The Importance of Gist in Bible Classes

As Bible classes for kids and teens gradually moved away from meaningful scripture memory work decades ago, it really wasn’t replaced with anything. Young people were left with a gaping hole in Bible knowledge, understanding and more importantly, memory. They had no verses memorized that could help them in real life situations and often struggled to know what God wanted them to do when faced with what felt like a need to make an immediate choice.

One of the reasons given for scrubbing Bible class curricula of meaningful scripture memory work (By meaningful, we mean passages long enough to require numerous repetitions over a long period of time to memorize. These repetitions make it more likely the scripture will be stored in long term memory, rather than repeated for credit and immediately forgotten.) was the conclusion that kids and teens did not want to take the time and effort needed to memorize scripture.

Regardless of whether or not the conclusion is accurate, there is some research that suggests there may be a substitute that could work almost as well for everyone…IF we are very careful. There is an idea impacting memory called the verbatim effect. It states that the gist of an idea is remembered better than the verbatim or exact wording of it. This is because memories are more of a snapshot rather than an exact copy. (Which is one of the reasons why eye witness accounts can vary greatly, yet all still be accurate.)

How does this impact scripture learning? Could it also have an impact on Bible classes? Often young people get frustrated when trying to quote scripture because an adult corrects every little mistake in wording….much of which don’t change the actual meaning of the scripture. While I am still a huge fan of scripture memory work, having students memorize the gist of a scripture may be more realistic and helpful for some Bible students. The key here…and this is critical…is that the gist of the scripture passage must not change the meaning of any one verse or the passage as a whole. Do a lot of homework before allowing students to give you the gist of a passage and make sure it is accurate. If it isn’t, you are essentially adding to or taking away from scripture, which the Bible itself tells us is wrong.

Encouraging Bible students to give a short summary of your Bible class at the end of it and again before starting a new lesson can have the same impact. A short summary should give the gist of the story, its meaning and real world application. Having students regularly state the gist of a Bible lesson can make it more likely they will remember it.

Try using the gist method and see what happens. Do your students seem to recall scripture passages more readily? Are they able to remember Bible lessons better? The gist method may not work for every student, but for those it does, it can make a huge difference in their ability to remember and carry out God’s words.

Categories Bible, Elementary, Faith Based Academic Program, Special Needs, Teens
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