If you’re going to track your progress, you might as well learn something from your tracking chart, right?
Elsewhere on this site, I have provided charts to track your chapter-by-chapter progress when reading the standard works. What makes them different from other similar “chapter reading charts” is that they break the chapters into groups so that you can see the structure of each scriptural book you’re reading. In other words, as you track your progress, you also learn something about how the book is organized, and you hopefully better understand and remember what you’re reading. Thus I’ve called them “structural chapter reading charts.”
In the LDS Church’s four-year seminary program, the Old Testament is the only course for which reading the entire text is not required. Instead, selected chapters were chosen for emphasis (I used the chapters designated in the 2014 teacher manual). Students are of course welcome to read the entire work, and some take the challenge, but the selected readings covers most of what you would need at an introductory level.
Therefore, I’ve adapted the Old Testament structural chapter reading chart and made this version, which only shows the selected reading chapters; the rest are greyed out. I also inserted lines for the books of Moses and Abraham. Other than that, the two charts are identical. I hope this makes it easier for seminary students (and teachers!) to not only track their progress, but also wrap their minds around the larger story arch. Kind of like how individual episodes of Avatar: The Last Airbender are cool, but the multi-season story arch is even cooler. Yeah … kind of like that …
Series: Structural Chapter Reading Charts
- Old Testament
(or just the Seminary Selected Readings) - New Testament
- Book of Mormon
- Doctrine and Covenants
Brother Richardson, these charts are great help but I have one question: Is each row supposed to correlate to the amount of chapters to be read each day and the corresponding lesson for that day? The reading charts put out by the Church don’t really indicate day-to-day reading, leaving us very confused!
Thanks
Good question. No, this chart does not correlate with any kind of reading schedule or time period. It doesn’t tell you how much to read each day or week. It only tells you which chapters go together by the same topic or theme as you read through them. This is not a schedule; it only tracks your progress, regardless of how fast or slow you’re reading.
If you want a reading schedule that goes along with the Seminary lesson plans, I believe Jenny Smith has prepared something like that. Go to this web site:
http://www.mormonshare.com/lds-clipart/jennys-old-testament-reading-schedule-pacing-guide
I LOVE THIS. I have been looking for some structured reading plan. THANKS SO MUCH as I think this will be wonderful, just wish I could order already laminated! THANKS AGAIN!
This is a very meaningful aid and contribution. Very grateful for your time and effort creating it. It has greatly helped me in providing a structured approach to the topics and periods of the Old Testament, a book that is otherwise daunting because of its complexity. Thank you and bless you.
Will you be showing a reading schedule for PGP and OT soon? Last year’s D&C was so helpful to us and kept us on track.
Yes! I’ll add it to my Christmas vacation to-do list. Thanks for the nudge!
Do you by chance have your updated reading chart for 2022? Your work is fabulous!
Working on it AS WE SPEAK! Thanks!