This web site contains news and activities for the adolescent faith formation at Christ Our Light Church in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.

You are God's Handiwork

Portfolios

This year we will be using portfolios. Portfolios are a great way for you to share your work and to show how you have grown through the year. For each week that you are in class, you will reflect on an essential question and develop a response to it. Each response will be added to your portfolio. These responses can be created in a variety of ways. They can either be printed and added to your portfolio as a document using word processing software. You can create a presentation with a software application such as PowerPoint - you then include a copy of your work on a cd/dvd that is placed in your portfolio. You can also post your reflections to the web. You would then print out your response and add it to your portfolio. You could create and post a video to YouTube that offers a reflection. You would then post the link to the video as a comment in the blog for that week's essential question and then include a copy of your work on a cd/dvd that is placed in your portfolio. You need permission from your parent(s)/guardian(s) before you post anything to the web!

Essential Questions

Essential questions require you to either make a decision or plan a course of action. Questions for making a decision would begin with "Should...?" or "Which...?" Questions for planning a course of action would start with "How...?", "Why...?", or "What if...?".

In order to answer an essential question, you begin by asking foundation questions. Foundation questions are the "What is/are?" types of questions. They provide factual information and help answer the essential question.

The list of essential questions for the Morality session can be reviewed by selecting the link in the left navigation bar for essential questions.

Weekly Process

There are three mini-courses being offered this year: faith, morality and vocation. Each mini-course is four sessions or meetings. Each student will change mini-courses after four sessions so that by the end of the year, every student will experience all three mini-courses. Every evening when you have class, you will have one session and a large group activity. Based on what you learned and experienced that evening, you will be given an essential question to consider. In order to answer the essential question, you should think of foundation questions. By researching and answering the foundation questions, you begin to answer the essential question. After all the research and answers are complete, you then create a response to your essential question and place this response in your portfolio. The response should include your foundation questions and answers.

Example

In class you learned about the importance of prayer and an introduction to the Bible. You also read the gospel for the week which is Matthew 20:1-16, The Laborers in the Vineyard and discussed the Question of the Week for the Parish, which is: "The master in the vineyard is very generous. How can you be like him?" In the large group activity, you made sandwiches for the soup kitchen in Camden.

You are given the following question, "How could prayer make a difference in my life?" (essential question)

To answer this, you might ask some foundation questions: "What is prayer?", "What is the power of prayer?", "How important was prayer to Jesus - did prayer make a difference in his life?", and "What kind of difference did prayer make in the lives of the saints?" (research a few). After researching the answers to these questions, you would create a response and include these questions and answers in your work. After you have finished writing your response, place it in your portfolio.

Reflection Length

Since an essential question needs several foundation questions and research, your response can not be just a few sentences or a single paragraph! It should be several paragraphs.

Cheating

It's pretty tempting to search the internet for information and then "cut and paste" that information into your reflection. However, cheating is wrong - especially on religion homework! And the person you are cheating the most is yourself because you are not giving yourself the chance to express and develop your thoughts and faith. There aren't very many moments in life when you are given an opportunity to express your thoughts about your faith knowing that someone will listen. We value you and your faith. Please do your own work and give yourself an opportunity to share your thoughts and faith with us.

Activities and Reviews

If you would like to review what we did in class, please select either Mystery of God and/or Morality - Life in Christ when you go to the FaithFirst web site.

Hard copies of the chapter reviews can be downloaded by selecting either Morality - Life in Christ or Mystery of God.

Articles

These articles discuss Confirmation

• Confirmation - 7 Symbols in 1 Sacrament
• Confirmation - A Deepening of our Christian Identity
• Confirmation - Sacrament of the Spirit
• Godparents and Sponsors - What is Expected of Them Today?
• What Difference Does Confirmation Make?

Resources

Use these resources as part of your research

• Catholic Encyclopedia - the 1917 volumes of the encyclopedia - even though the encyclopedia is old, it has alot of valuable information
• Catholic Topics - a variety of catholic topics are either defined or explored through interesting articles
• Liturgical Calendar - explore the colors, seasons, and Mass readings of our liturgical year
• New American Bible - a Catholic Bible is available online
• Saint Index - an extensive listing of Saints can be found here
• Search the Catechism of the Catholic Church - type in a word and search the Catechism for teachings on the word
• Tour of a Church - become familiar with the various sections/parts of a church