Shaping Desires and the Formation of our Students

While Master of New College - a Christian residential college at the University of New South Wales (Sydney) - I invited James K.A. Smith to travel from the USA in 2012 to present our annual public lecture series to the College, University and the wider Church. He shared much wisdom on how to live as people of faith in a sometimes hostile world. One truth that resonated strongly with my experiences as a Christian educator, teacher and college head, was his reminder that education is very much an holistic endeavour. 

God made us with different abilities, characteristics, bodies, minds, desires and imaginations. Hence, our pedagogy needs to reflect this understanding, whether teaching 5 year olds, high school students or even university students. Thankfully, God offers us freedom in how we teach, and the way we support student learning and formation.

 

A Key Non-negotiable for the Christian School

I believe that there is one key non-negotiable characteristic of Christian schools. That is, they are to be places where we enable and support the transformation of both body, mind and soul. 

Teachers must understand that as we teach students, we are seeking to shape them as they grow. They like all of us have membership of multiple communities of practice in and outside school. All influence them and us! The varied communities in which we have membership, project their hopes, desires and beliefs that are largely invisible to the teacher. This is a great challenge; for at school we see just a fraction of our students' lives.

As I wrote in 'Pedagogy & Education for Life' (2018),  "Christian pedagogy requires the teacher to maintain a metaphorical orchestra made up of the key instruments of teaching, learning, knowledge, intent, and over all of these, belief" (p.57). The teacher's role is to serve as a 'conductor' in the classroom and school, not just a teacher who transmits knowledge. One key task that flows from this, is the need for the Christian teacher to challenge students to identify the foundations of their 'desire'.

It is the teacher's role "... to conduct this integrated metacommunity for the 'good' of our students." The Christian pedagogue is seeking in all they do, to challenge the very foundations of student desire, and appeal to a humanity that is as rich as the Bible’s teaching on personhood and God’s purposes for creating and sustaining us. ('Pedagogy and Education for Life', Cairney, pp 54-57).

Overall, the Christian teacher will seek to "... see students transformed in more than just their knowledge and skills." They must seek to "... orchestrate the life of the classroom and school in order to point their students towards Christ" (p.61).

How do we point our students to Christ?

The key question is how can this be done? I outline a number of key points in my book. In brief:

1. First, the redemption of our children and their growth in knowledge and love of God is a community affair. Varied communities and people help to shape our children.

2. Second, our pedagogy should reflect our desire to see our students being formed in more than just knowledge. The nature of this type of pedagogy requires teachers to orchestrate and sustain learning to support their formation and life priorities.

3. Third, the Christian pedagogy is informed not by the desires of the world, but by the Scriptures as we seek to focus their hearts and minds towards God' Kingdom.

4. Fourth, we must do more than simply apply a biblical framework that simply communicates knowledge and information in the hope of transformation. We need to understand why we teach, why our school exists, not simply how we teach.

5. Fifth, Christian pedagogy should lead to an education that points toward kingdom goals in the moment-to-moment life of the classroom and school.

Summing up much of what I've been saying above is that I see the greatest challenge for the Christian teacher is "how do we create contexts for learning, where practices communicate internal and external goods, and hence teach and model the truth of God pointing our students to eternal goals, not just earthly ones." ('Pedagogy and Education for Life', p.90).

This requires commitment by all leaders within faith-based schools, and diligence in reminding and shaping our teachers to understand the critical importance of a pedagogy, that is much more than skill in filling our students' heads with knowledge, or preparing them for exams and worldly success. This of course is a foundational distinctive of the faith-based school.