UpClose 7-21

Photo: Lorrie Lankin

Waterloo, Ont

A well-told Bible story has great power, says Lorrie Lankin. Lankin, who grew up in Wilmot Mennonite Church and now directs adult education at Waterloo North Mennonite, is one of a number of first-class teachers Waterloo North has had over the years.

Lankin especially enjoys young children. “You become invested in children, important to them... A significant bond develops.”

Lankin says it is important to make the classroom a place where students feel safe and comfortable. She always began class with a snack, a ritual of hospitality and inclusion during which students would share highlights of their week. Then it was time to move to the story corner—no more talking.

“Children loved the wooden story figures” that came with the Jubilee curriculum, says Lankin. When she finished the story, she would leave the figures at the story centre so that kids could return and recreate the story, or play with the characters.

“The stories in the Bible are bare-bones,” she says. “A good teacher knows how to bring a story to life with details.”

Lankin has no shortage of ideas. Give small tasks to introverted children who would not be inclined to offer, she says. And don’t be shocked at the things kids come up with.

“Some children want to get a reaction by saying inappropriate things,” she says. “Don’t over-react. Once they realize this gets little attention, they stop.”

Her classes often involved dramas and skits, with children putting on clothes to get into character or switching roles “because everyone wants to be Jesus, or be the sick child healed by Jesus.” One of her classes wrote and presented a poem to rap music.

Once, for children’s time during worship, she led an imaging exercise to illustrate the Adam and Eve story. She asked the children to imagine that they were in a beautiful garden.

Some students like to sing, others hate it, she says. (Currently, Waterloo North children assemble to sing before going to their classes.) If she felt uncomfortable teaching a given lesson, she chose another from the extras offered in the Jubilee series.

Lankin’s people skills are also evident in her current role in adult education.

“You have to know the issues important to adults,” she says. Adult offerings this fall include something intellectually meaty (a study on John Howard Yoder) and something participatory (building healthy families), among others.

Over the years she has maintained rapport with many young adults she taught as children, even if the class lasted only a year.

“They come back, and make a point of saying hello,” she says. She believes that the children in a congregation are everyone’s responsibility. Those children grow up to be a blessing to everyone.

Lankin says she gets as much out of teaching as her students do. Not surprisingly, her daughter Kaitlyn is now teaching, and sponsoring, junior youth at Waterloo North. Kaitlyn is incorporating into her teaching what she learned. —Betti Erb

Photo: Lena Dyck-Hildebrand

Boissevain, Man.

The tension builds up when you have to chew on dried bread while others eat chocolate bars, says Lena Dyck-Hildebrand about a Sunday school lesson she taught about rich and poor.

Lena, 77, may be of a different generation than her students but she knows how to make Sunday school exciting for young people.

She began teaching Sunday school at Whitewater Mennonite Church in 1963. Although she has retired from regular teaching she is often called on to substitute. She has taught all ages—from kindergarten to young adult.

It was difficult in the beginning, she recalls, when Sunday school was taught in German. “It was so nice to teach kindergarten then” because the German wasn’t as hard, she says.

Lena is a teacher by profession and taught in a country school until she married. She raised her five children before she ventured into the Sunday school classroom. The church asked her to teach and, given her teaching background and enjoyment of children, she accepted the challenge.

She was grateful when the Foundation Series curriculum became available.

“Before its use the whole Sunday school used the same German booklet and adapted it to each age group. It was quite hard. I really enjoyed the Foundation Series.” Currently her church is using Scripture Press materials.

Another significant change she has experienced is a drop in student numbers, due to declining rural population and smaller families. Space was a challenge when Sunday school had 100 students, grades one to eight.

“We would use wooden sliding dividers and we had to try to keep our voices down when teaching,” she recalls. “Now we have about 25 children and only 4 classes.”

“Children are different these days,” says Lena. She found it easier to capture their interest in earlier years. But she welcomes the challenges that come her way. “The most…interesting time was when I had the youth class, because of their independent thinking and honesty.” She recalls that one student wasn’t sure if he loved God because he was having a hard time loving his neighbour.

Lena enjoys making faith stories become real for her students.

“One time I got some CO guys [conscientious objectors] to come to class when we were studying the believers’ church story. The kids were really attentive and gung-ho. Before that they didn’t even know there were COs.”

Lena incorporates object lessons and simulation into her teaching to drive the lesson home. She tries to capture the minds and imaginations of her students to nurture seeds of faith.—Evelyn Rempel-Petkau

Elmira, Ont.

Cassandra Bauman is 11 years old. She’s not too young, however, to have taken great care of the flowerbeds at Elmira Mennonite Church this past summer.

In May, Ralph Martin, on the property committee, presented the congregation with a list of tasks that the church was paying someone to do. If volunteers would sign up and do those jobs for nothing, he said, the church could save a fair bit of money.

Cassandra, eldest daughter of Brent and Kathy Bauman, has always enjoyed gardening, so she volunteered to take care of the flowerbeds. Over the summer she watered and weeded two or three times a week.

Cassandra comes by her love of plants naturally. She is part of the 4-H Garden Club organized by Susan Martin, a cousin of her father. She helps to tend the flowerbeds at her own home, and around the farmhouse of her grandparents, Grant and Ruth Ann Bauman of West Montrose.

Her grandparents set aside a spot for a vegetable patch for her in one of their cornfields. This past year, Cassandra raised zucchini and beans. She hoed the patch and kept a sharp lookout for bugs, and pests that come in a larger size—raccoons.

Cassandra’s interest in plants is but one of her pastimes. She takes both piano and voice lessons. She began singing solos in church at age five, and people began to pay attention to her promising voice. She began voice lessons at age eight. Like any girl, she enjoys biking around the streets of her town.

Casssandra is in Grade 7. She looks forward to high school at Elmira District Secondary School, located only a block from her home. Cassandra’s father commutes to the Chrysler plant in Brampton. Her mother Kathy is based at home. Cassandra has two sisters: Ashley, 10, and Tiffany, 5.

Staff at Elmira Mennonite Church, take note: Cassandra says she would gladly garden again.—Betti Erb