Teachers: connected to God and the server

Just a few days ago, District Apostle Mark Woll informed the Apostles and teachers in Canada about an innovation in the Church’s teaching: the Project Group Children’s Teaching Material recently released an app for mobile devices that will synchronise with the teaching material on the website. Teachers in Canada can now also access the digital teaching material via an app and download it on to their mobile device.

Website and app in North America

The teaching material for Sunday School includes a teacher guide, individual lessons, and a lot of supplementary material such as various kinds of puzzles, role plays, crafts, a journal page, games, group work exercises, a take-home page, and illustrations. Other teaching materials for Pre Sunday School, religious instruction, and confirmation instruction can also be accessed on the website and via the app.

The app is available to teachers free of charge in an Android and iOS version. Offline use is also possible; however, 2 GB of storage space is required to download all files. The teaching materials are available as PDF files in English, French, and Spanish. Canada being the home of the international project group, the Canadians are a step ahead of many other countries.

NAC Media Portal in Europe

With the start of the new school year in September, many congregations in Europe will start with the new digital Sunday School material. The New Apostolic Church Canada made the English material available so that it could be translated into various European languages. The European churches are in the process of launching the new teaching material in their congregations.

The technical basis in Europe is the NAC Media Portal. The portal is responsive; it can therefore be used by mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets, as well as by laptops and stationary computers. In addition to the digital files, some European District Churches are providing a printed teacher manual and student book.

The NAC Media Portal does not just contain teaching content in various languages, but is also the basis for a Web2Publish-System, which the public relations staff of the District Churches in Europe use to produce brochures, invitation cards, and posters. In addition, the web portal also includes an image data base that can be used both internally and jointly by the District Churches. It was used during the IYC2019, for example. In addition to this, the Media Portal serves the District Churches as an intranet, in other words, a document management system used to keep thousands of ministers, other functionaries and teachers in the Church informed and up-to-date.

Children are the present and the future of the Church

Children are a gift from God. Right from the beginning parents make every effort to foster the development of their children’s personality. They teach their children to respect the things that are divine and to act in a way that pleases God. From an early age the children have their place in the congregation. They participate in the divine services, in pre Sunday School, Sunday School, religious instruction, and confirmation classes.

So that all of this works as easily and well as possible, the Church provides seminars, workshops, and teaching material for the many thousands of volunteer teachers. In North America and Europe, the teachers now have access to the new Sunday School material—in some regions in digital form, in others in digital and printed form.