Orthodox Saints and Geography: North American Saints
Have you ever wondered where the saints considered North America Saints came from? Did you know that most of them were not born in North America? How did the geography and climate influence their life and journey to America? What mountain ranges did they climb, how did they get here? How long were their boat rides? Where did St. Raphael our schools patron saint come from? How did he get here?
In this course we will discuss twelve North American saints such as St. John Maximovitch, St Peter the Aleut, St. Herman of Alaska, St Innocent and many more! We will discover how they made their way to North America, what did this land look like when they got here? How long did it take for them to get here? We will discuss a saint, their journey, and explore a map of their journey discussing major landmarks they traveled through or around. We will have map activities provided by the instructor, students will be mapping the saint of the week on an overlay of their printed map. As a final project students will be creating a salt dough map of an area. Did the saints ever cross paths? These are all questions we will spend the semester exploring the answers too!
Each week students will share what they found interesting about the saints journey. Students will be sharing their maps in class and complete some map activities.
Syllabus
Course Materials:
- Father Herman Alaska’s Saint by F.A. Golder
- Saints of North America- An Activity Book for Orthodox Children and Parents (provided in pdf format at no charge)
- Fine Point Wet erase markers
- Clear Overlay paper
- Printed map provided in PDF form by Instructor
- 101 Orthodox Saints
- Various Potamitis Publishing Saint books
- (We will use this in class. Not required for home use, but a great addition to your library.)
*Required materials are not included in the purchase of the course.
Stephanie Jones has been teaching in some capacity for over a decade and has a deep love for Christian education. She graduated in 2002 with a double major in Business Management and Marketing. She has volunteered as a Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) for the last seven years, advocating for eleven foster children in her area. Brandon and Stephanie also work weekly at pregnancy home in their area, helping the young women find stability for them and their new babies. She also serves as co-chair of the Children’s Education committee at her home parish Holy Ascension Orthodox Church in Norman Oklahoma. She teaches church school and assists in implementing a four year cycle of children’s curriculum for the parish. Stephanie and Brandon have four adopted children, all of whom she has educated at home over the past 12 years. Sjones.scholeacademy@gmail.com
Computer: You will need a stable, reliable computer, running with processor with a speed of 1 Ghz or better on one of the following operating systems: Mac OS X with MacOS 10.6 (Snow Leopard) or later; Windows 8, 7, Vista (with SP1 or later), or XP (with SP3 or later). We do NOT recommending using an iPad or other tablet for joining classes. An inexpensive laptop or netbook would be much better solutions, as they enable you to plug an Ethernet cable directly into your computer. Please note that Chromebooks are allowed but not preferred, as they do not support certain features of the Zoom video conference software such as breakout sessions and annotation, which may be used by our teachers for class activities.
High-Speed Internet Connection: You will also need access to high-speed Internet, preferably accessible via Ethernet cable right into your computer. Using Wi-Fi may work, but will not guarantee you the optimal use of your bandwidth. The faster your Internet, the better. We recommend using a connection with an download/upload speed of 5/1Mbps or better. You can test your Internet connection here.
WebCam: You may use an external webcam or one that is built in to the computer.
WebCam Recommendations: Good (PC only) | Best (Mac and PC)
Headset: We recommend using a headset rather than a built-in microphone and speakers. Using a headset reduces the level of background noise heard by the entire class.
Headset Recommendations: USB | 3.5mm
Zoom: We use a web conferencing software called Zoom for our classes, which enables students and teachers to gather from around the globe face to face in real time. Zoom is free to download and easy to use.
To download Zoom:
- Visit zoom.us/download.
- Click to download the first option listed, Zoom Client for Meetings.
- Open and run the installer on your computer.
- In August, students will be provided with instructions and a link for joining their particular class.
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