Classification by M. E. Kern

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Jan 12, 1905

Classification

By M. E. Kern

Bible Teaching—No. 2

Classification

To make some suggestions for our work in Bible I would say:—

1. Students should be properly classified according to their ability to work. How often has it been the case that, in our frantic efforts to adjust the conflicts of students in the daily program, we have advised dropping the Bible class and going into another class. And the student frequently feels that he has dropped and been dropped; for perhaps he finds the Bible class into which he is taken composed of students all the way from the eighth grade to the junior or senior years of the college. A teacher would have to possess wonderful powers of adaptability to adapt himself to such a class. We have often, too, allowed students to take work in a class to which they were not adapted. Baldwin truly says, “We think of a class as a company of fellow workers interested in the same subject, and capable of moving forward together.” Surely this can not be said of a “Daniel and the Revelation” class where some of the pupils are eighth grade students who have not studied the books, and know nothing of the world’s history, and others who have come in from the field to go more deeply into the inexhaustible mine of these prophecies. While we could not be as definite in requirements as in some other studies, I would be in favor of requiring for the regular students certain prerequisites to the different classes in Bible.

Instruction Adapted to Class

When we have been able to classify our students as far as possible with reference to their ability, I would suggest that—

2. “The instruction in both matter and method must be adapted to the capabilities of the learner.” This is a very important axiom in teaching. We should ever keep in mind that the instruction is provided for the student, and not the student for the instruction. The teacher who does not study his pupils, and endeavor to adapt his instruction to their needs, will fall far short of success; as it is not what we eat, but what we digest that produces brain, bone, and muscle, so it is not what the teacher tries to pour in, but what the students comprehend and assimilate that develops the mind, and gives the knowledge necessary to eternal life.

The teacher may enjoy his work very much, and feel that he is presenting to his class just what they need, and the students may feel the same way about it, but if they are not required to think and reproduce for themselves the thoughts which the teacher is presenting, it will be found that they have fallen far short of what they should obtain.

Some ministers seem to have their sermons stereotyped, and give them always in the same way to young, old, educated, and uneducated. But such work is of little value. Unless a preacher has a message adapted to the conditions of his hearers, he is not true to his calling; for God deals with us in a very definite way. And unless a teacher has his subject-matter adapted to the mental capabilities and experiences of the pupils, he will fail to accomplish what he should. One of the greatest beauties of the Bible is that it has matter adapted to all grades of children as well as to men and women. That we have not always been wise in our selection of material for our children to study I think we shall all agree.

M. E. KERN.