2004 Meeting
Session Descriptions
Contextual Pedagogies: Teaching Context as Religious Text
November 5-7, 2004
Brown Palace-Comfort Inn Complex
Denver, Colorado
PLENARIES
Program Chairperson
Bob O’Gorman and committee members are planning, for the opening
plenary, a multi-sensory immersion into the 2004 APRRE-REA Meeting
Contextual Pedagogies: Teaching Context as Religious Text –
the context of the cosmos, the school, the culture and the liturgy.
Participants will move into the opening session through the four image
stations, followed by a process of welcome and reflective interaction
on the images. The opening plenary will conclude with an introduction
to the conference theme and the weekend.
Plenary II,
on Saturday, will be lead by Malcolm Warford, Research Professor and
Director of the Lexington Seminar sponsored by the Lilly Endowment,
Inc., Lexington Theological Seminary. Dr. Warford is the editor of
Practical Wisdom: Teaching and Learning For the Church's Ministries,
forthcoming Fall 2004. The plenary presentation will focus on stories
illustrating the kinds of contextual concerns that face seminaries
and many other institutions in our society.
The final
plenary, on Sunday, will be lead by Terence Copley, Professor of Religious
Education, University of Exeter, the United Kingdom. Dr. Copley has
written 35 books and numerous articles for school children teachers,
professionals and researchers in Religious Education. His latest book,
Indoctrination, Education and God: the Struggle for the Mind
is due to appear in early 2005. For eight years Professor Copley has
directed the Biblos Project, a research project into
teaching biblical narrative in the classroom, including the multi-faith
classroom. According to Dr. Copley, in the UK schools all students
from ages 5 to 16 study religious education on a world-religions base
(usually Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism).
Included in their programs are selections of biblical narrative. A
minority of young people are introduced to biblical narrative in faith
communities (churches, synagogues etc). While inappropriate to make
recommendations for North America from the UK context, Dr. Copley
says we can identify key questions of help to religious educators
in North American faith communities, in academia, and in public contexts
in addressing their own situation at the ‘fork in the road.’
TASK
FORCES AND DENOMINATIONAL MEETINGS
Gender:
Susan Willhauck will convene the task force, which will have a panel
discussion on "Whatever happened to inclusive language?"
A variety of perspectives will be represented to address questions
like "Is it important? Is it still being taught in the seminary?
Is it only a white feminist concern?” The discussion will concern
the role of inclusive language in the discipline of religious education.
Ethnography:
Participants in this task force will
• Share ideas for using ethnographic assignments in our classes.
Participants should bring a syllabus that includes an ethnographic
assignment to share with the group and any policy or procedure statements
that their school uses for such assignments.
• Share teaching evaluation tools or techniques that draw on
ethnography. How does an ethnographic disposition help us to evaluate
and plan as teachers?
Margaret Ann Crain will convene the task force.
Liturgy
and Catechesis Task Force: In light of the success of the
format of our task force session with David Hogue last year, Ron Anderson
has asked Debra Dean Murphy to lead a conversation about her new book:
Teaching That Transforms: Worship As the Heart of Christian Education,
Brazos Press, 2004, ISBN: 1587430673
Children: The children task force APRRE/REA will
meet to review recently published books in our interest area and discuss
how these new studies and resources are shaping our research and teaching.
Continuing and new members are invited to come prepared to comment
critically on a recently published book. Peer reviews of new books
written by task force members are especially desirable. Please send
titles of books you would like to have reviewed or plan to review
for the discussion to the children task force convener, Karen-Marie
Yust (kmyust@cts.edu), for forwarding
to the rest of the group.
History
of Religious Education: Ronnie Prevost
Adult Education: Jane Regan
Asian/Asian North American: Mai Anh Tran and Tito
Cruz
Peace and Justice: Bud Horell
The Black Experience: Fred Smith and Lynne Westfield
Greening of Religious Education: Kathleen O'Gorman
Women’s
Luncheon: Diane Hymans, Coordinator
Men’s Luncheon: Gabriel Moran, Coordinator
DENOMINATIONAL MEETINGS
Pan-Methodist:
Patty Meyers and Susan Willhauck
Roman Catholic: Peter Gilmour
UCC-Disciples: Sharon Warner, convener. The group
is spending the session networking.
Baptist: Ronnie Prevost
Presbyterian: Lib Caldwell
Lutheran: Norma Everist , convener. A time to share
areas of ministry in Religious Education, to get to know and up-date
one another, and to talk about areas of common concern and interest
to each other.
RESEARCH
INTEREST GROUPS, COLLOQUIA AND WORKSHOPS
Friday,
November 5, 4:30-5:45 p.m.
Workshop
D. Bruce Robers and Robert E. Reber,
“Research on Contextual Pedagogies for Leadership Development
in Peer Learning Groups: The Indiana Clergy Peer Group Study Program”
Colloquia
Russell Haitch, “Distance Learning in Theological
Perspective” and
Gabriel Moran, “Religious Education and National
Interest”
Colloquium
Virginia Lee, “Multiplicity of Difference:
Developing a Resource for Understanding Diversity and
Kathy Winings, “Taking Religious Education Out of the Classroom:
Service Learning as an Effective Contextual Pedagogy”
Colloquia
Claire Annelise Smith, “Creating God’s
Neighborhood as Learning Environment” and
Chin Cheak Yu, “Christian Religious Education
for Awakening and Living in the Spirit in a Chinese Church Context”
Research Interest
Group
John L. Elias, “Thomas Edward Shields, Pioneer
Catholic Religious Educator” and
Lucinda A. Nolan, “John Lancaster Spalding
(1840-1916): An Early American Catholic Philosopher of Religious Education.”
Research Interest
Group
Caustino M. (Tito) Cruz, Carol Jacobson, Boyung Lee, Joyce
Ann Mercer, Mai-Anh Tran, and Anton C. Vrame, “Teaching
Context(s): Using Congregational Studies and Participatory Action
Research as Pedagogical Strategies”
Research Interest
Group
Thomas E. Leuze, “Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s
Experiment in Theological Education: Would Finkenwalde Be Accredited
by ATS” and
Eileen M. Dailey, “Catholic High School Religious
Education and the Teaching Authority of the Catholic Church: Is the
Textbook Review Process Working?”
Research Interest
Group
Dent C. Davis, "Accelerated Learning and Adult
Religious Education: Potential and Pitfalls” and
Catherine P. Zeph, “Location, Location, Location:
Ministry Education on the Road”
Saturday
November 5, 10:15-11:45 a.m.
Workshop
Thom Bower, “Contextual Pedagogies: Teaching
Context as Religious Text”
Workshop
Naoki Okamura, “Elderly Japanese American Christian
Women and Their Spiritual Silence”
Workshop
Henry C. Simmons, “Age as Context: On-line
Annotated Bibliography on Religion, Spriituality, and Aging”
Colloquia
Charles Foster, “Teaching Contextual Practices
in Theological Education”
Research Interest
Group
Fred P. Edie, “A Different Context for Difference:
Protestant Christian High School Students Practice the Ordo”
and
Bert Roebben, “Redefining Theological Language
and Education in the Context of Pastoral Ministry with Young Adults”
Research Interest
Group
Linda L. Baratte, “Growing Within Our Hearts:
Exploration in the Faith Development and Religious Education of Adopted
Children and Their Parents” and
Partner canceled
Research Interest
Group
Sue Singer, “Educating for Conviction and Commitment:
Insights from Postmodernity” and
Siebren Miedema, “Religious Education Today:
Between James and Durkheim and in Dialogue with Charles Taylor”
Saturday
November 5, 1:45-3:15 a.m.
Workshop
Burton Everist, “Community College: Challenging
Context for Teaching Religion”
Workshop
Dean Maternach, “Journaling: Teaching the Context
of Our Lives”
Workshop
Clarence H. Snelling and Shirley Heckman Snelling,
“Remythologizing Religious Experience for the 21st Century”
Colloquia
Kathy Dawson and Cindy Kissel-Ito, “Preschool
Community and Faith Practices” and
Beverly Jones, “The Great Assignment”
Research Interest
Group
Alison LeCornu, “People’s Ways of Believing:
Learning Processes and Faith Outcomes”
Research Interest
Group
Jerome Berryman, “Religious Education and Evil”
and
Theresa O’Keefe, “Coming to Know the
Other—Coming to Know Oneself: A Study of Jewish-Catholic Dialogue
at the Congregational Level”
Research Interest
Group
Peter Gilmour, “Text and Context of ‘The
Passion of Christ’” and
Carol Lakey Hess, “Fiction and the Public Search
for Truth”
Research Interest
Group
Rebecca L. Davis, “Perpetuating Justice: Transformative
and Emancipatory Pedagogies” and
Nam Soon Song, “Self-Cultivation and Christian
Education: Exploring Self-Cultivation in the Life and Teaching of
Jesus
Research Interest
Group
Leona M. English, Mario O. D’Souza, and Leon Chartrand,
“Religious Education Journals on Two Sides of the Atlantic—Are
We Alike or Different?” and
Boyung Lee, “Decolonizing Bible Studies: A
Postcolonial Challenge to Contextual Pedagogy”
Sunday
November 6, 8:00- 9:15 p.m.
Workshop
Christine Gapes, “Braiding Learning: Weaving
Mats and Eating Kim-Chee Pie”
Workshop
Karen J. Markin, “My Story, Your Story—Journeys
of Reverence”
Colloquia
Jane Struvoka, “Confirmation through the Contextual
Lens: Rethinking the Practice of Confirmation in the Slovak Lutheran
Church” and
Anne Carter Walker, “Contexts for the Support
of Agency and Vocation”
Colloquia
Barbara Fleischer, “St. Gabriel’s Parish:
A Case Study in Communal Praxis” and
Kevin Lawson, “the Impact of Long-term Small
Group Participation: 40 Years in a Women’s Bible Study and Prayer
Group.”
Research Interest
Group
Cheryl Magrini, “Ethnographic Inter-textual
Voicing in Children’s Storyboard Art: Biblical Meal Stories
Interpreted through the Practice of Hospitable Pedagogy” and
Simone A. deRoos, “Young Children’s God
Concepts: Influences of Attachment and Socialization in a Family and
School Context”
Research Interest
Group
Paulette Isaac, “Toward a Scriptural and Cultural
Context of Adult Education in the African American Church: A Health
Application” and
Richelle B. White, “Christian Education Theoryfor
the Hip-Hop Generation”
Research Interest
Group
Kathleen O’Gorman, “The Natural World
as a Religious Educator” and
Mark Markuly, “Literacy of the Heart: Finding
a Language for the Affective Dimension of Religious Education”
