Date

2-2022

Department

Rawlings School of Divinity

Degree

Doctor of Ministry (DMin)

Chair

W. Ryan Steenburg

Keywords

Christian Education, Apologetics

Disciplines

Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion

Abstract

The purpose of this action research project was to evaluate the ability of Christian high school students to explain and defend their faith. The main focus of the project was to compare the current apologetics curriculum used by Cedar Park Christian School to a new curriculum designed for the sake of this study. The new curriculum sought to provide grade-level resources as source material for each student. Additionally, it approached the course with the expectation for students to articulate their learned knowledge conversationally. There were forty-nine total participants, all who were either a junior or senior at the start of the 2021 fall quarter. There were twenty-two students in the control group and twenty-seven in the test group with the new curriculum. Every student was given the same theological assessment on both the first day and the final day of the quarter so that growth could be measured. Students also ranked their level of confidence in discussing their faith at both the beginning and end of the quarter. The assessments were then coded and graded anonymously according to a pre-determined grading scale. This researcher did not know whether it was a control or test group assessment being graded. Once the assessments were graded and sorted, results yielded significant differences in the scores between the groups. Those who had received training from the new curriculum were much more successful in explaining and defending the Christian faith. They also recorded higher confidence levels.

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