ResearchOnline@Avondale

Education Matters: Readings in Pastoral Care for School Chaplains, Guidance Counsellors and Teachers

Beverly Christian — Thu, 22 Feb 2018 16:46:43 PST

This is a review of the book Education Matters: Readings in Pastoral Care for School Chaplains, Guidance Counsellors and Teachers by James O'Higgins Norman.

Contributions of an Enriched Musical Program as Taught to Students in a Primary School Classroom

Sussan May Croker — Mon, 19 Feb 2018 17:58:53 PST

This study re-affirms the importance of music within the broader society and the primary curriculum. However it notes that due to differences in philosophy there is a division in the approach to teaching music by teachers. The 'instrumentalists' emphasise the importance of teaching skills of music making and tend to create special opportunities for the musically skilled students through ensemble groups, choirs, and bands. In contrast, other music teachers promote a generalist approach that includes a broad range of skills, concepts and appreciation rather than focusing on the precise skills involved in learning a particular instrument.

This study involved a quasi-experimental design in which the effects of two musical programs as taught to two year-five classes were compared. The control class (24 students) received a 30 minute weekly general music class with a specialist teacher. The experimental class (24 students) undertook this same weekly program and in addition received a recorder program by the classroom teacher for 15 minutes, four times a week. At the beginning of the program the two classes were not found to be different in gender division, age, musical skills, family musical influence and cognitive and creative abilities. At the end of the 11 week period the students in both classes were re-tested for musical skills and creativity (measured by the Torrance Test of creative thinking).

The results showed that at the end of the 11 weeks students in the experimental class, learning the recorder, were more advanced in a range of musical skills and knowledge as compared to the control class. A backward, stepwise, multiple regression analysis revealed that factors contributing to this development included the students' cognitive ability, private after class musical tuition, family musical influence and participation in the classroom recorder program. The results also indicated that at the end of the 11 weeks, students in the experimental class learning the recorder had increased levels of creativity when compared with the control class whose members did not learn the recorder. The additional recorder program may have contributed to the development of creativity in the experimental class. These results are by no means conclusive because the researcher was not able to control all potential influences of creative development. However these results are consistent with research investigating similar connections between music and general creative development dating back three decades.

This study argues that the additional recorder program was responsible for the enhanced musical skills of the students in the experimental class and that the potential exists for a program similar to the recorder program to contribute to the enhancement of creative abilities. The study recommends that primary school music programs should include classes where generalist music skills and concepts are taught together with classes that are enriched by the involvement of particular instrumental skills where students learn real musical skills and learn to make music. That is, weekly generic music programs covering many musical attributes are not enough to provide students with a truly holistic enriched program. Limitations of the study are acknowledged and recommendations for further study are made.

John Calvin, John Wesley and Ellen White's Steps to Christ: A Comparison

Norman H. Young — Mon, 19 Feb 2018 14:47:32 PST

This article discusses John Calvin, John Wesley, Ellen G. White, righteousness by faith, and sanctification.

Teacher and Student Attitudes Towards the Use of Interactive Whiteboards in Two Australian primary schools: Factors Influencing Their Use

Kimberley Ann Sharman — Sun, 28 Jan 2018 21:35:35 PST

Technology is an integral part of all our lives. As educators, we must embrace new technologies as our students grow and develop around them. Current technologies allow us to communicate, record and engage more effectively. One such technology allowing us to do this is the interactive whiteboard (IWB). IWBs are quickly being introduced into schools across the nation and worldwide and, as such, educators need to explore the implications of having them in the classroom. It is also important to explore student attitudes to IWBs. As attitudes play an important part in student interest and engagement levels, it is important to determine current attitudes towards IWB use in the classroom and explore links between background factors and attitudes. Through a mixed methods approach, the current study used questionnaires to ascertain current attitudes towards IWBs and classroom observations were used to measure student engagement and teacher approaches. Students’ attitudes towards IWBs are positive and can be positively linked to student engagement. Contrary to initial expectations, one type of IWB use was not more effective in terms of engagement than another. However, what proved to be most effective in terms of student engagement occurred when teachers alternated between teacher-centred approaches and student-centred approaches. IWBs can be used to engage students in learning and the findings of the study indicate that teachers should alternate between student-centred and teacher-centred approaches in short clumps of time, thereby facilitating student interaction and high engagement levels.

The Role and Function of Nurses in the Transforming Work of Mercy Ships

Sonja Dawson — Sun, 28 Jan 2018 21:30:14 PST

Recent estimates by the WHO state that although more people have access to basic health care than any other time in history, over 400 Million people are still lacking access to one of the seven essential services (World Health Organization 2015). An inability to access health care contributes to feelings of powerlessness, ridicule, despair and even death. Nurses and other health professionals are engaged with both governmental and non-governmental organisations to provide care within international humanitarian relief and development contexts as a compassionate response. Mercy Ships, an international, non-governmental organisation exists to that end, using ocean going to bring hope and healing. Urgent needs of the forgotten poor are addressed through surgery in this unique hospital setting, including those needing reconstructive procedures for head and neck tumours, burn contractures, congenital defects, eye disease, and injuries sustained through obstructed labour. The concept of care, which is intricately interwoven into nursing, fundamentally seeks to improve the quality of life by extending compassion, promoting dignity, and to nurture and empower both individuals and communities. Volunteer nurses with Mercy Ships admnister holistic care of body, mind and spirit to begin the process of transformation of the ‘human condition’ which often fulfils one’s need to be loved, to feel valued and to function within the environment in a healthy, whole and meaningful way.

The Church and the Individual: An Interdisciplinary Approach

Darius Jankiewicz — Sun, 28 Jan 2018 16:02:22 PST

At its best, Christian theology has sought to find a balance between two approaches to religious authority. One approach suggests that the Church has authority over the individual, and that the individual should respond with complete trust toward religious authority and its pronouncements. The other approach suggests that the individual is the source of authority, and that the individual has the right to scrutinize, critique or reject the pronouncements of the Church. In this paper, these approaches to religious authority are referred to, respectively, as dependence and independence models of religious authority.

Kuntillet cAjrud: A Case for Critical Revision

Koot J. Van Wyk — Sun, 28 Jan 2018 15:37:30 PST

Kuntillet cAjrud is an archaeological site with data in objects, images and texts that kept scholars on both sides of the hermeneutical divide busy. The secular/nihilistic orientated archaeologists are trying to connect the dots on both image and text to what they have already chose to see regarding the text: that the text is a late post-exilic creation and archaeology in their view is uncovering the “true Israel and their religion and their pantheon”. The other view is biblically textual-based, a position supported by other extra-biblical sources of literacy in all periods of the Levant in nearly all Ancient cultures continuously, and not only after the sixth century BCE. The hazard to prove earlier writings’ existence archaeologically is the preservation ability of writings materials used that leads to meagreness of data, not the reality of its existence. Kuntillet cAjrud is not only an Ashera site but also a Baal site, mentioning the word “prophet”; included an eschatological text with elements similar to Habakkuk 3 (520 BCE) and the Divine Warrior motif in Kajr 4.2. Ceramics (pithoi) came from Jerusalem, Samaria and even further north. Was Ashera written on the pithoi in Jerusalem or on Kuntillet cAjrud? Ashera also appeared on plaster-texts. Scholars are divided how it should be interpreted: that Ashera is a cultic place, gameboard, goddess or name of person. The 3 rd person singular pronoun added to the name can be shown also at Ebla and Ugarit. However, consensus of nihilists preferred to read “his [Yahweh’s] Ashera”. It was found in this article that a revision of all data rather points to the fact that the Ashera of the Addresee is in mind just like at Khirbet el Qōm where it reads “his [Uryahu’s] Asherah, not that of Yahweh. It does not deny that idolatry was exercised here but as the prophets (early = Amos, Hosea, Isaiah) all condemned Ashera and Baal worship on mountains near Tema, at Samaria, so this continued also with the later prophets Ezechiel and Jeremiah around the invasion of Nebuchadnezzar in 597 BCE and continuing to 586 BCE. The iconography at the site had strong connections to Greek Vase art, especially the particular connection to one cow and calf motif dating to ca. 520 BCE. Nimrud Ivories are dated not only in the 9 th century but from the 9 th to the 6 th century BCE as the scholars reminded us. Textiles at Kuntillet cAjrud were in abundance, especially linen and also wool. The prophets like Ezechiel indicated the importance of textiles for the idolaters of that era. Whereas nihilistic archaeological-priority scholars find support at Kuntillet cAjrud for Yahweh having a consort and proving their stance that Israel religion transformed from polytheism to monotheism, the opposite view in this article uses their excellent data to prove that the biblical texts (that not only originated after the exile) are text and data connected to such an extent that archaeology cannot be done without a text on the tel. The Lachish III pottery debate leaves open a 800 BCE date or a 597 BCE date (favored by this writer) and Kuntillet cAjrud are filled with these types of ceramics. Radiocarbon dating does not only indicate a 800 BCE date but as Schniedewind indicated may even touch the 10th century BCE. Phoenician influence at the site led Singer in her confrontation with ca. 800 BCE scholars (early Lachish III dating scholars) to move the timing about 50 years later around 730 BCE (herself also an early Lachish III dating scholar). The gods at this site included: Yahweh; Ashera; Bacal; and the Egyptian god Bes and as a trading post with cultic and entertainment facilities for the visitors, they specialized in Phoenician, Israelite, Egyptian, Greek and other visitors to the water sources at this hill. Kuntillet cAjrud is so relevant for biblical studies, that networks are set up by nihilist female archaeologists to make a quest for the historical Ashera and to raise the issue whether the biblical text have pushed Yahweh’s wife out of the picture in the past, setting up for them the agenda, in this day and age with LGBTQH agitations and world transgender legal jurisdiction concensus, also woman ordination contra the biblical text, to try to ”set free“ Ashera image in the modern world. On the other side of the divide, all the fingerprints of idolatry on mountains as complained by the early and later prophets, over a long period, especially the prophets Ezechiel and Jeremiah, are at this site. At the end of the research, after working with the conventional theory that Teman and Shomron are cities of Teman and Samaria, another theory became more appealing, namely that it refers to persons on the basis of Rabbi Redak’s exegesis of Jeremiah 49:7 and Obadiah 9 for linking Teman to a person as Genesis 36:11 did. Extending Redak’s method it was found that at least three people in various stages of Israel’s history were called by the name Shomron. Instead of F = Kajr3.9: “May he [functionary] bless you to Yahweh of Teman [(conventionally a city)] and to his [(Yahweh’s)] Asherah” rather read F = Kajr3.9: “May he [functionary] bless you to Yahweh of Teman [(a person)] and to his [(Teman’s)] Asherah”. The same is the case with Yahweh of Samaria. The result is that the conventional application that Yahweh had a consort no longer is the only interpretation of the syntax and semantics of the inscriptions.

Engaging Faces: The Persistence of Traditional Portrait Painting Practices in a “Post-digital” Age

Andrew Collis et al. — Thu, 18 Jan 2018 15:28:16 PST

In the current global climate of contemporary art discourse, the term “post-digital” variously draws attention to the rapidly changing relationship between digital technologies, human beings, and art forms, an attitude that essentially concerns itself more with “being human” than with “being digital.” While the proliferation of digital imagery—particularly depicting the human face—has become commonplace and ubiquitous to the point of becoming somewhat unremarkable, portrait painting and public demand to see the painted portrait thrive vehemently today. Significantly, and perhaps surprisingly, is the fact that the majority of portrait-painting galleries and portrait-painting prizes uphold the traditional notion that the painted portrait be painted from life; that there must be some personal human encounter between artist and sitter either during or throughout the creation of the work. This article explores the significance of the “painting from life” clause as stipulated by specific gallery and competition stakeholders and its viability as an artistic convention in a period of advanced technological opportunities. It will be shown that such a clause may in fact embody important humanising elements that make it an extremely valuable means of representation in a “post-digital” age.