One of the justifications for using visual presentations in church is the fact that people learn in different ways. Traditionally, three principle principal learning styles have been identified: visual learners, experiential learners, and aural learners. Some learn by seeing, some learn by experiencing something, some learn by hearing.
Eddie Sharp, who now preaches down in Austin, did an interesting experiment a few years ago. He intentionally varied his language from sermon to sermon. In one, he used lots of “visual words”—what we see in this passage, the image presented, etc. In another, he focused on feeling words, emphasizing emotions and empathy with the characters in the Bible story. In a third, he focused on “hearing” the word of God. After each sermon, a different group of people came up to say how much the sermon had impacted them.
Eddie’s experiment shows that you don’t have to have a projector and a screen to appeal to different learning styles. It also reminds me that just using a presentation won’t necessarily appeal to different styles either. When putting together a sermon with a presentation, appeals to different learning styles should be kept in mind. Our services have traditionally rewarded those who liked to learn by hearing (hence the term auditorium and the arrangement of our seating), as well as those who preferred highly rational, non-emotional worship.
[As a side note, back in the 1980s, Flavil Yeakley wrote an excellent study of the discipling movement in our brotherhood. The best chapter in the book was “What We Can Learn From the Discipling Movement.” There he spoke of how our traditional evangelistic style appeals to introverts more than extroverts. That may have changed in twenty years, but it was interesting then.]
I favor the use of presentations largely for this reason, the need to reach out to other learning styles. It’s not the only way to reach out to them, but it can be an effective way.
I like using presentation slides (keynote being my favorite tool in which to prepare these) for this very reason. However, if I’m finding myself putting more work into the slides than the sermon itself, I’ll often drop the slides and present “naked” the first time I deliver the message. Then, based on what I heard myself emphasizing and concentrating upon during that first delivery, I’ll craft some slides for future use.
Of course, since I’ve started using Keynote as a brainstorming tool, the slides and the sermon evolve side-by-side these days.
Here is another learning style: Audio-Visual Interaction. Think “Guitar Hero” or “Rock Star” video games. I read where these video games have become to music what MTV was to music in the 1980’s-90’s. MTV created the video that killed the radio star. Now longer was music something just to be hear but instead it was something to be seen and usually with a small story-line (e.g., Madona’s video for “Papa Don’t Preach” or Aerosmith’s Video for “Jani’s Got A Gun”). Now with the emmergence of Guitar Hear and Rock Star, a person cannot only hear and see music being performed but they can also interact with the music by being one of the performers.
How do we present a gospel that allows the learner to hear, see, and interact all at the same time? This is the question I have been thinking about for the last week. Perhaps, this is why Jesus (Rabbi) did not confine the teaching of his students (disciples of the Rabbi) to the temple but instead took them along with him as he did ministry and found a way to include them in the actual participation of doing ministry. I do not know what this says for the assembly but perhaps for our Christian education (e.g., Sunday School) needs to be done less from a classroom and more as the class participates in ministry (e.g., serving in an underprivledged neigborhood, visiting a local jail or homeless shelter, etc…)
Grace and peace,
Rex
Robert,
I’ve found much the same, as far as brainstorming in Keynote. I don’t like to use many notes when preaching, usually none at all. I’m one of those people who can’t read and talk at the same time. Many times the slides take the place of notes for me. [I have to admit, I’ve loved it the few times I was able to have my laptop near enough to me to be able to see the Presenter’s Notes on the screen. Great for putting exact quotes I want to use, etc.; I can even have my Bible texts written out in a large enough font for my old eyes to see them.]
Thanks for contributing to the discussion.
Grace and peace,
Tim
One preacher here in town has had people in the audience text him at certain points of some sermons. Now that’s interactive!
That would definitely be a new experience in preaching.
-Rex
In learning about any subject, some people study books, (reading), go to conferences (hearing and visual), and some directly play with the data and ideas in some mysterious abstract way (theorists). Of course the purest in my mind way of studying anything is to experiment and interact with it using whatever senses we have, or even building an instrument to study it! I love how Eddie is running an experiment on his audience.
Hi Keith. Glad to see you commenting on the blog. I’m also a fan of experiential learning, although it’s not easy for that to take place during the Sunday assembly!
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