Year-end Chatter

“Chatter” is one of those words that is gaining new meaning in this age of technology.  It generally means lots of talk in cyberspace about a particular subject, or group of subjects.  As The Kingdom Educator approaches time and readership milestones, and as this school year draws to a close, here’s a little bit of chatter about Christian education issues. 

Achievement Tests

We get a few emails (kingdomeducator@yahoo.com) asking questions about the purpose and value of achievement tests, especially at this time of the year.  With most states, and the federal government placing such a high emphasis on testing, parents are naturally concerned about them.  You need to ask your school administration how they use achievement tests to evaluate their student progress, as well as any other possible use for them. 

Occasionally, we get a parent who is concerned that their child only answered half of the questions on a particular test correctly.  If it is an achievement test, like the Stanford Test, and not a curriculum based test, like many of the state versions, the score you need to keep an eye on is the percentile.  This tells you how your child did compared to the rest of the students who took the test during the same time period, and against the test norms.  If their percentile score is 50% or higher, that means they did as well or better than half or more of the students who took the test.  Again, your school administration can give you advice on how to read these test scores, and how to evaluate them. 

Test scores are not the “product” of education.  They can measure achievement, compared to previous levels of study, and there are some who would argue that curriculum based tests can measure “mastery” of content, though it remains our studied opinion that an annual curriculum based exam on classroom content administered by the state is not the best way to measure mastery.  As a parent, your evaluation of your child’s progress should come in watching their every day progress, as they incorporate what they are learning into their thinking and applying the principles and disciplines they learn in school to their lives.  Observe them, and look for signs that their education is being applied. 

Bible Curriculum

We continue to get emails and comments regarding Bible curriculum used by various Christian schools.  It is the incorporation of the truths of scripture into every aspect of a school’s educational process that sets a Christian school apart from all other kinds of schools.  Not only should your students be involved in a systematic study of the Bible on a daily basis, but the school’s approach to teaching should reflect the Bible’s proven educational methods and philosophy, and the truths of scripture should be the means of measuring all other truth in all other subject areas.  If you don’t have that, you don’t have a Christian school.

The subject matter in a Bible course should be as challenging, academically oriented, and applicable as possible.  It is not the place to experiment with unproven teaching strategies just because some students may complain that the class isn’t “fun” or that it should be less challenging than other subjects because “if they weren’t in public school they wouldn’t have to take it.”  If your son or daughter goes to a state-supported college after high school, you can bet their secular philosophy professor will not dumb down his class because students or parents complain about its difficulty. 

Increasing Tuition

The time is upon us, as Christian educators, to get serious about the financial situation Christian education finds itself in.  As it is, only a small percentage of Christian families can afford to bear the costs of providing a Christian school education for their children, and I am continually amazed at the resistance to implementing a Biblical financial strategy to spread the costs out, so that those who are blessed by the Lord can share some of the responsibility of helping other families make it more affordable, a policy completely consistent with the operation of the early church in the Book of Acts.  If we are not willing to follow Biblical principles related to personal abundance, and sharing responsibility, then the influence of Christian schools, and the effect they could potentially have on our society for the cause of Christ’s kingdom will not be realized. 

Be part of the solution.  Help your school as much as you can.  Your willingness to sacrifice will be blessed.