Designed for Oral Learners or "Dumbed-Down?"

Submitted by rmanley on Fri, 01/06/2012 - 17:20

       The reality that 2/3 of the world’s adults don’t, OR WON’T LEARN FROM READING, has is challenged one of MAF-LT’s clients to move their leadership training materials from 6th grade to 2nd grade level. A common mistake made by literates when simplifying training for these “Oral Learners” is the temptation to “dumb down” the material. After all, what can they teach if they are limited to a 2nd grade vocabulary?

 

But the adults they are working with are not second graders. Many are intelligent men and women who may be perceptive believers. As Oral Learners they just don’t have the ability (or desire) to use written material. They don’t divide life into arbitrary categories like “love” or “forgiveness.” Neither did Jesus. He told memorable stories, like the Prodigal Son! 

 

Since an Oral Learner’s capacity for learning is limited largely to memory, the challenge is to make important lessons more memorable. Here are some ideas:

 

1.     Use compelling stories.

2.     Return to familiar Bible stories for multiple lessons and applications.

3.     Develop pithy sayings.

4.     Link memory verses to concrete examples of truth – via Bible stories and through believers’ stories.

5.     Use cultural sayings that support Biblical values.

6.     Sing it!

7.     Icons, if designed or clearly understood by the group, can be good memory aids for a series or large sets such as building an “oral Bible.”

8.     Drama and dance turn the classroom into a memorable event.

9.     Amplify materials with culturally relevant examples.

10. Train leaders to use basic questions that will enable them to continue “mining” God’s Word for direction: “What can I learn from what these in the story say and do? What could they have done differently? What do I learn about God? What will I do differently because of what I learned from this story?”

11. Use common folk tales that affirm Bible values, or where appropriate apply new interpretations to old traditions. A Western example is Christians using the pine tree – originally a pagan symbol of worship - to represent characteristics of God.)

12.          Always make room for application!

 

One last encouraging note to course designers who are working training Oral Learner leaders. Far greater transformation takes place when the LITTLE LEARNED IS APPLIED WELL than when a lot is learned, but applied little!

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