Learning and Teaching in the Latter-days



1/17/06

IP&T 790R: Advanced Seminar in Agent Psychology

Learning and Teaching in the Latter-days

Preaching the Gospel

Course information:

Topic: Learning and teaching in the latter-days: Preaching the gospel. 3 credit hrs.

Instructor: Dillon Inouye; Office 150E MCKB; Office: 801-422-7071; Home: 224-4710; Cell: 592-0040; e-mail: dillon_inouye@byu.edu.

Participants: Doctoral, post-doctoral, and those who receive permission from the instructor..

Days, time, and room: TTH 12:00-1:15, 150 MCKB.

Course rationale:

During the holidays, I felt impressed to offer this seminar, even though I did not see myself as the most qualified person to lead it. My personal experience has been limited to one full time mission, the supervision of one dissertation, and a few research visits to the Japanese missions to study missionary productivity and convert retention.

Why was I willing to tackle such a formidable task? The answer is found in five reasons for offering for the course:

1. Preaching the gospel is the paradigmatic, simplest, or general, case of learning and teaching.

By studying the preaching of the gospel, one can learn more about our field in a shorter period of time, with less wasted effort, with a greater degree of order, certainty, and generality than by studying any other topic.

2. Preaching the gospel is the most important topic in learning and teaching.

Our missions as individuals, the Church’s missions to preach, perfect, and redeem, and Father in Heaven’s mission to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man, all depend on the successful preaching of the gospel.

3. Studying preaching the gospel shows what is needed to restore a fullness to our field.

“Restoring a fullness to our field” is another way of stating the mission of our department and its graduates. One can see clearly what is needed to restore a fullness to instructional design, research, evaluation, measurement, and teacher education in general when one considers what is needed to successfully preach the gospel.

4. Many graduates of our program will eventually assume responsible roles in preaching the gospel.

Although all students in our program can profit from the study of preaching the gospel, many of our graduates are destined to become responsible stewards in the preaching cause. One need only look at who the current heads of the MTC departments are to see why a course is this subject should be offered.

5. Because many current, and former, stewards of the Church’s missionary effort are willing to participate in the seminar, it can offer a rich educational experience.

As the list of seminar discussion leaders illustrates, many current and former stewards of the missionary effort will contribute their expertise to the seminar. Many have been mission presidents, some are current stewards at the MTC, while still others have served at mission, area, and general leadership levels of preaching the gospel.

10 Questions.

The seminar is designed to help participants answer the following 10 questions with greater understanding, skill, and conviction. Some participants currently have stewardships which require answers to these questions, others have had such stewardships in the past, and still others are preparing for the possibility of similar stewardships in the future.

1. Upon what truths should an agent psychology be founded? How would these foundations differ from those of mainstream psychology and education?

2. According to the Lord Jesus Christ, what truths should his disciples preach to all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people? Where do these appear in yjr missionary lesson plans of the modern period?

3. Which truths of the restored gospel have been most effective in bringing souls unto Christ? How could we find answers to such a question? Would answers differ across cultures?

4. When these truths have been most effective in converting souls, how were they preached? What instructional designs and preaching methods would be optimal?

5. What are the best ways to define and measure success in preaching the gospel? For missionaries? For members? For mission and church leaders? For the world?

6. How can we find the most informative examples of success in preaching the gospel? How can we identify these exemplars? What would be the best way to learn from them? What would be the nature of that learning?

7. What key attributes govern success and failure in preaching the gospel? How can we identify them with greater order, certainty and generality? How can the relationships among them be more usefully represented for solving preaching problems? What tools of techniques of modeling the process would be helpful? How can missionaries be helped to see the relationships between the realm of the spiritual and the temporal?

8. How could we optimize the retention and continued growth of converts? How could we graft them into the Church in an optimally expeditious way? How could we provide them with the jobs, friends, and the nurture of the word of God that President Hinckley has directed?

9. How could we apply knowledge of these attributes to optimize success in preaching the gospel in the church, home, school, and community when money, time, and personnel resources are limited?

10. What kinds of tools and support systems could help missionaries and members to be more effective in preaching the gospel?

In each of these questions, the terms we, can, and could are used hypothetically.. We are not arrogating to ourselves the responsibility of those who are actually called to preach the gospel and administer in the ordinances thereof. I am confident that they would want us to learn as much as we can about these important processes, as long as we learn them in the right way.

Tentative Schedule of Topics, Session Leaders, and Readings

(Although all guest speakers have indicated their willingness to participate, we will have to be flexible with the dates in order to accommodate changes in their demanding schedules.)

|Date |Topic: |Session Leaders: |Reading(s): |

| | | | |

|1/12 |Introduction |Dillon Inouye |IP&T 790R Syllabus |

| | |Seminar participants | |

| | | | |

|1/17 |A history of missionary work in the |Richard O. Cowan, Professor of Church |Cowan, Richard. Richard Lloyd |

| |modern period. |History |Anderson and worldwide church growth. |

|1/19 |Defining and measuring success in |Tim Bothell, Supervisor of Evaluation, |Preach My Gospel, Chapter 8 |

| |preaching the gospel |Research, and Records, Missionary | |

| | |Department | |

|1/24 |Defining and measuring success in |Rick Ott, Director of Evaluation and |TBA |

| |missionary training. |Assessment, MTC | |

| | | | |

|1/26 |Conversion and the metaphor of |Eileen Sorenson | |

| |cultivation.. | | |

| | | | |

|1/31 |Preach My Gospel. The why’s, how’s, and|Richard Heaton, Director of Training, |Preach My Gospel. |

| |wherefore’s of our current preaching |MTC |Duffy, John C. The New Missionary |

| |plan. | |Discussions |

|2/2 |Response to Richard Heaton’s |Seminar participants | |

| |presentation | | |

| | | | |

|2/7 |Preach My Gospel II: |Richard Heaton, Director of Training, |Preach My Gospel |

| | |MTC | |

|2/9 |Productivity exemplar 1: The Des |President Robert Rowley, Iowa Des | |

| |Moines, Iowa Mission |Moines Mission | |

|2/11 |Productivity exemplar 2: The Richmond,|President Allen Feller, Virginia | |

| |Virginia Mission |Richmond Mission | |

|2/16 |Helping missionaries to preach the |Elder F. Enzio Busche, First Quorum of |MTC Tuesday Devotional |

| |gospel more effectively. |Seventy, Emeritus | |

|2/18 |Helping missionaries to preach the |Elder Yoshihiko Kikuchi, First Quorum |MTC Tuesday Devotional |

| |gospel more effectively. |of Seventy |The First Vision DVD |

| | | |Fear Not DVD |

| | | |Believe in Christ DVD |

|2/21 |Monday instruction. We can meet if | | |

| |there is no schedule conflicts. | | |

|2/23 |New assumptions and tools for |Dillon Inouye | |

| |missionary productivity | | |

|2/28 |Key attributes that govern missionary |Seminar participants | |

| |productivity I | | |

|3/2 |Key attributes that govern missionary |Seminar participants | |

| |productivity II | | |

|3/7 |Key attributes that govern missionary |Seminar participants | |

| |productivity III | | |

|3/9 |Retaining new members: New analyses of|Dillon Inouye |Report on males ordained to the Aaronic|

| |a classical problem | |PH |

|3/14 |Structural adaptations for solving the |Dillon Inouye | |

| |retention problem | | |

|3/16 |More support for missionaries and |The military analogy: strategic, | |

| |members in preaching the gospel |tactical, and logistical support for | |

| | |those going to war. | |

|3/21 |Training and support service plans for |Brian Kohler, Special Projects, MTC | |

| |Preach My Gospel | | |

|3/23 |Training missionaries to Preach My |? | |

| |Gospel in a foreign language. | | |

|3/28 |Training missionaries to Preach My |? | |

| |Gospel in a foreign language | | |

|3/30 |Spiritual training for missionaries |Elder F. Enzio Busche | |

| | | | |

|4/4 |The First Vision. |Elder Yoshihiko Kikuchi | |

| |The B of M as a witness of Jesus Christ| | |

|4/11 |Constrained optimization of missionary |Dillon Inouye and Richard Oveson, 1st |Walberg, H. A psychological theory of |

| |conversion and retention. |Counselor, Provo Temple Presidency |educational productivity. |

|4/13 |The production function, the cost |Richard Oveson |Inouye and Oveson. Constrained |

| |function, and marginal productivities. | |optimization. |

| |Tilling the constraint. | | |

|4/18 |TBA | | |

| | | | |

| | | | |

Reading Materials

Abbreviated titles for the reading are found in the schedule above. The dates listed in the schedule are the dates by which your preparatory reading should be finished.

Books

Driscoll, M. P. Psychology of Learning for Instruction (2nd Ed.) Boston: Allyn and Bacon. 2002. (Do not buy this; I’ll give you a free copy.) or

Driscoll, M. P. Psychology of Learning for Instruction (3nd Ed.) Boston: Allyn and Bacon. 2004. (You may purchase this at for about $80.00).

Gilbert, T. F.  Human competence.  New York:  McGraw-Hill, 1978. (Clean used copies are relatively inexpensive at .)

Gong, S. Learning and Teaching for Exponential Growth. Provo, UT: Brigham Young University.  2002.  (I will sell you a copy for $9.00.)

McConkie, J. F. Here I Stand. Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co.

McTaggart, L.  The Field:  The Quest for the Secret Force of the Universe.  New York:  Harper Collins.  2002. (I will sell you one for $12.00.)

Preach My Gospel. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 2005. (Available from Church Distribution for $4.00.)

The Standard Works of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Chapters, articles, and dissertations:

Cowan, Richard. Richard Lloyd Anderson and worldwide church growth. In Stephen D. Ricks, Donald W. Parry and Andrew W. Hedges (Eds.) The Disciple as Witness: Essays on Latter-day Saint history and doctrine in honor of Richard Lloyd Anderson. Provo, Utah: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 2000,

Dalton, G. W.  Influence and organizational change.  In Kolb, D. A., Rubin, I. M., Eds.  Organizational Psychology: A Book of Readings.  Oxford, England: Prentice-Hall.  1974.  

Groberg, Delbert F. Toward a Synoptic Theory of Educational Productivity. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, 1985.

Inouye, D. K. and Oveson, R.  The constrained  optimization of productivity.  Presented to the Annual Meeting of the American Psychological Association, Montreal, Canada.  April, 1983.

Inouye, D. K., Merrill, Paul F., and Swan, R. S. Help: toward a new ethics centered paradigm for IDT

Inouye, D. K. The five steps of qualitative change. (In process).

Prince, Gregory A. and Wright, Wm. Robert. Chapter 10: The missionary program. David O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. 2005.

Report of the APA Task Force on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control.

Grading and assessment:

Because this is an advanced seminar, traditional tests and educational assessment are not appropriate. Grades for the course will be given on the basis of participation in the seminar, including attendance, and the degree to which their project or proposal of a project might help missionaries, missionary leaders, and/or members to be more productive in missionary work.

Some possible articles, dissertation topics, and projects to consider:

Scholarly articles or dissertation topics.

The growth curve: What we learn about learning.

The decision to learn.

Why investigators terminate learning: Accounts of their lived experience.

What directions have prophet leaders given about the manner of conversion?

Strengths and weaknesses of different views of the manner of conversion: Is there a middle way?

The matrix of conversion: Universal pattern of personality change.

Instruction design for conversion: How is it different?

The Holy Ghost as an agent of change: What converts say.

Akrasia: Helping to heal the weakness of the will.

sing the love of God to break addictions and free people.

Love as a power from heaven.

The metaphors of conversion and qualitative personality change.

Fear and love of God.

Forgiveness and healing.

Returning to the fold: What we can learn from the newly reactivated.

The role of designated “angels” in the conversion and retention of members.

Cell groups and the spatial ecology of fellowshipping.

The conversion susceptibility scale: Characteristics of those most likely to convert. (Like the Hilgard and Weitzenhoffer Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale.)

Life table analysis as a way of anticipating and down-proofing inactivity. (Like the Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale.)

How to predict those converts who are most at-risk for inactivity. (Like the heart attack risk scales.)

New measures of missionary and mission productivity.

Time to convert. (How much time is needed for conversion?)

Training materials to hearten and improve spiritual skills of their viewers:

A training video about, “Helping a person see that (s)he is a child of God.”

A training video about, “Starting each day in your own Sacred Grove.”

A training video about, “How to teach the First Vision.”

A training video about, “How to teach the Book of Mormon as another witness of Jesus Christ.”

A training video about, “Cleansed and purified from all sin.” For missionaries, priest quorums, and laurels.”

A training video about, “Be not afraid. Teach diligently and my grace shall attend you.”

A training video about, “Believe in Christ.”

A training video about, “Being a Christ-like witness of the living God.”

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