### Purpose and Audience

The purpose of this curriculum is to resource youth leaders of all kinds in the ministry of discipling high school students. This curriculum is designed to be used as a part of a larger youth ministry strategy; it is not designed to be youth-group-in-a-box. What it is designed to do is to assist youth leaders in preparing an environment where students can learn about their faith and grow in their maturity as followers of Jesus Christ.

To that end, there are nine series comprising thirty two sessions (including the Christmas series). Each session is meant to be used with a group of high school students and at least one leader. Each session will take approximately one hour to lead and approximately half an hour of minimum preparation, which must include reading through the material and may include making photocopies, doing extra reading, renting movies, and a variety of other activities.

### Content

Included in SHINE are eight regular series which are united in theme but distinct in their topics. These series vary in length from two sessions to five. Each series is meant to be done in consecutive weeks. Also included is a two-week Christmas series meant to be done in the Advent season. In total, there are thirty two sessions in SHINE. Although they are designed with a ten month youth ministry calendar in mind, they will not fill every week of the ministry year. This is to allow room for local ministries to insert their own concerns into their yearly planning. Plan to use these lessons according to the needs of your own context.

### Date and Time/Number of Students

At the beginning of every session, there is a blank field called “Date and Time” and another one called “Number of Students.” As you prepare your lessons, keep a record of when you will teach a lesson and how many students you anticipate having. This will help you plan ahead and it will help you remember what you did and when. You can also record the actual number of students that were present in this space.

### Materials Needed

At the beginning of every session, you will also find a list of materials that we suggest using as part of that lesson. Minimum preparation for teaching should include reading the lesson over carefully and gathering all of the necessary materials.

### Lesson Objectives

Lesson Objectives are the engine that drives a lesson. We have spent our time researching topics and Scripture so that you can reduce your preparation time. We have condensed our research into clear, concise, and measurable objectives that express what students should learn or do as a result of the lesson. The point of each lesson is to achieve the Lesson Objectives, and we have designed each lesson to do just that. You will also notice that Lesson Objectives are framed in terms of the students rather than the teacher. That is because the point of education is not teaching; it is learning.

### Pastoral Objectives

At the beginning of each lesson, you will also find a blank field called Pastoral Objectives. This is a space for you to record pastoral or personal objectives that you want to achieve during the course of the lesson, but that do not specifically relate to the Lesson Objectives. For example, you may decide that it is very important for one student in your ministry to integrate into the larger group. You may decide that your students need to have fun together because they have a history of hostility towards one another. You may decide that your students need more time to pray than in previous weeks. Think these through in advance and record them in the Pastoral Objectives field. Of course, each group will require different pastoral strategies and that is why you choose and record these rather than us! This field is an opportunity for you to reflect on your group and refine the lesson in light of their needs. Here is a list of pastoral concerns that are common, and which may spark your imagination.

1. During this lesson, Caleb will have the chance to work with someone other than Mark.
2. During this lesson, I will give Carla the chance to lead one game or task and then I will help her reflect on how it went.
3. As a result of this lesson, Jennifer will work in a group with Caroline.
4. These students need to spend some time praying together and talking about what’s going on in their lives. I will make sure there is twenty minutes free to do that.
5. I want to give students an opportunity to worship using music that makes sense to them, so we will spend thirty minutes at the beginning of the lesson singing songs with a guitar.

### Feedback

In almost every lesson, you will hear us harping on a teaching strategy called feedback. Quite simply, feedback is the act of clarifying or correcting another person’s work. Some feedback is teacher to student and some is student to student. Feedback ensures that students are working towards the objectives of the lesson. It ensures that they walk out of the classroom with the best answers and knowledge as opposed to walking out of the classroom with unedited and unaccountable thoughts.

We have used a teaching approach in this curriculum whereby the students do much of the work: they answer questions, look up passages, debate with their peers and much more. This does not mean that you, the teacher, will be able to sit back and relax. While the students interact with the material and with each other, the teacher’s job is to ensure that their interaction ultimately leads to the accomplishment of the objectives.

What does this mean for you as a user of the curriculum? It means that you need to be prepared to give feedback at the end of every discussion, activity, and task. Feedback can be as simple as saying, “Yes! Good job! I agree with all your answers,” or it may require you to challenge the students and help them towards the right answers. At many points in the curriculum we have attempted to coach you through possible ways of accomplishing this.

### Teaching Tips

Teaching tips are back by popular demand. These brief but instructive sections are designed to help teachers sharpen their classroom skills. This year’s teaching tips review past tips and also introduce new ones. You will find one tip at the beginning of every series.

### Teacher Feedback Incentive

"We can teach and teach. Or we can teach and learn. This kind of teaching, a ‘learning teaching’, is a refusal to say ‘I know it all. I can relax for the rest of my career.’ Learning teaching is a desire to move forward, to keep learning from what happens. It involves feedback from others and from ourselves about what happened. It involves reflection on what happened, together with an excitement about trying a slightly different option next time. Learning teaching is an aware and active use of the experiential learning cycle in one’s own life and work. Learning teaching is a belief that creativity, understanding, experience, and character continue growing throughout one’s life." (Jim Scrivener from Learning Teaching(

These are the words of life-long educator, Jim Scrivener, in a book called Learning Teaching. They reflect our sentiments that where we are now is not where we hope to be tomorrow. Just as our whole lives are being transformed from one degree of glory to the next, so can our teaching be transformed more and more in the service of our students.

Our writing team is committed to this in several ways. We endeavour to improve our own teaching and awareness of teaching so that we can offer you excellent resources. To that end, we value your feedback on our work so that we can continually improve it. In fact, we are so excited about your feedback that we want to offer you an incentive for returning it to us. Have a look at Feedback Frenzy. There you will find instructions on how you can win one two prizes worth $100 in titles from Read On Bookstore.

Moreover, in addition to collecting your observations of our work, we want to help you develop your ability to observe your own work! Built into SHINE, you will find a number of resources designed to improve your awareness of your own teaching. At the end of every series, there is a feedback form entitled “Teacher Feedback.” Fill these out as the year goes on. You can return them to us for a chance to win!

### ADDITIONAL COPIES

Please feel free to make additional photocopies of this binder for your small group leaders. Additional binder copies and CD’s are also available from BCOQ YOUTH for $40/binder and $5/CD.

### CDs

The CD is designed for ease of use. On the left side is a frame containing all the topics in the curriculum. Just click on the topic of your choice. Listed below each topic are all the session notes plus their corresponding handouts. When you click on a specific session, the notes will appear in Adobe format (.pdf) on the right frame. Handouts will appear in a separate window.

### Handouts

The handouts are designed for you to adapt as you see fit. They are saved in Rich Text Format (.rtf), so most word processors can use this. If you're unable to, email Alvin.

### Adobe Reader

Adobe Reader is a free program which we have used to format our session notes. If you do not have Adobe Reader on your computer, you can install it for free by clicking here.

### Curriculum Team

This resource has been developed by Paul Carter, Darren De Graaf, Luz Iglesias, and Alvin Lau—a group of men and women serving God in the fields of youth ministry and education. It is our hope that this resource will serve you and your students as you SHINE like Jesus in our world. We invite and encourage your feedback on any aspect of SHINE. We can be reached by email.