{"id":209,"date":"2014-05-09T10:42:27","date_gmt":"2014-05-09T17:42:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/?p=209"},"modified":"2014-11-25T08:07:52","modified_gmt":"2014-11-25T16:07:52","slug":"reading-materials-for-the-landumas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/2014\/05\/09\/reading-materials-for-the-landumas\/","title":{"rendered":"Reading Materials for the Landumas"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOOK PUBLISHING<\/span><\/h3>\n

As we continue on here in the States, dealing with our health issues, Kirk has been busy working on some projects directly related to our work among the Landumas. Part of what we do in church planting is to produce written materials for the Landumas. The books we publish include Landuma fables and other stories, health topics, Bible lessons, and Scripture. We have also been compiling a Landuma-French-English dictionary almost since day 1.<\/p>\n

Page from Landuma Jonah booklet<\/p>\n

But w<\/strong>hy bother?<\/strong> |<\/strong> Why print books for a people group with so few readers? Moreover, with so few who are even interested in taking the trouble to learn to read?<\/p>\n

The answer is that we believe literacy is critical if there will ever be a strong church among the Landumas. Though it is of course possible for illiterate people to come to know the Lord and grow in their faith, the overwhelming evidence points to the fact that strong churches are much more likely where 1) the people group has God\u2019s Word in their language, and 2) the people can read and write well.<\/p>\n

The hard part |<\/strong> For that reason our missionary team has made a big effort to develop a literacy course, so we, and Landuma literacy teachers, can teach anyone who wants to learn. But now the hard part: helping people get motivated to take advantage of it.<\/p>\n

LANDUMA SPELL CHECK<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Though we have always done our best to proofread our Landuma books carefully, as anyone who has done a fair amount of editing knows, it is next to impossible to catch every misspelled word before going to press. Up until recently we didn\u2019t have a convenient way to do a computer spell check of our written materials. For some reason Microsoft Word doesn\u2019t come with a Landuma language pack!<\/p>\n

But recently Kirk was able to figure out how to make a Landuma spelling dictionary that would work with Word. So he has been busy taking advantage of this new tool.<\/p>\n

Bulking up the dictionary |<\/strong> Computer spell checking Landuma books not only catches most misspelled words, but it also alerts us to many words which haven\u2019t yet been included in our Landuma dictionary. So our dictionary (on computer, anyway) is growing quickly. The next time we do a printout it will be much more complete than the last time.<\/p>\n

Cover of Landuma a literacy primer<\/p>\n

Improving the literacy program |<\/strong> The literacy primer pages are written in a very specific sequence, an effort being made to strike the best balance between review of known syllables and words, and learning to read new ones. Starting with a \u201cblank\u201d spell checking dictionary and adding words to it one-by-one as each primer reading page is checked in succession, it is possible to know exactly how many new words are being introduced on each page.<\/p>\n

Breaking the rules | <\/strong>Actually, \u201cspell checking\u201d the primers hasn\u2019t uncovered many misspelled words. But it certainly has been a great way to find where we have inadvertently broken the \u201crules,\u201d having included too many new words on a given reading page. In spite of our great efforts in the past to get each page right, the human eye will always miss things the computer easily finds. So Kirk has been making these corrections, eliminating extra words when necessary and carefully rewording the story, using only the limited vocabulary allowed up to that page. (Too bad the computer can\u2019t do that part as well \u2013 not yet, anyway!)<\/p>\n

HAVE YOU NEVER READ?<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

As Jesus engaged the religious leaders of His day He repeatedly corrected them on their faulty theology by asking them the rebuking question, \u201cHave you never read the Scriptures?\u201d They refused to believe in Him because they depended on what they had been told about what God\u2019s Word said, yet hadn\u2019t read it objectively for themselves. Reading is important!<\/p>\n

Meditate day and night |<\/strong> Not only is it necessary to read what the actual Word of God says in order to come to know that Jesus is the Messiah and Savior, but the believer in Jesus also has to read it in order to successfully walk with God day by day. God Himself told Joshua,<\/p>\n

\u201cDo not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.<\/em><\/span>\u201d Joshua 1:8<\/p>\n

Our heart\u2019s desire, and we believe God\u2019s desire as well, is that the Landumas prosper spiritually!<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Please PRAY<\/strong> that the Landumas would become more interested in learning to read their language.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
      \n
    • PRAY<\/strong> that those who can read would take advantage of the many books we have published, that their reading fluency would improve, and most importantly that they would read and understand the published Scripture portions and Bible lessons.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      BOOK PUBLISHING As we continue on here in the States, dealing with our health issues, Kirk has been busy working on some projects directly related to our work among the Landumas. Part of what we do in church planting is to produce written materials for the Landumas. The books we publish include Landuma fables and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":118,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-209","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-ministry","7":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/118"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/kirk-rogers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}