, to everyday living.

Each lesson begins with a set of objectives which you should help students to reach. You should, then, start your preparation for each lesson by looking at these objectives and planning your lesson to help the students to be able to do these things. For each of the lessons, there is a Review Quiz provided for the following class meeting. There is also with each lesson a worksheet for the student to complete during the lesson. You should encourage each student to listen carefully and participate in the discussion of each class period. As the student does this, he/she can complete the worksheet for that lesson. Then you should encourage the students to review the worksheet in order to be prepared for the review quiz to be given at the first of the next class meeting. Following this procedure will increase the amount of student learning and will move the students toward reaching the objectives.

Each lesson is based on a pattern of reading a few verses and then asking questions over the verses. If you will list the readings on slips of paper and pass them out to students in the class who can read them when called on, then the reader will be ready when called on and you will encourage more class participation than if you read all the passages yourself.

The set-up for each lesson assumes that you want to use the question/answer approach to your class meeting. Each question is preceded by a Q sign and the answer follows an A sign. If your situation calls for more lecture, you can cover the same material by looking at the answers as the basic information to present. Getting the students involved in answering questions, however, will increase their participation, their thought processes, and thus their learning.

Using the Review Quiz as a way to start each lesson has several benefits. If students know they will be answering questions over the lesson, they will listen better, take notes better, and thus learn more during the lesson itself. Then if they study their worksheet before the next class meeting, learning again is enhanced. Then, when they take the quiz and do well, they will receive an important reinforcement for their efforts. Asking questions for students to answer also helps them learn how to dig more deeply into the Bible text for themselves.

Do not spend much time on the Review Quiz, however. You may wish to make it available as students enter the room so they can answer the questions before class actually begins. Then you will only have to take a few moments to give the answers- thus allowing them to check their own paper and giving those who take the quiz and those who do not a review of the previous lesson.

I hope you will use a chalkboard or marker board with the lessons. You can write key words on the board as you go and, in some cases, make lists of student responses to questions. Seeing the words will help students remember them.

The numbers on the worksheet correspond with the numbers in your teacher guide so you can help students find the answer if they do not get it from the questions and answers given in class.

While there is some opportunity for application during the lesson itself, each lesson plan closes with an application section. Be sure to leave adequate time for this even if you have to cut something from the lesson portion. The lessons are geared for a 45 minute period. If you have less than this, or if students spend longer discussing some section, you will have to adjust the lesson so there is plenty of time for the application. It is more important, then, to give time for application than to “cover” everything in the lesson.

Since Paul has much to say to the Corinthians about love, each lesson connects its particular theme with love. Be sure the students get this connection so they will see that love is the theme of the practical elements of the book.

Stafford North
Oklahoma Christian University
August 10, 2005

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