Religion Education - July

by Stuart Holmes

To quote myself during a recent Time With Children, “Summer is like a giant banana split. You can’t wait for it to get here, but by the time you’re halfway through you’ve really had enough!” Hopefully no one will feel that way about RE during this summer!

The summer season began on June 17th with “Tie Dying Fun” led by Paul Dulany. Be sure to look for smartly tie-dye-clad RE students throughout the summer! Special thanks to Paul for securing the special dyes and treatments, and Debbie Hall for her donation of the white T-shirts!

Upcoming events in July and August include hiking at the San Miguel River Park near Lake Hodges, spending a day in the science lab, and there’s bound to be a watermelon, water-balloon packed picnic in store, as well. Check the weekly announcements or your email for the most up-to-date information on these and other events. Got any ideas you want to share? Don’t hesitate to let me know.

This year, on July 5th the RE committee will hold a mini retreat at Chalice to map out the program for the coming school year. As always, we strive to meet the diverse needs and interests of the students and their parents. If you have concerns or input you’d like us to consider as we plan, please don’t hesitate to contact me.

We are excited to be introducing the “Center Quest” program for the coming year. “Center Quest” is both a curriculum and a methodology that gives anyone the tools to become an engaging and effective teacher. Special training for teachers is required for the program to ensure its success. Several volunteers from Chalice will attend a training this summer, in July, at the Palomar UU Fellowship to help get our year started. A training session led by Liz Jones of First Church will follow for all our volunteer teachers on September 21st and 22nd. The benefits of this training will last for years to come. Once again we will need a full slate of volunteers to make the RE program a success in the next year. I encourage anyone even remotely interested in teaching RE (or anything else for that matter) to set aside these dates and contact me right away!