For teachers: The Mark Gospel Project
Divide the class into groups. Make sure each group has one or two reliable students.
To start off, find out how much your students already know. Ask these questions:
How much do you already know about Jesus? Write all that you know about Jesus on or paragraph or take a video of yourself talking about it.
If you have never heard of Jesus, what do you think a person who is God would do on earth? Write or record your thoughts.
Post the answers on a shared document for the groups to access and analyse.
Next, show the class the video An Overview of Mark. Go through the details of the “Gospel of Mark Project” on the header of my webpage. Remind students that every student needs to read the whole of Mark at home to do the project.
Brainstorm ideas students could use to teach Mark creatively. If they have no ideas show them some examples. Give the groups time to discuss and plan their lessons.
Keeping track of student's progress
Spend ten minutes of every lesson checking in on groups as they discuss and plan by asking the following questions:
Show me your plans on how you would teach the Gospel of Mark to your class.
How many lessons would you need? How long would you need to prepare the lessons?
What would you teach in each lesson? How would you do that?
Show me the resources you have made. Use the resources on the website to help you.
Do you think the jobs are fairly distributed?
Decide how you can tell if your classmates have learnt what you have taught.
How would you set and grade the assignments you have set?
After the students teach, get the rest of the class to summarise the key points in the lesson. Give student-teachers encouraging feedback to their lessons and one tip on how to improve their next lesson.
At the end of the project, get students to self-reflect on their teaching and then as a group share what they have learnt from the 5 weeks.
Other Resources
Other ideas on how to co-construct projects can be found here, here and here.
This is an example of lesson plans on Mark in 5 weeks.
Other interesting Catholic resources on Mark written in Melbourne
Scaffolding
If students who have other faiths feel unable to do this project, try using this scaffolding:
Lesson 1- Son of God. What does God look like for you and the people in your country. Mark says Jesus is the Son of God. What do you think that means? How is Jesus (in Mark) similar and different from your view of God (or your family's view) ? Why do you think Jesus lived his life in this way. Why did he have to die?
Lesson 2- The Messianic Secret. What is kept secret in your culture? What is considered good news that has to spread to friends and neighbours? Do you think Jesus wanted his identity kept secret? Why or why not.
Lesson 3- Disciples. Who has a big following in your country? What are followers supposed to do? What are Jesus’ disciples like? How are they supposed to follow Jesus in the book of Mark?
Lesson 4- Servanthood. Do you have servants in your country? If you don't, what are servants like in the movies or programmes that you watch? How are they expected to behave? What did Jesus teach about servanthood? How did he show it?
Lesson 5- How should you read the passages in Mark in detail? Use the 5 Rs method to study Mark.
The 5 Rs method of reading narrative biblical text.
Retell- Retell a story you have read.
React - How did people (in the gospel of Mark) respond to Jesus?
Reveal- What did this reveal about Jesus?
Reason- Why has Mark included this?
Respond- How do you think we should respond to this passage?
Does it surprise you that we read and study Mark the same way we read other narratives? What do you think it shows about the bible.
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