Welcome to week five. Can you believe we're at Week Five already? I'm loving  engaging in this course with you, and I hope that you are gaining richly from the  resources and from both Barb and I, as we've shared some things in the other  videos that we've been able to put in place here for you to learn from. So we  continue to talk about universal design this week, but we've dove in a little bit to  our children and youth context. We've dove in a little bit into what that looks like  in our corporate worship settings. And now I want to share some real examples  from churches and students from this course, as well as churches that I've  interacted with. So here we go, universal design examples from students in this  course, we hear from a student in Zimbabwe, where it is noted that shade is  also important to provide, and in other countries, in Africa and all over the USA  and Europe and Asia, students note accessibility features like ramps and wide  spaces for wheelchair users are extremely important. So remember what I said  a while back, that accessibility features are often a part of the conversation  when we're talking universal design, because it's all about expressing we expect people with varied abilities to be here and to use this space. So accessibility  features, like a ramp, say you are welcome here. We want you to be here. We're expecting you to be here. And also, again, a ramp, much like an elevator, is  offering people how a way in that may not have to require steps, but people can  use it, even though they might be able to use steps. So ramps are a great  example here. So a lot of people have built ramps. In fact, one church put in  their in their sanctuary, this little lift so that people using walkers or in a  wheelchair could actually be lifted up onto the stage and towards the pulpit, so  that, so that they could be leaders and preachers right there on the stage. So  sometimes a ramp is a good option. Sometimes installing something like a lift or  a mini elevator, just for that little area is also a possibility some neat features to  be aware of. Seating is a hot topic among students of this course, as it should  be. Many church goers think of pews or those padded chairs in rows that kind of interlock together, and some have a little rack underneath for Bibles or right we  have pew racks for our Bibles and hymnals, but many church goers think of  wooden or plastic chairs gathered on a concrete or a dirt floor or even outside.  See the idea of universal design is to offer options so that people can choose  what works for them, ensuring that the options are offering something that will  support participation by a greater number of people, those who use wheelchairs, those who move around a lot while seated, or stand up and move around often,  no matter how hard they try to stay seated, those whose bodies will be in great  pain unless they have some cushions and perhaps some back support. So  again, just thinking about all the different ways that we can be helping to meet  the needs with our different seating options, like we talked about in our  children's setting, but now just thinking in that corporate worship setting in  Norway, a student shared that they added different seating options in both their  children's and their adult spaces, purchasing some used sofas and adding 

cushions For use on pews and in other chairs. So students are taking these  ideas and implementing them in their own context, and it's exciting to see. So be curious how you would implement these ideas in your context. A student in the  state of Georgia in the USA notes that we will implement video screens and  prominent signage to indicate when the worship music is about to start and  inform attendees that the volume will be high, and this notification will allow  those who may be uncomfortable with loud sounds to make an informed choice,  to either exit the area before the music begins or opt to wear earplugs. And we  will provide earplugs that effectively reduce sound levels but still allow for a  comfortable hearing experience. And I think this student really took it to heart  and said, we just need to let people know it's going to get loud. We're going to  just let people know worship is starting, and here comes here comes the  loudness, and we'll provide some sound blockers so that that is a more  comfortable experience. Great job for the students in Norway who are taking this to heart. I want to introduce you to Dave Vander Woude. He's actually an alum  of CLI so he's been through the Christian leaders Institute and is an ordained  pastor. He's the planting pastor of a church called City Hope GR in Grand  Rapids, Michigan, and so I want you to be able to hear from him. So click on  that video and watch Dave, because his church has really taken this to heart,  and they've got some great options built in, because they are thinking literally to  be a church of all abilities from the very start, and they're very intentional about  that. So so have a look at Dave's video and what City Hope GR has to offer in  the. Pact that it's making on the families who come and the community, and  really simply saying that we, the church, are the place to not just be, but to  belong. And so a great example right from an alum of CLI that I'd like you to get  to know now, a student from the state of Florida in the USA, says, in tandem  with visual schedules, adding transition chairs to the children's ministry has been a great tool, and says that when children sit in the transition chairs, they listen to the next activity that's on the schedule and then make that transition from those  chairs to the next activity. Now, admittedly in the disability world, when you say  transition chair, some of us are thinking of something very different, which is  more the picture on the left, which is a chair that is modifiable as a child grows  and so it transitions with them, who might need a high chair, for example, with a  table surface on it and a supportive back. And so that structure built into the  chair, but they need it to grow with them. So it's their transition chair, as they  grow from a young child, small child high chair into a bigger child, or individual's  high chair, that offers that kind of structure. So transition chair can mean a few  different things, but this student was talking about these chairs that you can sit in during a transition time of routine change, or a routine of transitioning from one  activity to the next. So that's just what we're talking about. And I kind of think of it like chairs that are in a waiting room, right? You go and you sit in the waiting  room, and that's your transition space before you enter an appointment. And so 

think of it like that. You want to offer people a bit of a waiting room for their  transition into the next activity. So just offering, what does it look like to offer a  little bit of a waiting room space in between one activity and another activity?  And that's a great example of universal design that can help all of us just be able to transition more easily. Okay, so some other things to use in Zimbabwe, a  student writes. Picture is the universal design that will be used. Picture is easy  to develop based on the things I would love to communicate. It makes  communication easier. It helps people with all abilities who find it difficult to  collaborate with people when it comes to learning to be independent. In that  short period, pictures can positively affect the mood of people of all abilities,  especially when the picture is attractive and exciting. It's easy to create pictures  without having financial challenges. And so I'm showing you some pictures here, of, for example, the Bible Project, which has great illustrations that can be used  when you're teaching and wanting to use pictures. I encourage you to have a  look at free Bibleimages.com. They offer these, and they're actually like libraries  of images. So when you first log on, you'll see pictures, but those just indicate a  library of more images about stuff like that, and so click around on those. I also  have pictures from my trip to the Holy Land. This is a picture of a city that is  about 2800 years old, and Abraham would have walked through that city gate.  And so real pictures of real places are also really, really helpful visuals to include that help all of us to engage better with Scripture and knowing that these are, in  fact, real historical places. Sometimes illustrations are helpful. This is actually an illustration my husband created for some Bible study material about the Good  Shepherd and Psalm 23 and so there are lots of different options when we're  talking about pictures and how they can be used, and whether you go online  and find things and use technology, whether you print them, whether you draw  them, like my husband did, and he's often doodling and drawing in church, and  sometimes his drawings and creations get used in sermons or in other ways in  our congregation, and so utilize the gifts and abilities and the tools that are at  your disposal to make visuals a part of what you're doing now there are some  curriculum options that already have these built in. And so together, is a great  example of this. I told you that I was going to mention some things by with  ministries, and this is one of them. Their Bible study curriculum. They have quite a few different units to think through, but great content that helps us to engage  with Scripture together. And so what it looks like when you log into it and you  purchase access to this material, it is through a subscription, so you will have to  pay if you want to use it, but you can see examples of it for free. And this one  from the road to Jerusalem that I happened to be the author of makes use of  some video things. And there you'll see again, right those thumbs up, thumbs  down responses for different options for how to express what you're learning  and engaging in the material. And there are also options like drama. And lots of  people love to participate in the drama version of the Bible study. And there's 

always something that is called a take it home. That is something tangible,  something that reiterates the learning, something you can take with you, and  sometimes it's something you give away, but just that that I mentioned, so many  churches are getting away from using paper, but I still really like to have  something tangible to send home with someone, and to say, this is what we've  been talking about today and and this is what we want to continue to focus on in the days ahead, in between our times, worshiping together. And so encourage  you to utilize visuals much like this together curriculum does whether you use  their curriculum or not. Some other things to think about a student in the state of  Georgia in the United States, says the simplification of church language. So let's just think about that as a concept of universal design for a moment, that our  Christianese our our churchenese can be over complicated. Sometimes for  people who simply aren't very experienced at coming to church, it may have  nothing to do with a disability. It's just an unfamiliarity with being in church. And  so there are a lot of reasons why we might want to simplify or at least offer  explanation for and again, kind of different handles to grab on to, for that  churches or that Christianese that we're using. So let's think about our  language, and that leads us into thinking about how we can use icons and  simple language in our worship services, and even to talk about what we do in  our worship services. And that leads me into our next topic. And I've warned you that this was coming, because I'm really excited about this. We call it vertical  habits, and Barb is going to come in and explain about that in the next video  segment. But let me introduce it this way. I came across this actually in my own  personal devotions, not all that long ago, and it reminded me of this concept. So  you might be familiar with the author, Oswald Chambers and his devotional  book, my utmost for his highest. But he wrote this when we first begin to form a  habit, we are fully aware of it, and there are times when we are aware of  becoming virtuous and godly. But this awareness should only be a stage we  quickly pass through as we grow spiritually. So he's just talking about kind of our spiritual development, and I think about that, as we all become co laborers in  Christ, that's what we're all doing, is growing in our spiritual development,  disability or no right. And so he says the right thing to do with godly habits is to  immerse them in the life of the Lord until they become such a spontaneous  expression of our lives that we are no longer aware of them. And I think that's  why we call them habits, because we build them up in our lives. We practice  them while we are in our worship services, and those should become the habits  that just erupt out of us spontaneously in the rest of our lives. So you're going to  learn from Barb more about the vertical habits and why they're called vertical  and habits and all of the things. But wanted to introduce it that way, just from my  own personal reflection, to say this really is what it's about to be someone who  is a disciple of the Lord Jesus, who is a Christian, and whose abilities might be  limited in a way that images and simple language and different options for 

engaging are really going to help me participate in this faith formation process  and in developing these habits. So listen to Barb and enjoy her in the next  segment about vertical habits.



آخر تعديل: الاثنين، 20 أبريل 2026، 9:14 AM