Fall 2016 - That's a Wrap
Well, it was a real difficult finish for me as I struggled with my health over the past month, but by God's grace, I pulled it together and finished out my first Semester at DTS. While I haven't been well enough to keep my posting schedule here, I had just enough strength to limp my way to the finish line and I submitted my final assignment just before Christmas to close out the BE101 course.
Difficulties notwithstanding, I had a great semester and I have high expectations for an excellent grade. Here's a brief wrap of my final month of BE101 and in the coming days I'll write more about my overall experience at DTS this semester.
Saving the Best for Last
The workload for the class was much heavier during the first half of the semester, however, the final weeks of the class really brought all the learning into perspective. I was actually kind of surprised to see how all the work of observation really laid the foundation for interpretation and application. While is a lot of overlap between interpretation and observation, the methods employed in the class really fit together nicely to bring the class to completion.
Reflecting on this a bit, I can see how this class has really challenged my own personal approach to how I study God's Word. It's not enough to come to a realization of the truths of Scripture, it's perhaps even more important to turn those truths into application in my life. I can certainly appreciate that this is an area of my spiritual growth that I need to invest more time in practicing on an everyday basis.
What's Next?
Well, I'm going to be out of school for at least one semester as I attend to my health which I'm sure I'll write a lot more about in the coming months, but I plan on using my down time to apply what I've learned in my BE101 course. I am tentatively thinking about tackling the book of Romans or Thessalonians I and II in my own personal study. This is something I've been eager to do for a while but I've been wary of the challenge this material will certainly present. That said, I can't really imagine a better way to apply my learning than to put it into practice. Perhaps that's also something I'll blog about moving forward.
Additionally, I'll have some time to prepare for my next courses at DTS. I think when I feel up to it, I'll go ahead and order up the texts and get through those like I did for BE101. Reading ahead of time and then during the class really made a big difference in putting my learning into practice during the class assignments. That's what I'm thinking at this point anyhow.
BE101 Statistics
So with everything turned in, here is the time I committed to my studies. Overall, I thought the time investment was very reasonable and while the class was rather front end loaded, it all balanced out and was very manageable in hindsight. The online platform was great and the pace was very reasonable. This allowed me to work around my personal schedule and many weeks I found myself well ahead of my coursework.
On average, I spent about 10 hours per module which was spread over 15 modules covering about 17 weeks. This worked out to be about 3.4 hours of homework for each credit hour. I think this is just about perfect from a course planning perspective!
