All Five Senses
working together to fill the vessel that is you.
There is meaning to this life – to your life. The Bible reveals in Genesis that God didn’t just stop on the second day after creating the heavens and the earth, day and night, morning and evening, water vaults of earth below and sky above, dry lands, and wet seas (Genesis 1:1-10). After creating the FORM we know as our universe, God filled it … like a vessel.
He could have filled His vessel with anything. But God chose to filled it with life – seed-bearing vegetation that produces fruit. He began with plants, then created the fish of the water and the birds of the sky. But God didn’t stop with just one species of bird or one type of climate. He didn’t even stop at one gender. He made two genders, male and female, so that they are dependent on one another for survival.
Why would God do that?
But He didn’t just stop there. Next He created people, and this creation of mankind he made in His own image (Genesis 1:24-27).
But He didn’t just stop there. God gave all creation receptors of various kinds – sight, sound, smell, taste and touch – and to make matters more perplexing, he didn’t just stop at one color or one pitch or one taste bud or one scent. God created, with passion, a great variety of sensory experiences.
Why would God do that?
It is genius really how God created this way for mankind to read the language of his WORLD – through their own eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin. God infused our world with variety beyond measure.
But why?
I imagine God created the world with variety for reasons any parent would have in wanting the very best for their child … God had it in his power to give his children any infinite number of sensory experiences to match their infinite number of personalities, talents and gifts … So that his children may know him … so that his children may belong in relationship together. God’s love abounds in us, his creation, and it shows! I look at the miracle that is in each and every person, and I imagine God’s delight in making you, in all your vibrant variety.
It takes ALL five senses to become proficient in literacy, as it does any field of study for that matter.
To hold a book and turn its page uses four of the five senses: sight, touch, sound and smell. To write by hand with paper and pencil uses the same four senses. To write a letter and put it in the mail uses all five senses.
As we become more technologically advanced, literacy becomes more of a single-sensory activity though. That is not to say technology is a bad thing, but we also need to keep our feet on the ground, especially in the field of education. When it comes to retaining information and processing it in the brain, computer screens may be compromising our child’s education more than helping. For instance, the recording you hear when turning the page of your kindle is not real. It is the mimic of a real book.
Computers have replaced most every literary experience given and received, and so the very skills of literacy become flat, one-dimensional, shallow … FAKE.
Literary Messages are
Given & Received
Literacy is like playing catch. Children learn the give-and-take relationship of connectedness through PLAY. Games like soccer, baseball, tennis, and tag all teach children that these two opposing forces not only depend on one another, but they compliment one another. Soccer goals are scored off of passes. Tennis balls are returned after serving. The tagger is not “it” until being tagged. Baseballs are thrown after catching.
It takes one to give flavor and one to receive it … a total of TWO. He who gives a visual image, sound, scent or texture outwardly needs a vessel to receive that communication inwardly. There is a complimentary pairing at play in God’s world, and literacy is no different.
South Washington County Schools
Focus on LITERACY
According to Merriam Webster, Literacy is “the quality or state of being literate“. This includes a noun (person, place or thing) who can read and write in the language of any given space (verbal and visual). This also includes an adjective (describing word) to define the field of skill one is literate in – media-literacy, culinary-literacy, financial-literacy.
In January, Ms. Classen wrote a District 833 news article titled, “LITERACY IS EVERYWHERE.” Quite a few more articles about literacy have been published by the district since then (and even before), but for some reason this one in particular stood out to me. I couldn’t shake the words, so since then I’ve been following this bread crumb to its natural end.
To summarize the message of this letter, Ms. Classen points out that literacy is more than just reading. The goal appears to be knowledge in things like ONLINE literacy, FINANCE, and ART (marketing, advertising, and music are mentioned). She lists the following means of literacy as viable within the context of educational literacy …
- Create and Use a LIST.
- Use a MAP (paper or digital app).
- Check a RECEIPT.
- Pay a BILL.
- Sign a CONTRACT.
- Read a RECIPE.
- Use a MEASURING CUP.
- Check NUTRITION facts.
- Look at ART to understand visual text.
- Listen to MUSIC to hear poetry.
- Watch ONLINE VIDEOS to see How-To-Fix broken things.
- Pay attention to POSTS on Instagram, other SOCIAL MEDIA platforms, and Superbowl COMMERCIALS because their “texts have messages for us.”
Pay attention to the number of skills which are in-coming versus out-going messages. as we get to the end of the list I think the question we need to ask is,
IS THIS EVERYTHING?
if knowledge is your ultimate goal
and the internet is your foundation for truth
then how do you know wHAT IS REAL?
You may think the Bible
has nothing to offer to this list,
But hear me out for the next couple articles because the Bible may be more relevant to this conversation than you think.
Secondly, literacy involves both short-term and long-term vocabulary skills. Creating a list and using it is a short-term skill. In fact, this district list is nothing BUT short-term literacy skills. Granted, the author was simplifying a very complex topic for readership, but this list neglects to mention ANY long-term literacy skill which might include things like CREATING art, WRITING music, PLANNING a trip, CHARTERING a course, DISSECTING the intent of a commercial advertisement, RESEARCHING the funding of a social media influencer, or writing an ESSAY about healthy living and real-life consequences.
I can’t help but think that many receivers of district language (ie parents) may be interpreting these seemingly simple literacy skills to mean something very different than the giver (ie district admin) intends. Navigating district language therefore becomes key to understanding WHAT SKILL IS REALLY BEING HONED.
If literacy is EVERYWHERE, then these literacy skills listed by the district are really just a starting point. As I explore the Bible as Literature, let’s apply these district 833 literacy skills to the bible …
Because the BIBLE IS all these things and more.
The Bible is proving to be the standard measure by which all literature flows in both public and private school models (see the JOURNEY SERIES), yet some don’t acknowledge it as relevant to their daily life.
Before we dive into the Bible as Literature, lets look back at the side-by-side comparison I began with in January, The REAL or FAKE series (See “Beginning With REAL” HERE). In it I defined simple and tangible realities within the categories of beauty, home, food, city, and social. The idea was to begin simple with What IS REAL and then expand into more complex subjects.
Simple and Tangible
LITERATURE
Book
A printed BOOK is primarily made of paper, ink, thread and glue. Every book has a beginning, middle and an end. Each hard copy cannot be changed once published, sold, and distributed worldwide. Yes, new Editions may be printed at a later date to clarify, correct and introduce the book to a new generation of readers, but hard copies remain an intact truth about their authors perspective at that historical moment in time. Its purpose is to deliver a message that the authors intended audience will then receive, absorb, reflect and project back out into their circles. The intent may range from teaching to enlightening to activating change.
Real books are a MULTI-SENSORY experience.
A digital KINDLE is made of an electrophoretic
display, flex circuit connectors, light plastic casing,
wireless cards/WiFi chips, controller boards, and lithium polymer batteries.. Its purpose is to mimic real books (or entire libraries) in a smaller, easy-to-transport digital option.
Did you know that reading a physical book “increases intelligence, boosts brainpower, makes you more empathetic, helps you better understand the content, reduces risk of Alzheimer’s, helps you relax, improves sleep, increases your life span, and encourages life-long reading”? – REAL SIMPLE, “9 Benefits of Reading Printed Books, According to Science” by Abigail Weis (See article HERE. What a great source list!)
Up next in The REAL or FAKE Series
THE BIBLE IS (at Least) Literature
The Bible is the most relevant piece of literature, the most published book of all time, and the most widely translated text. It has laid the foundation for laws, events, and doctrine practiced by the entire world today. If literacy is to be found in lists, maps, measurements, bills, contracts, recipes, music and art, then the Bible has it all!
The REAL or FAKE Series
The Real or Fake Series sets the stage for 2024 and will be the foundation for future articles. It builds off of the Christmas Gift poem written and published on December 15th, 2023 titled “The Maker IS”
Everything that “IS”, has been made, and all things made have a MAKER. Therefore, everything made has a purpose. This series distinguishes between the superficial and the substantive things we choose to surround ourselves with. Generation after generation passes by, and pretty soon fakeness become so embedded in a culture that reality is forgotten altogether.
The characteristic traits of REAL are defined here, and FAKE is called out for the counterfeit it is. Follow along as Jaime looks at all parts of the K-12 education system, from tangible to complex, literature to curriculum, public to non-public, and the real and fake players within the Minnesota election process.
THE BIBLE IS: A Message for us
The Bible is a story from beginning to end that is so masterfully organized in its literary structure that no other story can compare – in depth, in metrical precision, in mathematical genius, in profound impact, and in communicating FUNCTION (purpose) simply through the Creator’s FORM (vessel). FORM TENDS TO NATURALLY FOLLOW FUNCTION in this way. There are three main aspects to every story – character, plot and setting. The first sentence of the Bible contains 7 Hebrew words, and the second sentence contains 14, and yet in just two simple sentences the Author establishes TIME, CHARACTER, ACTION, and PROBLEM. From there, we read about the SOLUTION to this problem, and it repeats in every book like the beat of a metronome to the end. Learn how to read the language of your child’s school by first learning the language of the Bible. The Good News may have more to teach us about our world than the news of man.
Literacy and The WORD
A person who can read and write is considered “literate”, but what IS literacy if not for language, and what is language if not for words? In the conclusion of the JOURNEY series, I add a fourth Book Review to the mix. THE HOLY BIBLE is the language of God’s word. Your child’s school may not focus on teaching them biblical literacy directly, but the scholars they hire to create school curriculum are VERY well versed in Biblical knowledge. Here I explain how the Bible is a valuable resource of educational literacy for all children – historically, culturally, and (for some) spiritually. Who is the HERO of the Bible and who is the VILLAIN? We all know that decades ago, our nation systematically removed Bible education from the public school day. That in effect has conditioned Christian families into believing that the truth of their spiritual teacher is not compatible with the truth of their secular life. This is wrong, and I think the three books reviewed in this last series are proof that secular is not spiritually neutral.