This was a big risk for me and I have to admit that I have a very hard time of letting go of things like this because I know how it should be done. However, I thought I’d give it a whirl and it turned out OK.

Good thing is, I have a small group and they like doing the guided reflections and they have been behaving very well during these experiences. So what I did was, I chose a student who is a good reader and I asked her before class if she would be willing to read the script that I had ready. I showed her the technique of counting slowly to 2 in her head after every sentence (to slow the pace down) and counting slowly to 5 in her head after every time the script said “pause” to allow for reflection.

I still did my part of getting everyone into their “sacred space” and quieting them down before turning it over to my volunteer. My aide and I were able to “patrol” the room as the reflection went on (I also had quiet music in the background and the lights dimmed).

In all, my volunteer did pretty well. She was a bit nervous and so her pace was a bit too quick but not terribly so. I slowed her down once but I basically let go and allowed her to do it on her own.

The script she used was from a book called Guided Reflections for Children – Volume 1: Praying with Scripture.  I would say that her reading part took about 8-10 minutes, including all of the built-in pauses. The rest of the group was as quiet as usual and perhaps more so since it was one of their peers leading them and since 2 adults were patrolling the room!

Afterwards, I thanked the volunteer and asked if anyone else would like to do this in the future and one young lady raised her hand, so I’m going to give it another try.

Has anyone else tried something like this?

I’m going to prod one of the young men to volunteer as well. I’ve been noticing how the guys often sit back and let the young ladies take the lead when it comes to speaking and leadership roles in RE. Years ago, young girls felt pressure to not assert themselves in learning situations…even feeling the need to “act dumb” in certain situations when they were around guys. Thankfully, that has changed. Unfortunately, now sometimes, it is the guys who feel they need to “act dumb” when around the girls (no big surprise when you see how men, especially fathers, are portrayed on TV and in the movies these days).

Anyone else noticing this?

Of the 3 groups, one did exceptionally well, due in no small part to the fact that one of the young ladies volunteered to type for her group mates and she was a whiz at keyboarding! Here is the work of that one successful group so you can see what they came up with (this is untouched by me so it still includes mispellings, etc.).

Group 3 Slides: The Words and Actions of Jesus

This is closest to what I envisioned however, even for this group, there was no time for them to add any clip art. The other 2 groups didn’t come close to completing their slides. I’m not upset about that because they did complete a hard copy first before they began typing, so I know that they did interact with the content of the session which is the most important thing.

I am finishing the Powerpoint and will use it next week to have them present about Jesus to the group, each one commenting on (or at least reading aloud)  the slides he or she was responsible for. I will have a Who Is Jesus? booklet put together for next week for everyone to take notes in throughout the presentation so that when they go home, they can show their parents how much they learned about Jesus. I’ll make that booklet available to you when I have it ready!

With that in mind, for the first time in my life as a catechist, this evening I will be having my students create Powerpoint presentations rather than posters!

For the last few years, during the Jesus unit, I have had my classes work at Jesus Learning Stations, fromwhich they prepared posters to teach about Jesus to the rest of the class. This year, I’ve decided to do something very different.

It turns out that I have access to 3 laptop computers: my own, a work laptop, and my daughter’s laptop. With 10 students, I can easily form groups of 3 or 4 and have each group work with a laptop to create Powerpoint presentations that teach about Jesus. I will have 3 groups (I rearranged the material from the previous 5 learning stations into 3 groups):

• The World of Jesus and the People of Jesus
• The Words and Actions of Jesus
• The Death and Resurrection of Jesus

As you’ll see from clicking on each of the above, I am providing a resource packet to each group with all of the information they need to create their presentation on their assigned topic. I will be telling them to imagine that they are going to be explaining who Jesus is to someone who’s never heard of him before.

Before they do any work on the computers, however, they will have to show me a hard copy of their plan. I have created the “templates” for each of their PowerPoints and will provide hard copies of the slides they need to complete…each slide includes a header that asks a question they need to answer using the information from their resource packets. Each group will divvy up the slides they are to complete and then will get to work. Here are the slides:

• The World of Jesus and the People of Jesus SLIDES
• The Words of Jesus and Actions of Jesus SLIDES
• The Death and Resurrection of Jesus SLIDES

This week, they are to complete their slides which I will take home and combine into one presentation. Next week, we will show the PowerPoint presentation and each of them will “narrate” their slide.

The one “fly in the ointment” is that the clip art gallery on each computer does not have much in the way of Christian clip art so I’m going to need to spend some time this afternoon downloading some clip art that will be readily available to them (the classroom does not have wi-fi access) so that they can “dress up” their slides.

I’m excited and nervous about this new venture. I’m so accustomed to working with paper, scissors, and glue, but I’ve been curious about how to use technology in the classroom so I think this is a perfect opportunity. Pray that we meet with success.

Any pointers and suggestions are most welcome!

At the end of the evening, one of my students apologized that her handout had lots of doodling on it. I told her that doodling was acceptable. I was pleased to later discover the positive doodlings that she doodled!

Click here:  Positive Doodling

P.S. Here’s the answer key for the viewing guide

This doesn’t happen often for me. For one, the kids usually don’t arrive early or stay after class. Second, I don’t usually seek out conversations…it’s just not my style. Third, I’m very careful about not presenting myself as their “buddy” – I’m not seeking their friendship, just their apprenticeship.

So, needless to say, I was surprised when one of my students arrived early last night as we (all 5 catechists met together last night in one room to show a segment of Jesus of Nazareth) were getting things set up. I was dutifully connecting my laptop to the LCD projector when I heard a “Hi, Mr. Paprocki!” It turns out this this young person has decided to serve as a catechist’s aide for the first session of RE that takes place before our session. Needless to say, she was already in the building and came over to the room in which we were gathering.

She has chosen to serve as an aide for her Confirmation service and she is working with the kids who have special needs. As I continued to attach my wires, she pulled up a chair and I asked her to tell me about her experience. She was just so thrilled to tell me all about the kids she was working with and what she’s learning from them! Her catechist even invited her to come in with some ideas to reach the kids so I helped her brainstorm some ideas for presenting the Our Father to them next week.

She also was telling me about the things she likes about our class that she wants to do with “her kids” such as passing the candle around to invite students to pray a petition.

We continued with a pleasant, relaxed conversation as I continued to set up my AV equipment and, what I enjoyed most about it, was the way she kept talking about her kids that she was now serving. Might she be a budding catechist?!

I have to admit to being very guarded in such situations, especially when the student is a young lady. We all need to be fully aware of our role in providing a safe environment for kids, mindful of engaging them in such a manner that clearly communicates boundaries.

What a privilege to be able to interact with our young people in this manner! It’s humbling (and refreshing!) to know that some of them find us worthy of speaking to!

• “The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!”
• “There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home.”
• “I think I can. I think I can. I think I can.”

Repetition, of course. We human beings tend to repeat ourselves whenever we feel strongly about something, are excited about something, or want to convince ourselves about something. And just in case you’re thinking that this is old-fashioned, take a look at the opening lyrics of a top ten song by the Black-Eyed Peas, I’ve Got a Feeling. (don’t show the music video or give lyrics of the entire song to you’re class…innappropriate).

Repetition has NOT gone out of style!

I plan to use this as an introduction to praying a decade of the Rosary with all of the 8th graders tonight before we view a segment of the video Jesus of Nazareth. Since October is the month of the Holy Rosary, we thought it would be appropriate to pray a decade of the Rosary tonight…we’ll pray the 5th Sorrowful Mystery, Jesus dies on the Cross, since that is the segment of the video we will be viewing – the crucifixion of Jesus.

One of the things that young people often complain about is that the Rosary is just repeating the Hail Mary over and over again. Precisely. We repeat ourselves whenever we feel strongly about something, are excited about something, or want to convince ourselves about something.

But I think I already said that!

It’s a fun way to learn about the saints as described by Bert Ghezzi in his book, Voices of the Saints: A 365-Day Journey with Our Spiritual Companions.

I turned out to be Saint Anthony of Padua, who, the site tells me, “generated spiritual renewal,” had great “speaking abilities,” and “was physically unimpressive.” How’d they know?