You can check out the whole interview at the new Catechetical Leader web site. The podcast is also now available on iTunes.

You can sign up to receive COREnotes in your inbox at www.dio.org.

• Next Wednesday, May 5th, I’ll be giving a short presentation on “Passing on the Faith to the ‘Net’ Generation” at St. Cecelia Church in Glen Carbon, Illinois.  A potluck, sponsored by the Knights of Columbus, will start at 6p; the presentation will begin sometime around 6:30p.
• I’ll be teaching a two-day course on the Second Vatican Council at Ss. Peter and Paul Parish in Collinsville, Illinois, on June 7 and 8. For more information, or to register, contact my office.
• I’ll be giving two breakout sessions at this fall’s Diocesan Adult Enrichment Conference: “Administration as Ministry” and “Marketing Your School Online.” The theme of this year’s DAEC is “Entering the Mystery, Renewing the People” and will feature keynotes by Fr. Richard Fragomeni and Fr. Paul Turner. Registration information will be available in late summer.

Books

• Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives by John Palfrey & Urs Gasser
• Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing Your World by Don Tapscott
• Teaching Digital Natives: Partnering for Real Learning by Marc Pensky

Articles

• Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants by Marc Prensky (PDF)
• Do They Really Think Differently? by Marc Pensky (PDF)
• How Digital Technology Has Changed the Brain by Don Tapscott
• Life Support: What Young People Need in a Digital Age (PDF)
• Using Technology to Get Teens to Pray by Nick Senger
• Prayer Tools for Netizens by Nick Senger
• 8 Myths about Digital Natives by John Palfrey & Urs Gasser
• Interactive Connections, Issue 1
• Twitter and the transformation of friendship by Ron Dreher
• The Future of Reading: Don’t worry. It might be better than you think by John Green
• Tapscott: Digital natives need tech-rich education by Laura Devaney (free registration required)
• Why no one cares about privacy anymore by Declan McCullagh

Blogs

• Growing in Christ – St. Thomas Aquinas Parish (East Lansing, MI)
• One Catholic Life – Nick Senger
• Catechesis in the Third Millennium – William O’Leary

Media

• TKAMB21: To Kill A Mockingbird Meets the 21st Century
• That Catholic Show
• Don Tapscott Telling the Joe O’Shea Story on NetAtNite with Leo Laporte and Amber MacArthur (2008-12-17) (MP3 audio file)
• Social Media Week Presentations

Tools

• WordPress
• Flocknote
• Flip Video Cameras
• MyCatholicVoice.com
• Animoto

If you watched the webinar, please leave a comment with your thoughts and reactions!

photo by Steve Woods/stock.xchng

The following are a few of  the resources I recommended to them:

Books:

• The Bible Blueprint: A Catholic’s Guide to Understanding and Embracing God’s Word by Joe Paprocki – Joe Paprocki is a popular speaker on catechesis and religious education. This book is a great reference!
• Apprenticed to Christ by Jerry Galipeau – Discussion questions and activities following the Sunday lectionary cycle.
• Reading the Old Testament by Lawrence Boadt – Great overview of the Old Testament.
• Jesus of Nazareth by Pope Benedict XVI – An excellent scriptural reflection on the life and ministry of Christ. The second volume (covering Christ’s birth, death and resurrection) is expected this year.
• Adventures of Saint Paul by Oldrich Selucky – A narrative version of St. Paul’s journeys; great for young boys!
• United States Catholic Catechism for Adults – An invaluable tool for catechists.
• Tomie DePaola’s Book of Bible Stories by Tomie De Paola – A great treasury of Bible stories; perfect for younger grades.

Links:

• New American Bible – The daily lectionary readings, online.
• Pope Benedict XVI’s Homilies – The text of the pope’s homilies are available on the Vatican’s web site.
• One Year Bible Reading Guide (PDF) – Read the Scriptures in one year (includes one year Catechism plan).
• DivineOffice.org – Resources on the Liturgy of the Hours.
• Lectio Divina – An overview on this form of scriptural prayer.
• Word on Fire – Fr. Robert Baron’s site includes excellent commentary on Sacred Scripture and other topics.
• Catholic Answers’ Scriptural Reference Guide – A guide to where Catholic teachings may be found in Sacred Scripture.
• Biblia Clerus – A little advanced, but this is an extraordinary resource for finding ancient commentaries on biblical passages.

Class Handouts (PDFs)

• Timeline of Biblical Events – A list of major biblical events in chronological order.
• Liturgy of the Word (adapted for the beginning of the school day) – A simple prayer form to start off the day.
• Lectio Divina – An outline for using this scriptural form of prayer.
• Hidden Books of the Bible (with answer sheet) – A downloadable form of this classic quiz!

You can sign up to receive COREnotes in your inbox at www.dio.org.

Books

• The Cluetrain Manifesto by Rick Levine, et al
• Free: The Future of a Radical Price by Chris Anderson (also available as a free, unabridged audio book)
• Branding Faith: Why Some Churches and Nonprofits Impact Culture and Others Don’t by Phil Cooke

Articles

• Web Squared: Web 2.0 Five Years On by Tim O’Reilly and John Battelle
• 3 Easy Things Anyone Can Do to Evangelize Online by Matt Warner
• Jonathan Coulton on why he gives away his music
• Denominationalism: Is There a Future? by Dr. Ed Setzer (audio recording)

Web 2.0 Concepts

• Gratis versus Libre – Wikipedia article on “Free as in Beer” vs “Free as in Speech”
• 1,000 True Fans – Kevin Kelly’s outline of the concept
• Creative Commons
• www.wordle.net – word cloud generator
• The Long Tail – the original article by Chris Anderson
• Social Networking: A Primer for Catholic Teachers and Catechists (video recording)

If you were part of the conversation, please leave a comment with your thoughts and reactions!

Update

I mentioned a free co-op e-book during the Q&A. It’s titled What Matters Now and offers 70 big ideas from 70 big thinkers.

Next month I will be offering another webinar on technology and catechesis:

Today’s generation gap seems larger than ever. The students in our parishes and schools are comfortable with technologies that seemed like science fiction when many of us were growing up.

Given the radically different way that “digital natives” use technology to take in and process knowledge, what are the implications for the catechetical ministry of the Church? How can we reach out to them without compromising the Gospel? And what do teachers and catechists need to know about this “brave new world?”

This free webinar will seek to address these questions and help catechists, Catholic teachers, and youth ministers find ways to “bridge the gap.”

To register for this free webinar, choose one of the two sessions and follow the URL.

• Wednesday, April 7 – 3:30-4:30p
• Thursday, April 8 – 7:30-8:30p

[Note: all times are Central Time]

You can also watch a recording of my last webinar, Social Networking: A Primer for Catholic Teachers and Catechists, at MyCatholicVoice.com.

photo by demi-brooke/flickrcc