We are now in the 7th week of term 3.(our semesters are broken into two terms of 9 or 10 weeks), I am enjoying my classes more than average this term. It is a busy term, teachng 13 credits instead of the 9 credits of last year, (though I was still on home leave this time last year). I have my usual three classes of English which I generally enjoy. I am also teaching Church History, Pt. 1 again this year. It is a good review for me to teach it again. What I am enjoying the most is a class is world religions called Kan Kan Bilip (other beliefs). I am learning a lot and having a chance to share my exeriences with others.
Growing up in America, and especially since living in the New York City area, I have had a chance to meet, become friends with, and work with people from a variety of faiths. While my students are exposed to a variety of sects and cults (there is a snake cult in this area), they do not meet people from the other big faiths. I was lecturing about how to witness to Muslims when one student commented that he had never even seen a Muslim, much less talked to one.
Since our students do see newspapers, the internet, TV and can't listen to any radio besides a religious station, their knwoledge of world news is low. So, one of my goals is also to help them understand the role of religion in world politics. However, as a former graduate student in Political Science I guess I get carried away. I was talking on about the fighitng between Sunnis and Sh'ias in Iraq and Iran when I noticed the glazed look of the class. I realized I needed to get out a world map to show them where the countries were and also explain again how they are the two main branches of Islam.
It was interesting to have overlap in classes In the World Religions class I was talking about the development of modern Judaism (I figure they know a lot of the Bible stuff). I ended up spending much of a period talking about the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD and the growth of Rabbinical Judaim. That same week I talked about the destruction of the Temple in Church History class and how it helped change the focus of the early Christian Church.. I realized I could have found a reading for the English classes to read and write about and made it Destruction of the Temple Week! :-)
One thing that has been frustrating is the number of classes I have had to miss. I missed the first week with my father's funeral. I have also missed around 5 days from being sick with Bronchitis (and felt lousy some of the rest of the time). I was also in Lae attending a meeting for part of a week. Then extra holidays come into the calendar that I had not planned for, such as Repentance Day today. I hope that I can pick up a few extra lecture periods when other faculty have to be gone. I also need to learn to be more realistic in my planning. When I started here I wondered why the semster was 19 weeks instead of the 15 weeks in the US. Now I realize we may have the same number of class periods.
Okay, time to stop writing and get back to correcting English papers.
Growing up in America, and especially since living in the New York City area, I have had a chance to meet, become friends with, and work with people from a variety of faiths. While my students are exposed to a variety of sects and cults (there is a snake cult in this area), they do not meet people from the other big faiths. I was lecturing about how to witness to Muslims when one student commented that he had never even seen a Muslim, much less talked to one.
Since our students do see newspapers, the internet, TV and can't listen to any radio besides a religious station, their knwoledge of world news is low. So, one of my goals is also to help them understand the role of religion in world politics. However, as a former graduate student in Political Science I guess I get carried away. I was talking on about the fighitng between Sunnis and Sh'ias in Iraq and Iran when I noticed the glazed look of the class. I realized I needed to get out a world map to show them where the countries were and also explain again how they are the two main branches of Islam.
It was interesting to have overlap in classes In the World Religions class I was talking about the development of modern Judaism (I figure they know a lot of the Bible stuff). I ended up spending much of a period talking about the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD and the growth of Rabbinical Judaim. That same week I talked about the destruction of the Temple in Church History class and how it helped change the focus of the early Christian Church.. I realized I could have found a reading for the English classes to read and write about and made it Destruction of the Temple Week! :-)
One thing that has been frustrating is the number of classes I have had to miss. I missed the first week with my father's funeral. I have also missed around 5 days from being sick with Bronchitis (and felt lousy some of the rest of the time). I was also in Lae attending a meeting for part of a week. Then extra holidays come into the calendar that I had not planned for, such as Repentance Day today. I hope that I can pick up a few extra lecture periods when other faculty have to be gone. I also need to learn to be more realistic in my planning. When I started here I wondered why the semster was 19 weeks instead of the 15 weeks in the US. Now I realize we may have the same number of class periods.
Okay, time to stop writing and get back to correcting English papers.
