The Trunk of Integration

                                           The Trunk by The Ever Curious Education Major

         We are Christian Educators whether we are teaching in a private, Christian school or a public school.  We are Christians during school hours, but also outside school hours.  If we teach at a Christian school the danger might be to live out our faith only during school hours, and once we step outside the building to forget that the rest of the day is God’s too.  In a secular setting the opposite has the potential to happen.  We might lock our Christian faith inside ourselves during school hours, and then become Christian again once we stepped off school property.  Neither of those options are the ways we should approach the integration of Christianity and education, because both of them wafflelize Christianity.  We are Christians no matter the context.  We need to be Christians inside the classroom and outside it as well.  The trunk specifically represents our presence in the community outside classroom hours.  This blog post is going to focus mainly on our contribution as Christian educators to our community.  According to Dr. Harrigan, a professor of Education at an eastern coast college, teachers generally experience a level of respect from those in their community.  People view the teaching of their children as a serious business, and have respect for those who are willingly to spend a day in a classroom full of ornery kids and try to teach them something (Foundations of Education).  As Christians whatever we do we cannot become arrogant about this respect, because that corrupts the name we are seeking to represent.  We have to realize that we must act in a way that is worth this respect.  The name we carry as educators allows us to stand as positive leaders in our community, and we can be a presence for mercy and restoration.   There are so many problems communities are wrestling with across the nation.  Everywhere one turns there seem to be broken families which often sadly produce wounded children, poverty, and patterns of injustice and brokenness that seem to forge chains around people that become cyclic and spread out to affect those around them.  These cycles become strong, fierce--unbroken.  That is where we come into the picture.  We are Christians; we are educators.  We take the good name we have in the community, and the Spirit of the Living God pulsing through our actions, and we come to the community with hands ready to work.  We come as restorers, cycle breakers, walking through a corrupt world, and we come with much hope.  We are not going to break every cycle, we are not going to save every child from the effects of poverty, neglect, and social griefs, but we are going to carry His Spirit in our hearts and do what we are able.  This is all fine as a theoretical discussion, we can moan about the injustices and griefs of our society and thunder against the Christians who are ignoring them, but are we ourselves doing anything?  Often I find that we as Christians will be presented with an issue, but the details for carrying it out our vague at best.  We seem to lose our momentum between the need and figuring out how to fill that need.  That brings us to the other point, God is the only one who fills anything.  He is the One who restores and rebuilds in His own time and we are just along for the ride, but are we willing to jump in and let Him drive?  Here are some resources of people already doing just that.  Here are some resources for us to begin.
 

         Mentoring Groups are a wonderful way for teachers to use our presence in the community to become channels of restoration in our neighborhoods and schools.  We all know countless kids whose families are broken up to one extent or another and are desperate for role models and someone to be a stable presence in their lives.  Mentoring groups like The Mentoring Project started by Donald Miller, author of Blue Like Jazz and A Million Miles in a Thousand Years do just that. For more information check out http://www.thementoringproject.org/

 

         We often complain about the lack of Church involvement in issues like these, but the Church is beginning to wake up to them, and is quietly beginning to do something about their neighbors in their own communities.  The Adopt a Church Initiative is a way some churches are coming alongside the schools in their communities and taking responsibility for them.  Check out http://www.churchadoptaschool.org/ for ways churches can get involved.

 

         The whole process starts with finding the needs of the community.  That is why I am a huge fan of living in the community you work in as a teacher.  I understand that sometimes that is not financially possible, but trust God and see what He has to say.  Living in the community means that it becomes your community, and its problems are no longer their problems--you see them in your streets and they become your problems.  How can you know what the needs are if you are not around enough to see those needs?  What are those needs?  Find them and find a solution.  Family Empowerment Centers are a response to the needs of a specific community.  The Family Empowerment Center of Chicago is a Christian based organization that offers afterschool programs, ESL classes, and other activities for their community.  This is a great way for teachers to get involved with their communities.  For more information check out http://www.familyempower.org/

 

         Another organization is DC127.  DC127 is uniting churches to get involved with the foster care situation in Washington D.C, advocating for Christians to open their homes to children, consider adoption, or even filling out the paperwork to become a babysitter and support a family who is fostering children.  Foster kids attend the schools we teach in, and if the least we can do is give them a safe and stable home, we will have done much.  Check out http://dc127.org/

 

          The Family Initiative of D.C. is also a nonprofit addressing the problem of kids aging out in the foster care system with no adults behind them to support them.  Christians could come alongside these kids. Check out http://www.dcfyi.org/ for more information.

 

         This may seem overwhelming.  Now you know that there are so many ways for Christian educators to get involved in their communities.  As I am writing this my heart is breaking.  I know that this is an assignment for school.  I know that I have not graduated yet, that I may not know what I am talking about, that these issues may seem too big, that we are too small, and that maybe none of this could ever work.  But my question is this, “Have you tried?”  Here are the verses that refuse to be buried, that burn inside those of us longing to do and to be more in this live.

“Learn to do right; seek justice.

                                                           Defend the oppressed.[a]

Take up the cause of the fatherless;

                                                         plead the case of the widow.” (Isaiah 1:17 Holy Bible, 

 

                                   New International Version)

                                 

                                 “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.

                                                           And what does the Lord require of you?

To act justly and to love mercy

   and to walk humbly[a] with your God.” (Micah 6:8 Holy Bible, New International Version)

“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” (James 1:27 Holy Bible, New International Version)

            Burn these verse on your heart.  Cry out to God; ask Him what He would have you to do.  There is such a great need, and we can hear the echoes of it.  Seek the cause of the forgotten.  Seek those whom God would have you remember.

                                                         

                                                            

                                                             Works Cited

Becker, Amy Julia. "Christianity Today." School Choice of a Different Kind Apr. 2012:22-26                 Web.

Harrigan, Dr. Dion. Foundations of Education. Nyack College, Nyack. 2013. Lecture. 
             

Isaiah, Micah, James Holy Bible, New International Version. N.p.: Biblica, 2011. Bible Gateway                  Bible Gateway. Web. 03 Mar. 2014.

The Roots of Integration

    

 

                                    Part One the Roots: by The Ever Joyful Education Major

Welcome to our blog! We are a couple of enthusiastic education majors at Nyack College. We are seeking to understand the relationship between faith and learning. When faith and learning are combined, this is called integration. Integration is a powerful force. The goal of integration is to achieve intrinsic intuition of correlations and connections between faith and academic pursuits.

            We have chosen a tree to illustrate the integration of faith and learning. Each week we will explore a different part of the tree and how it applies to integration. Additionally, we will explore the lives of historical and contemporary integrative teachers. Integration is a way of life and so we will share stories of Christian educators and how they interact with students both in and out of the classroom. We are excited to be beginning this project and we thank you for reading along. We welcome any comments, ideas or personal testimonies. Thanks!

The Roots of Integration

            According to the University of Florida, tree roots take up about three times the area of the branches. In other words, if the branches of a tree spread out to create a diameter of eight feet, there is action beneath the soil in a twenty four root diameter! What happens beneath the surface is important. Roots store and extract nutrients. They offer support so that the tree doesn’t just fall over. Healthy roots make a healthy tree. Conversely, if there is trouble in the roots, that can spell death to the whole tree. Roots are an integral source of life. If the tree is cut down but the root ball is unharmed, many times tree can regenerate itself. Thus we have the phrase “get to the root of the problem.” The only way to truly get rid of a tree is to get rid of its roots. This is true of many plants, from dandelions to fungi and mushrooms. What we can see above ground is only an indication of what is happening beneath the surface.

            The roots represent our identity in Christ, where we have come from, and our heritage. Roots possess the essence of who we are. While the essence of who we are is beneath the surface, this should not be confused with privatizing or hiding who we truly are. Roots do not hide, they infuse. We draw upon the living water of Christ, gathering nutrients from the good soil we have cultivated in our hearts. As we constantly take in these nutrients, we slowly grow up in Christ and become mature, until we produce fruit. This fruit itself will propagate into more trees.

References: Where Are Tree Roots?1." EDIS New Publications RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Feb.

                                    Part One the Roots: by The Ever Curious Education Major

            Who we are as Christians affects all of our life, and as teachers it determines who we are in and out of the classroom.  Who we are grows out of how Christ has filled us.  As Christ fills us with Himself we can pour what we have been filled with onto our students.  For instance if Christ gives us peace we can draw upon that peace in the classroom, creating a safe and nonthreatening atmosphere for our students.  Christ offers us that peace, but in order to be an educator of peace we must have a source of peace.  That peace comes from those roots, that constant, seeking, ever changing growth in Christ.  If we forget those roots we will become useless as Christian educators.  We might still be amazing educators, but as Christian educators we will become shriveled scraps of who we had been, losing rest for our hearts and perhaps losing our way.  We will not be able to pour into our students lives like we would have if we had been drawing our strength from Christ.  He exists as the Root of all our life.  Jesus calls us into this, “Remain in me, as I also remain in you.” (John 15:4 New International Version Study Bible)

            Holding onto our roots in Christ allows us to be better educators inside the classroom, but also to impact the community surrounding our school.  Those roots allow us to be in tune with the Holy Spirit, to be able to sense the needs surrounding the school and the community and give us the discernment to be able to respond to those needs.  Whether it is patience at the chalkboard, or patience in the grocery line, our roots in Christ develop who we are as people and Christian educators.  We must daily hold on to those roots, never, never letting them slip from our hands.

New International Version Study Bible. 2011 ed. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011. Print.



Here are some lovely pictures of roots.