What a blessing it was to worship with our heroes during their exhibition! It was truly amazing to hear from the Lord through our early learners in their worship and messages. As our heroes prepared for their church service, they were filled with so much joy and excitement, so much so that they would even work on it outside of project time, such as during play-based learning time and indoor recess. As a result, they were able to coordinate and organize a church service based on world-class examples from their own churches. They voted and decided on the name of their church. One hero even took the initiative on her own, without any instructions or suggestions, and made a big banner for Journey Church at home, and brought it to school ready for her friends to color and paint. In addition, while researching their own churches, they decided to make their own website for Journey Church to help others learn about their church and ministries. They chose the template, added text and images, and changed the backgrounds for the website. They were so full of confidence and boldness in their faith, believing in the gifts the Lord has given them, their calling, and their place in serving God’s kingdom, which they enthusiastically expressed through their ministries and mission statements.  

The worship team was so dedicated to worshipping the Lord in song and dance. They worked together in choosing from their favorite worship songs the song they would like to sing during our church service, through lots of voting and negotiating. They also choreographed their own dances to each song, based on some videos or dance steps they created themselves. They found the videos they would like to use and added them to our slides presentation. It was amazing what they were able to accomplish on their own when they were empowered to work together and make their own decisions.

Our pastors and our bishop were committed to delivering their messages from the Lord that they wanted to share during the church service. From the very beginning, they believed they were called to teach and speak for the Lord. Each hero chose the message they would like to share. They created the slides they would like to use to add to the presentation. It was inspiring how the heroes had a specific message, which they believe the Lord has placed in their hearts, through Bible verses, Bible stories, discussions, or personal experiences. Their messages during rehearsals were getting better and better each day as they kept adding more and more (which unfortunately dwindled down to shorter messages at the exhibition in lieu of the presence of a much more intimidating audience, sorry, so I will record more on video next time). Eventually, as the heroes continued on their quest to build the Body of Christ and prepare for the church service, not only the pastors and the bishop had a message to share, even our worship team and our bakers were given a Word from the Lord. Every early learner made the decision on their own, without coercion, suggestion, or external motivation, to stand in front of a crowd and share something the Lord has spoken to them in their hearts.

As the heroes reflected on our quest, many of them felt that while doing all their work, they had so much fun that it did not feel like work at all. But as we have witnessed during the exhibition and all around our studio, our young heroes did do a lot of work. They stayed on task during our project times, engaged in meaningful work that they believed was very important to meet their individual goals. Some heroes diligently searched for the worship songs. Another hero wrote pages and pages of the lyrics to the songs, which she said was for her friends to help them remember the words to the songs. Some heroes read Bible stories to each other in the library. Many heroes used a Bible app to interact with Bible stories. And another group of heroes was busy creating every piece of the armor of God and planning activities for their younger siblings who would take part in the kids’ ministry. What an amazing sight to see the Lord build His Body through a small group of young believers.

Right before the exhibition, the heroes discussed their main purpose for our church service. One hero pointed out that we really need to tell people that Jesus loves them no matter what. All the heroes agreed and also talked about listening to the Holy Spirit to know what to say during the exhibition. Another hero added that all we do, our worship songs, dances, and messages, are all not for ourselves, not even for parents and families, but for God. Someone else reminded her friends that we need to focus on God during the church service instead of ourselves.

Seeing it all come together during the exhibition was a spectacular demonstration of how the Lord works in our studio. Because the heroes were not restricted or limited to complete specific tasks or assignments, they were enabled to discover in their own ways what the Lord really calls them to do, to learn, and to be. But truth be told, the exhibition was barely a glimpse of what our heroes have truly learned during this quest. Even with the advantage of seeing the heroes at work each day and having heard some of their thoughts and ideas throughout the session, assessing, measuring, and evaluating their learning seems to be a daunting task, even impossible, except for the Lord who knows their hearts and minds, constantly at work in growing the seeds that have been planted during this quest.

Thus, the exhibition continues, as the heroes continue to amaze us each and every day, from this day forth, at the end of the Body of Christ quest, and we have yet to witness even more splendor and greatness the Lord has in store in each hero. Simply put, one hero exclaimed, “Ms. Elsie, you are learning a lot from us!  We are not learning anything from you. God is making us learn on our own!”

Our Week At A Glance

Written by Laura Sandefer and originally posted Feb. 06, 2018

Lesson #3: Level up your storytelling.

I overheard Charlie say to Sam, “Don’t do what mom did! Remember that story? It didn’t turn out very well!”

We all use storytelling in our parenting. We know the power of a good tale and how hungry our children are to learn details about our childhoods and daily lives. Our stories entertain, teach, relax, excite, and forewarn.

But my experience at Acton Academy has changed my strategy of storytelling.

I now know all children need a repository of particular stories – hero’s stories. And as a parent, I aim to hunt for them and weave them as I go through daily life.

An esteemed friend described the alternative well: “Without hero’s stories children grow up into young adults who believe they are fragile and are not to blame for their own misery.”

Pre-Acton, I released this level of storytelling to the great filmmakers and writers. But I cannot risk missing the opportunity. Hero’s stories give my children an inner map for traversing their journeys with confidence. They teach that life isn’t fair, feelings get hurt, ordeals arise but there are mentors, guides, true friends to help along the way. And, most importantly, these stories transmit the truth that my children – all children – have unique inner gifts to discover and use joyfully to help others in the world. I don’t need to be the most brilliant storyteller to share how the checkout worker at the grocery store swiftly covered for the woman who didn’t have enough money to buy her groceries.

Here are two main ideas to help you level up your own storytelling.

What’s a hero?

At Acton we describe heroes as people who don’t always win but who get back up when they fall. Heroes aren’t afraid to be wrong. Heroes look for mentors and guides. They work to solve problems. They are honest even when it’s hard and learn how to apologize with humility. Heroes accept responsibility – actually crave responsibility.

Victims, in contrast, blame, complain and shirk responsibility – even responsibility for their own feelings. They look for the easy way out or quit when things get hard. Victims have excuses when things don’t go well and have a hard time apologizing because “it’s not really my fault.”

We all act like heroes and like victims. Being aware of these mindsets helps us call out one or the other and shift attitudes and behaviors when needed. It’s helpful to use a lot of forgiveness and grace with yourself and others in the process.

What’s the framework for a hero’s story?

I like this simple description from “A Practical Guide to The Hero With a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell” and adapted by Chris Vogler:

“A hero is introduced in his ordinary world, where he receives the call to adventure. He is reluctant at first but is encouraged by the wise old man or woman to cross the first threshold, where he encounters tests and helpers. He reaches the innermost cave, where he endures the supreme ordeal. He seizes the sword or the treasure and is pursued on the road back to his world. He is resurrected and transformed by his experience. He returns to his ordinary world with a treasure, boon, or elixir to benefit his world.”

(Don’t forget the “cave” is the thing you fear doing the most. You’ve got to go there to get your treasure. I love that angle when I need to encourage my children to face something hard.)

Happy treasure hunting and storytelling!

Each day, our heroes actively pursue their own learning, driven by their individual interests, needs, and abilities. What they learn and how they learn it is centered on the choices they make. They thrive when given the responsibility for their own learning. Empowering them to meet their learning goals based on their own choices provides our heroes valuable opportunities to increasingly engage in their learning, independently make decisions, and assess their individual competencies.

The heroes are empowered when they are involved in planning, implementation, and evaluation. They excel in a task when they are given their voice in what, why, and how they learn. Our heroes achieve their goals because of their involvement in choosing the focus of the content. Their interests drive the skills they would like to develop and concepts that they would like to learn about. Throughout the day, whether they are working on core skills, writer’s workshop, and project time or collaborating with friends for PE, music, or civilization, our heroes make their own choices in what area content they would like to work on, the amount of time they would like to work on it, where to do their work, with whom to work with, what materials or programs they would like to work with, and how to demonstrate their learning. And because their choices perfectly match their interests and needs with the skills and concepts, our heroes succeed and achieve their goals.

Our heroes especially thrive when they are given a chance to take charge of learning activities, regardless of mastery of content skills. When given the opportunity, they demonstrate their ability to lead, negotiate, communicate effectively, engage in higher order thinking, and problem solve. Hero-led learning experiences have proven to be effective in addressing the specific needs of each hero and presenting context that is more meaningful to them. The opportunity to confidently apply skills in a meaningful way keeps them engaged in authentic learning, wherein they tackle challenges that they are likely to encounter in their real world.

Our Week At A Glance

Week 5: January 22 – 26, 2018