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Episode 75: How to Talk about Santa Claus
What should we do when students ask their teachers whether or not Santa is real? It's especially complicated at the Elementary school grades, where parents have different perspectives, and teachers want to both respect those differences and capitalize on the opportunity for transformative learning. Actually, the conversation surrounding Santa Claus goes far beyond whether or not Santa Claus really exists. Host Noah Brink builds a case for why Christian teachers shouldn't shy away from Santa Claus conversations; they help us to embrace the power of stories and our need for hope, imagination, mystery and wonder. In the conversation, Noah provides some of the background legends and historical contexts that gave us our current Santa Claus, leaning heavily on G.K. Chesterton and Jesus Christ's insistence that we have faith like a child.
Episode 74: The Ultimate Goal of Learning (On Learning, Part 6)
Host Noah Brink concludes our six part series on learning by returning to essential questions about the purpose of our Christian schools. Christian schools ought rethink what it means to be an educated person and what's most important for our students to learn. Do our "Portraits of a Graduate" reveal a truly Christian commitment, or are they essentially the same as what we'd find in secular school? What do we mean by success? These struggles aren't aren't limited to the Christian Education sphere alone, but they reveal our general approach to "the Christian life." However, our task is to cling to what the Bible calls us toward, believing the gospel and accepting the unique realities of a gospel-immersed worldview.