Questioning to Apply

Questioning is the most overused and under valued teaching method in the church. One of the main purposes of questioning is to cause us to change our way of thinking and understanding and then make plans to change our behavior. Lets dig a little deeper. The purpose of all lessons should be to bring people to Christ. With so many people of varied levels of commitment all in the same class, the best way to allow for individual application is to teach doctrine and principles and allow the students to individually make application. The use of questioning in this process is necessary, but must be done correctly. The questions like “What does this scripture teach us?” really don’t encourage application, because it is analytical in nature. We must get to the next level, and we can with questions like “What will you do this week, to follow the example of (insert story here)? Lastly questions that go unanswered aren’t really getting all their value, we must elicit response. If I don’t have to answer I often think of something else. Many of the responses to these lessons will divulge current sinful ways and sharing out loud isn’t the best option, so they can write the answers down. Most of us would be embarrassed to say “I’m going to pray with faith tonight concerning my family scripture study since we don’t have it often”. I’ve found that in classes for adults, people won’t write answers or work in groups or do what you want as the teacher naturally like kids will, so I always have to have a little expectation lecture with each new class, but after I’ve done this people are much more likely to do what I plan in the lesson including writing. I always bring pens, and paper, or encourage them to text the short writings to themselves, but they write or I walk up to them and ask them why they aren’t writing, just like I would to a seminary student, or a primary student. As the teacher you are there to teach, whether or not they are your peers, don’t be afraid, to confront them, you will only need to do it once or twice before everyone will be on the same page.
Possible Downsides
Allowing time to think and write takes time away from covering the material, however if conversion is the goal we must remember we are teaching students not lessons, and we must be selective of what we teach. After writing you might ask if anyone would like to share what they wrote, but only share a few. I’ve found that people know what they need to do and really don’t need others ideas to see how to apply something very often. Most of us share something that we are already doing, so we look good to the class, which doesn’t stretch us, but glorifies our pride. Follow up with them as a group as to how it went applying last weeks lesson. Ask them “By raise of hands how many of you actually did what you wrote down to apply last weeks lesson” Then ask if there are any brief stories to share about that, if the time allows this is a great way to encourage action, which is our our ultimate goal as teachers to get them to be more like Christ.

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