Isaiah Gospel Doctrine Teacher’s Guide 2018 A five part series helping instructors use the "Come, Follow Me" format

This post introduces the 2018 Gospel Doctrine Lesson Guide using the Come, Follow Me format, but for the adult Gospel Doctrine Sunday School classes operating in this Fall. The intent of the 2018 Gospel Doctrine Lesson Guide is to offer Sunday School teachers in the LDS Church additional resources to engage adults during Sunday School.

Below is a transcript of the above video with some supporting images:

Brothers and sisters, I’d like to welcome you today to Gospel Doctrine with Darryl. This is something a little bit new.

By way of background, so you can understand why I’m doing this, I am a Gospel Doctrine teacher currently in my own ward.  This is probably the third or fourth time I’ve taught the Old Testament, but having worked on “Discover with Darryl” at SearchIsaiah.org the last ten months, I feel like I have some insights to share, especially for Gospel doctrine instructors.  The first thing we’re going to do is show you two or three slides to give you a background into the “Come, follow me” format.

As stake Sunday school president, which was my previous calling for three years, I was in every classroom in the stake watching youth teachers use the “Come, follow me” curriculum. I fell in love with the format: small group discussions, scripture study during the week, reading talks, taking them apart, sharing dialogue and ideas.  It’s really kind of neat.

In this format, it’s important that you, as a teacher take the time to prepare yourself through study and through prayer.  You need to read the scriptures and related conference talks.  (There are not updated conference talks in the Old Testament: Gospel Doctrine Teacher’s Manual printed in 2001, so you will have to find them.  I’m going to show you how to do that in a minute.) And you also need to ponder and listen to what the Holy Ghost is suggesting to you for your class members.

One of the challenges I’m finding is that in our Gospel Doctrine class, we usually have thirty-five members. I try to get six discussion groups of five or six and that works ok.  In the regular “Come, follow me” format classroom, the groups are often two, three or four youth.  If you could get that same kind of ideal setting, you’ll probably get all the benefits of a “Come, follow me” discussion.

I’m told the thing about the “Come, follow me” curriculum is that (now I don’t know this, because I haven’t used “Preach my Gospel” in the mission field), people who have used it find the “Come, follow me” curriculum very natural.  If you have a return missionary who is serving as Gospel Doctrine teacher, or you are one, you’ll find this format to be really, very simple.

What I’d like to recommend to you right now, is that you take a moment and download the course outlines.  It will look a lot like the youth curriculum. There will be some suggested talks in scripture study for you. Then it’ll follow the Gospel Doctrine lesson manual with some discussion ideas.

At this point, it would be wise for you to watch the video, Teaching the Gospel in the Saviors Way.  This is a four-and-a-half-minute video from the Church.  It helps you understand the youth curriculum and we’ll play it for you right now, or you can go out later and study it.

But be sure you watch this video, so you have a background if you don’t know the “Come, follow me” format.  Also, at the Church’s youth website, “Come, follow me” there are some important teaching tools that give you a chance to explore the “Come, follow me” curriculum. 

Here you can see the first presidencies announcement, read articles about the curriculum, and read frequently asked questions. These things will really help you get this format under your belt.  Now, we’re going to move from this introduction into an actual lesson (if you click here we will take you to lesson 35 where you will receive a lesson plan in the Come, Follow Me format and a slide deck to use with this lesson).