New curriculum to teach specific books of the Bible academically in public high schools is now available from Essentials in Education (EIE). Wisdom Literature from the Bible is a standards-based (National Council of Teachers of English/International Reading Association) curriculum using material from the writings of

• Psalms
• Proverbs
• Ecclesiastes
• Song of Songs and
• Job

in the Hebrew Scriptures to teach English/Language Arts objectives and incorporate lessons of character that can be imparted from the Bible.

[Read Bible Gateway Blog posts that introduce you to the Bible]

According to the EIE news release, this new course was developed as a result of a meta-study on the relationship between character education, student achievement, and behavioral outcomes funded by EIE and conducted by researcher, Dr. William Jeynes, Professor of Teacher Education at California State University at Long Beach. The study revealed a strong relationship between character education & student achievement and behavioral outcomes.

“When character is taught”, says Dr. Jeynes, “higher levels of educational outcomes are documented, no matter what type of standardized or non-standardized measure is employed.” Character education was also related to higher levels of expressions of love, integrity, compassion, and self-discipline.

[Read the Bible Gateway Blog post, Reading the Bible with America’s Founding Fathers: An Interview with Daniel Dreisbach]

Deborah Hicks, EIE’s vice president, says “Wisdom Literature from the Bible allows students to meet language and literacy objectives by studying the writings and life experiences of David, Solomon, and Job. Students gain personal insights by applying critical thinking skills, analysis, and oral and written skills to interpret meanings and imagery of selected materials from the Hebrew Scriptures. Students also experience the influence of these writings on art, drama, and music. This unique instructional resource should be taught in every high school English classroom in America.”

[Read the Bible Gateway Blog post, American History’s Entwined Relationship with the Bible: An Interview with Angela Kamrath]

EIE is the publisher of The Bible and Its Influence, the only academic textbook on the Bible deemed First Amendment safe and is currently being taught as a high school elective in over 650 high schools in 45 US states.

Since 2006, nine US states have passed legislation to encourage their respective public schools to teach the Bible academically: Georgia (2006), South Carolina and Texas (2007), Tennessee (2008), Oklahoma (2010), South Dakota and Arizona (2012), Arkansas (2013), and Kentucky (2017). Several more states are pending for 2019.

[Read the Bible Gateway Blog post, How the Bible Created the Soul of Western Civilization: An Interview with Vishal Mangalwadi]

“With the launch of Wisdom Literature from the Bible, we’re now adding this as a requirement to legislation going forward both in the US and in countries around the world,” says Chuck Stetson, CEO of EIE. “We as a country need to correct the absence of the Bible being taught academically in the classroom since the Bible contains amazing literature that has taught good character for nearly 3,000 years.”

Data collected supports the need for teaching the Bible academically in schools:

• A survey revealed that 98% of US high school English teachers believed that students who had little knowledge of Bible content were at a disadvantage when reading English literature. One course designed to prepare students for the ‘Advanced Placement Literature and Composition Exam’ cites that 60% of the allusions used in that test are biblical.
• In a 2005 survey interviewing university English professors including those from Yale, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, and the University of California at Berkeley, 38 out of 39 agreed that “an educated person, regardless of his or her faith, needs to know the Bible.”
• In a 2017 survey of 1,000 households with teens 13-17 here in the US, 80% of parents believe it’s beneficial for their child’s comprehension of art, literature, and music to have an education that includes teaching about the characters and narratives in the Bible.

Stetson says, “With nine states already committed, we would like to see the other 41 states endorse Bible literacy as a supported academic course. We’re calling on parents to seek out answers from their children’s educators to encourage the inclusion of these programs as part of the curriculum for the overall academic and character development of their children.”

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