Problem. Seventh-day Adventist adolescents need a clear understanding of the gospel which provides the assurance of salvation. Since in Seventh-day Adventist colleges there is no curriculum for the Epistle to the Galatians, this study was intended to provide college religion students with the opportunity to understand cognitively and to apply experientially the claims of the gospel as presented in Galatians.
Method. The basic philosophy of the learning approach utilized in this study was that a curriculum is more than a blueprint for educational planning. In Christian education, curriculum is a bridge between theory and practice in the cognitive, affective and spiritual domains. The instructional product development method of Baker and Schutz (1971) was utilized in this study. The product was empirically developed through seven systematic steps. Having established the need for the product, behav iGTu 1 objectives were created. Then the cognitive pre- and post-tesc items were formulated, as well as the criteria by which they would be evaluated. The curriculum was prepared in the form of lectures for the college students. General mastery was established at 80/80; that is, at least 80% of the learners would need to demonstrate mastery of at least 80% of the criteria established for each of twenty-eight objectives in the cognitive post-test. An affective instrument was also developed to measure the modification of effect in the instructional sequence. The lectures were presented first to small groups, then modified, and the group size increased. When the mastery of the content was achieved at the determined level, the curriculum was considered to be ready for field use.
Results. All of the thirty-three participants achieved (1) cognitive mastery at the predetermined level of 80/80 and (2) a t-score of 8.122 which is above the level of significance of 2.036. This suggests that a positive modification of affect was also achieved.
Conclusions. Since there is both a need for a well-formulated gospel message and a lack of a college curriculum of the Epistle to the Galatians, this college curriculum could be utilized as a primary learning tool of instruction in college religion classes