Summer Kinard’s Accessible Church School: Incarnational Practices for Participating in God, published by Park End Books in 2023, prepares teachers and learners for successful learning together. The book offers both theory and practice: beginning with the reasoning behind making Church school accessible, and ending with practical ideas such as floor plans for accessible classroom layouts, suggested usages of those spaces, examples of how to create accessible lessons with each Sunday’s Gospel, a detailed list of ideas for a parish-wide activity day on the Angels, suggested further reading, and more.
Why is it so important that classrooms be accessible? Kinard says, “In a classroom, accessibility means employing best practices to teach all learners. Just as God wills that all humans be saved and has given to every Christian the mission to go and teach all people whatever He commanded us, we set out to teach all people, whether they are disabled, impaired, or neurodiverse.” (p.1)
What does an accessible classroom look like? It will differ with every class, with every teacher, but a key component of accessibility is what should be the goal of every Church school class: an invitation to relationship. “Rather than trying to force the enlightenment of students by presenting them with the ‘intellectual’ (in the modern sense) lessons in words only, we focus on inviting them into the Way, the living relationship with God in the Church, which engages the intellect as a soul faculty.” (p.5) Even the way that the classroom is set up can either enhance that relationship and engage the intellect or, unfortunately, it can be a hindrance.
How does a teacher engage the intellect of their students? Kinard has broken the order of attention into four steps: Feel first, See second, Think third, Friendly fourth. She explains each step in this book. (The reasoning behind her theory, including how it fits with patristic understandings of scriptural levels of meaning, is found in great detail in her book Of Such is the Kingdom: A Practical Theology of Disability, published by Ancient Faith Publishing in 2019.) Along the way, Kinard encourages teachers to incorporate occasional spots of humor into the lessons. “As servants of Christ and of these little ones, there is no indignity to any if we allow the children to teach us through a little humor.” (p.10)
The book offers highly practical recommendations of what is needed for an accessible Church school room (as well as what is not!), suggestions of how to theme a parish’s classrooms (including sound reasons for these), and possible setups for said rooms, all focusing on prayer. “You want a child to feel safe, welcomed, engaged, and curious when they enter the classroom. You also want them to be prayerful, and that is why the first focal point of your room should be a way to enter into prayer. Then you will have a seating or rest area that continues their attention towards learning, before they go to the interactive stations of the room where they will apply what they learned through playful exploration.” (p. 11-12)
Kinard’s accessible practices span age groups while also encouraging teachers to learn from their students. As she says, “Let us set aside what does not work and make church school like every good and solid learning that we keep into adulthood. Like when we teach children to cook, let’s use show-and-tell, hands-on learning, acting out the lessons, working alongside teachers, producing the works of prayer through music, prayer actions and words, imitation, and holy iconography, and allowing the children to lead with us, to humbly engage their attention with humor and kindness and deep listening, so that they can follow us as we follow Christ”. (p. 27-28)
Teachers (and teaching parents) who truly long to enhance their students’ relationship with God and with each other; who are also willing to humble themselves and learn alongside/from their students; will do well to read this book and begin to apply its practices. Its pages offer inspiration, practical examples, and resources beyond the book itself that will aid to that end. This book will be an encouragement to all who read it, while also offering readily-available tools for implementing its ideas.
Purchase your copy of Accessible Church School: Incarnational Practices for Participating in God by Summer Kinard at https://parkendbooks.com/shop/accessible-church-school/
For printable downloads of sensory anchors, sample lessons, and the Gospel Lectionary Study template, visit http://www.summerkinard.com
Reviewed for the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Education Ministry by Kristina Wenger, educator, podcaster, co-author of Tending the Garden of Our Heart.