144: What’s Your Story? (with Tosca Nathan)

What’s your story, and why does that matter? Long-time educator Tosca Nathan shares about the significance of knowing your story and connecting to God’s bigger story, especially as teachers.



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  • “Like any story, our life stories have a path, they have a trajectory, and it’s full of meaningful events, defining moments, key relationships, trials and disappointments, dreams and aspirations, passions and discoveries.”
  • “How coherent your life story is and how coherently you can talk about your life story has been seen as a factor in well-being.”
  • Coherence of time, thematic coherence, and contextual coherence
  • “Your life story never exists in a vacuum. It is always part and parcel of a bigger story.”
  • “In the telling itself, every time you tell it, there’s more meaning making that happens, so it’s important to tell your story.”
  • “If teachers are not fully aware of who they are and have exercised all of the areas of coherence, they will not be as effective in their teaching.”
  • “The teacher, with what they do or how they relate, helps the student understand how their story connects to bigger things.”
  • “You can’t give what you don’t have.”
  • “To realize that scholarship is part of that grand story completely changes why I even engage in research or why I engage in teaching and learning, and then on top of that, it elevates it to the level of worship.”

What’s changing our lives:

  • Keane: Playing the board game, Sorry
  • Heather: Reaction buttons on emails 
  • Tosca: Reading the Bible through the lens of the grand story and watercolor painting

Weekly Spotlight: Lingo

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Podcast Website: https://teachbeyond.org/podcast
Learn about TeachBeyond: https://teachbeyond.org/ 

12 Apr 24

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