Archive for 'Elementary'
Product Review: Live it Out
Posted on30. Jun, 2010 by Kenny.
So a few weeks ago, we took 70 kids and leaders to summer camp. There were 400 kids there overall and I had been hired by the camp to be the Camp Pastor at one of the three weeks of camp. They had chosen reThink’s Live it Out curriculum in a box to use as a camp theme and curriculum. We use both 252 Basics and My First Look every Sunday, so I was pretty familiar with the material. However, I wanted to give a review of my experience using the material supplied. Please note though that I didn’t go out and select this product and I wasn’t in charge of determining what we used and what we didn’t. As the Camp Pastor, I was given the DVD of video elements as well as the small group materials that had been selected for small group breakouts. So, my experience is more from a “adapt and use” approach instead of “choose and use” approach.
In the 8-10 years that I’ve taught at kids camp, this is the first time I’ve ever used a curriculum. I’ve always developed the theme, written the messages and put together the small group/develotional materials. So, this was a very new experience for me as well. After using a curriculum, would I do it again? Yeah, I think I would.
Live it Out was the first curriculum I’ve used for camp and it was a good/great experience… but I think that your feelings about it are going to depend on what your expectations are. As far as the theme goes, it was fantastic. Take it In and Live it Out is based on the scripture in Matthew, “However hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like the wise man…” The first day of camp was this main point as well as the parable of the wise and foolish men who built houses on the rock and sand. The next four days we chose lessons that were parables of Jesus and they all tied in so well to the theme overall. It was a GREAT message and theme for camp. I know that hundreds of kids were powerfully impacted. Many to begin relationships with God, others to truly “Live it Out.” In addition, the theme song was a lot of fun and very well done. The kids loved it… especially learning the rap. We only used 5 messages/lessons, but there were more to choose from. There was also tons of small group activities to take part in… tons. So, there was no shortage of material. Overall, “Live it Out” is pretty much consistent with what you would expect from 252 Basics.
What did I not like? Most of this may just be personal preference and experience. In all the years I’ve led camps, I never really led small group activities as breakout times like we do on Sunday mornings. For camp, I always had devotional times where kids spent time in their Bibles and working through a guided devotional that tied to what they were learning… teaching them how to have a quite time. In the evenings, I developed discussion guides for kids to reflect on what they were learning. In so many ways, camp is go, go, go, go and it was nice to have kids all gather around on one bunk and have a discussion time, not an activity. Also, I wasn’t a huge fan of the videos. They’re good, just not nearly as funny as I feel they need to be. The way to a child’s heart is through humor and I just don’t think they’re funny enough. Most of them are of one guy telling the story which has some humor, but I think kids really love the slap-stick approach of a straight-man/funny-man approach. However, these are just my impressions and my opinions.
The uses for Live it Out are endless. We used it for camp. I essentially wrote messages to go with the theme of each day. There is some video teaching with every lesson, but it just wasn’t long enough for our taste… not personal enough to lead the room of 400 kids to the heart of the lesson. Maybe it could have been with a guided approach with an emcee, object lesson and then wrap it up with the video teaching. However, others may love the video teaching and it would do the job. This curriculum in a box would also work great for a summer series. There is enough material in here to last you most of the summer with enough stuff to carry an entire church service. You could use it for a modified VBS or any other multi-day event.
So, if you’re looking at if for something like this, I encourage you to pick it up here. It really is a great resource!
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Fun stuff for your elementary rooms
Posted on04. Mar, 2010 by Kenny.
Over the years I’ve always tried to look for great activities for elementary age kids to do before and after the service. Many years ago I simple had the room set up with theater seating and I’d play cool music videos for the kids to watch while they came in. Although some kids may like this, don’t do it unless you have to. The best way to engage kids is with hands-on fun. So, I create activity/play centers/stations where kids can have fun. Not only will they have fun, they can get to know their small group and their leader better while they’re at it.
In my lower elementary rooms, I usually use boardgames and things like that. In the older elementary rooms we have foosball tables as well as video game stations (something the younger kids look forward to). I thought I’d share some of the resources I use at Gateway as well as some games and activities I’ve been looking at getting.
DDR Dance Pads: I got two of these for a little over $400. I picked up a PS2 off of Craigslist for $50 or so. Great deal and the girls love it!
Professional Foosball Table: I bought two of these last year. They’re not cheap ($875) but they’re beautiful and incredibly sturdy. They’re not going to fall apart on you.
Giant Connect Four Game: The younger kids enjoy this game, why not make it a little larger than life.
Giant Jenga Game: This game is a lot of fun for kids of all ages, but what if the tower is almost as tall as some of your kids? That’s fun!
Giant Game of Spoons: Spoons is one of the best games ever invented. Your kids will love it!
Giant Tic-Tac-Toe: It’s not as huge as some of the other games, but the younger kids will enjoy this one.
Giant Pick Up Sticks: A lot of your kids probably haven’t ever heard of this game. Be the first to teach them this classic from the times before video games.
Lego Base Plates: Although I tend to pick up legos off of Craigslist or Amazon, these giant base plates are hard to find. Stick them on a table or even a wall and watch your boys create.
HalfPenny Board: I’ve never heard of this game, but played games like this in school all the time on my desk with a friend. It’s simple and elegant, but I have a feeling that the boys will get hours and hours of fun out of this game.
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The Lock-In (Part 4)
Posted on11. Sep, 2009 by Kenny.
So, what ever will you do with a bunch of kids for 12-13 hours? We’re masters at programming for 60-90 minutes, but all night it totally different. Don’t worry, it’s not that hard. First of all, you need to think smaller. Think in 30 minute increments and it gets so much easier. Because registration can tend to take a long time, I usually try to start the evening off with a movie. Doing this gives everyone time to arrive, check-in and get to one place. A typical schedule would be to have the doors open at 6:45. While kids are registering and dropping off their sleeping bags and such, I’ll have an MC keeping things happening in the auditorium. I’ll do a short welcome at 7:20 and then start the movie at 7:30. Between check-in and the intro movie, I’ve kept the kids occupied and having fun until 9:00. Now that everyone is here, I’ll go over the guidelines and such after the movie is over. We’ll wrap up with a fun group game and dismiss the kids to start their rotations by 10:00. I typically divide the kids into gender and grade groups. So a lock-in with K-5th, I’d have 12 groups with six rotations. A lock-in with 1st-5th will have 10 groups with 5 rotations. I’ll let both genders of a grade rotate together. Essentially every grade will rotate through all six rotations every half an hour. Rotations might include some of the following.
- Group Games: in the biggest room we have we’ll do active games like relay races, dodge ball, and any other fun game that engages all the kids.
- Movie & Snack Room: In this room the kids will watch a 30 minute movie while pigging out on snacks.
- Video Game Room: This room will have all kinds of video games set up, enough so that every kid can play a game or at least won’t have to wait longer than one turn.
- Make-Your-Own-Movie Room: This room would have a video camera and a box full of props. Kids will have 30 minutes to make a movie that we’ll show at a later time.
- Scavenger Hunt activity: Kids race against the clock (30 minutes) to complete a scavenger hunt.
- Craft room: We’ll do a really cool craft that all the kids will like.
- Inflatable bounce and games room: I don’t think I have to explain this one.
- Whatever else kind of room you can think of.
With five or six rotations like this, this will keep things going until after midnight. At this point we may do a giant group game. In the past I’ve done a scavenger hunt/race that will literally wear the kids out. I’ve also done several games of sardines that the kids love and could play all night long.
Usually by 1:00 to 1:30, I’ll start getting the youngest kids ready to settle down for the night. We’ll let them get their sleeping bags and pillows all set up in the room they’ll be in and then gather all the youngest ones for a flashlight story (or glowstick story works well too). During this time, the older kids will continue with another activity. Eventually we’ll get the younger ones to settle down, pop in a DVD and turn the lights out. Most of the kids will be asleep in 20 minutes or less, but the rest can enjoy a movie. After the older kids wrap up their final activities (maybe more time on the bounces, video games or whatever) they’ll come in and settle down as well. We’ll turn out the lights for them and put a DVD on for them as well. By this time it’s close to 2:00 to 2:30.
By 6:30 AM, we start waking up the kids. They pack up, take their stuff to the lobby and go to the place they’ll eat breakfast. For breakfast they’ll eat fruit, cereal or maybe just pop tarts. Easy is good. While the kids are eating, fresh volunteer come in to clean. Since all the kids things are packed and in the lobby, my volunteers can clean the rooms and get everything ready for the weekend. I try to plan this so that parents are coming to pick up their kids right from breakfast so that I don’t have to program anything else for the morning when we’re all tired.
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The Lock-In (Part 3)
Posted on10. Sep, 2009 by Kenny.
Structure and organization are necessary for fun. Without structure and organization, you’re volunteers are going to hate you. Without structure and organization, the kids will experience too much freedom which leads to fights, injuries and hurt feelings. In the end, they won’t have fun either. You must have this in place!
First of all, every minute of the lock-in must be scheduled. Your volunteers want a plan. They love a plan. The idea of being with all these kids all night scares them. They think in their heads, “what am I going to do with these kids all night?” However, when you give them their schedule which outlines a different activity to attend with their kids every thirty minutes, they can get excited about that. The kids don’t have to know the schedule. It can be an adventure for them, something new and crazy every thirty minutes.
Second of all, don’t do a lock-in without guidelines. Be very clear on your guidelines. I post the guidelines on the registration page for the lock-in. After they register, I include the guidelines in all their paperwork that parents have to sign. I train the volunteers in the guidelines so they know how to keep their kids in line and what to do if kids get out of hand. Last of all, I personally go over the guidelines with all the kids before the lock-in gets started. I make sure that they clearly understand what they can and cannot do and what will happen if they break guidelines. To most people, my consequences are pretty strict. However, we rarely have to enforce them becasue the kids know the guidelines and they stay in line. It’s more fun that way.
I found that it took me the most time to establish policies, guidelines and scheduled for that first lock-in. However, once it was done, preparing for the next lock-in was easy. I just tweak the schedule and adjust my guidelines if our activities warrant it. I was starting from scratch though. Now it’s easy to borrow from someone else and tweak it to make it your own. I’ll post all of my stuff later which you are free to take and use.
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The Lock-In (Part 2)
Posted on09. Sep, 2009 by Kenny.
I only have one ingredient to my recipe for success. All you need is the same ingredient and you’ll see success. Want to know what that ingredient is?
The ingredient is… FUN!
Okay, that sounds kinda obvious and cheesy, but I say it for a reason. I’ve seen a lot of church’s suck all the fun (or most of the fun) right out of an event like this. I’ll tell you what the fun-suckers tend to be.
- Over spiritualizing the event. Just because your event is a church event doesn’t mean you need to program it into a VBS/Sunday School/Kids Church filled event. I’m not saying any of those things aren’t fun. I’m just challenging you to the idea that you can gather a group of kids at your church and not do ANYTHING overtly spiritual. I actually think that the quality of relationships built while having fun may be significantly more powerful than any kind of “lesson” you want to teach the kids. At most of my lock-ins we’ll say a prayer to open things up and we’ll pray before eating breakfast, but that’s in. It’s my belief that if the kids like the lock-in enough, they’ll be drawn in to engage where things are a little more spiritual.
- Don’t play it safe. Be extreme! Think about things that kids LOVE to do and program the event around those things. Usually this involves being loud, partaking in sugary snacks and doing stuff they don’t get to do at home. I’m not advocating dangerous activities here, just do something different that what you do on Sunday. I like to tell people that we’re not just going to have fun at the lock-in, we’re going to have “stupid” fun. We’re going to get the kids as wired and riled up as possible. We’re going to feed them candy well past midnight (maybe even give them some for breakfast). We’re going to let them run and play until they drop. Most importantly, we’re not going to make anyone go to sleep. Yeah, you’ll get some parents to roll their eyes, but the kids are going to have so much fun, most of your parents are going to become true fans.
Here’s the thing. Fun isn’t really the ingredient. It’s the goal. In everything you do, “think fun!” Don’t be reasonable, “think fun!”
This scares many of you. Don’t worry, my lock-ins are not wild and crazy free-for-alls. Rather, they are well planned and highly structured. This way the kids still have fun, but they stay safe and it keeps things easy for my leaders. More on that tomorrow.
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The Lock-In (Part 1)
Posted on08. Sep, 2009 by Kenny.
I have a love/hate relationship with lock-ins. I’ve been doing them since I became a children’s pastor over a decade ago. I’ve done small and highly unorganized ones (in the early years) as well as huge and highly organized ones (my biggest topped 300 kids) and I’ve learned a few things along the way.
So why do I hate them? They’re so FREAKIN’ long! Now that I’m in my 30’s, it takes me a week to recover. By the time it’s over, I just want parents to not be late so I can go home and fall asleep on my couch. Yes, this is selfish, but it’s a perfectly acceptable reason to hate lock-ins.
Why do I love them? Because kids FREAKIN’ love them! When we announce that we’re doing a lock-in, about half the kids wet their pants with excitement. Almost every kids loves a sleep over and the idea of doing this at church is just extra cool. Throw in some amazing activities and you’ll have nearly uncontainable excitement.
Beyond that there are several other reasons I do lock-ins.
- They provide a jump-start of excitement into your ministry. All kids can get into a routine. Sometimes our ministries can as well. Something fun like a lock-in can generate some excitement and energy around your ministry (if you’re depending solely on lock-ins and events to energize your ministry, there’s a bigger issue though).
- They’re a great connection point for your kids. The average kid attends church 40 hours a year (I think the average kid at my church is much less). Connecting kids to other kids as well as kids to their leaders is a huge benefit to lock-ins. The 10-13 hours of the lock-in equals 25-50% of the time a small group leader might spend with that child all year. Doing an event like a lock-in at the start of a school year might be a great catalyst for relational growth/
- They’re great for building teams. I treasure this time with my volunteers and leaders. You don’t really know a volunteer until you’ve seen them amped up on sugar at 3 AM. The fun conversations, games and times spent with your volunteers during the event and while the kids are sleeping is so valuable.
- They’re great for recruiting new volunteers. Every time I do a lock-in I seem to grab a few new volunteers. Sometime it is that really protective parent who MUST come as a helper becasue they don’t want to part with their child for the night who ends up becoming a volunteer by the end of the night (it’s that connecting part and team building part that does it). I also have many parents get excited about being a part of something that their kids are so excited about.
Like I said, I have a love/hate relationship with lock-in (I really love them a lot more than I hate them). Whether at a big church or small church, I’ll plan one once a year. Check in tomorrow to see my recipe for lock-in success.
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The Lock-In
Posted on08. Sep, 2009 by Kenny.
This week I’m doing a little series on Lock-Ins. Over the years I have found them to be incredibly powerful events for the Children’s Ministries I lead. I thought I’d write a quick series on why I do them and how to pull them off.
I’m going to include how we plan, what resources we use, how much they cost and everything else you might want to know. I’ve got a lot of information and I don’t think I’ve really blogged much about my lock-ins up to this point. So, if you’re interested in taking a peak behind the curtain, tune in to the posts this week about lock-ins.
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Kid’s baptisms: Are we focusing on what is most important?
Posted on17. Jun, 2009 by Kenny.
Okay, I thought I had finished this little series, but the conversation in the comments in this post has continued and has prompted me to write one more post.
I’ll be honest. I’m still really wrestling with what we’re going to do here at Gateway. For us to prevent kids to be baptized when it’s happening spontaneously like this seems very anti-Gateway. I don’t feel comfortable with it. However I must admit that every day I think about this, I dislike doing what we’re doing even more. I think I’ve narrowed it down and reached a conclusion on what is most important.
I feel it might be dangerous to allow kids to decide to get baptized because they feel like it the day we’re doing it as a church. That’s right, dangerous. Don’t get me wrong. There are some kids who come up to get baptized and they’ve made a genuine decisions and this was the day they decided to be baptized. However, I don’t think it is the majority.
Here’s the danger. So, a child wants to get baptized. Well, we have people there to meet with that child and talk with them. Often times the person meeting with the child leads them to faith or does the best they can to explain it. What’s dangerous is that we’ve placed our focus on them getting baptized, not their decisions to become a slave to Christ! “Oh, you’ve never asked Jesus to be your Lord and savior? Let’s do that real quick so you can get baptized.” God forbid they miss out on being baptized. Let’s convert ‘em real quick.
Shouldn’t our focus be on their decision to become a Christ Follower? I spend the first five minutes of my class teaching the kids that baptism is something you do as a result of deciding to follow Christ. I also repeat many times that the baptism isn’t nearly as important as this decision. We’ll do more baptisms. Don’t rush this decisions. Baptism can wait. I’m not saying that this is related in any way, but why do we wonder that 70+ percent of our kids abandon their faith when they leave home? Did you hear that? 70+ percent of our kids walk away from their faith when they leave for college. Do you think it’s because we’re elevating baptism above a commitment to Christ? It’s nothing for us to see hundreds of kids come to faith in a year. Woo hoo! That’s awesome! But I think I’d be satisfied to see half that number make this decision if I knew that they really, really, really got it.
Here’s my sticking point. When I walk out of the baptism class, I walk out knowing that they got it. They really got it. Some parents write on their response form “not sure they have made a decision.” That’s great. At least we know where they stand. Let’s not baptize them yet. Let’s make sure they got it.
Really, what’s most important?
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Kid’s baptisms: Post baptism summary
Posted on15. Jun, 2009 by Kenny.
So last week I shared what we’re doing for baptisms at Gateway. This weekend we actually had our baptisms at both our South and North Campus.
I met with a 9 year old girl for about 30 minutes to talk about baptism (she couldn’t make any of the classes). She knew lot’s about faith, but hadn’t ever made a decision to follow Christ. So, it was cool to pray with her and her mom and she was subsequently very excited to get baptized. I baptized her at one service and a set of twins at the next. At the North Campus I baptized four or five kids and assisted two sets of parents in baptizing their kids.
Glorious!
We actually didn’t have any last minute kids show up. Every kid who was baptized had gone through the baptism class, which made me feel much better.
Well, I have 3 more baptism classes set up for this summer with one last baptism in August/September. We won’t make any more changes for this one, but I’m looking to do some more tweaking for next year.
So, here’s what’s on the agenda for the future:
A post baptism class:
We had a baptism in April where about 15-20 kids were baptized without attend the class. I’m thinking of offering a post baptism class just to see who we can get to come out. It won’t be our normal baptism class since these kids have already been baptized. However, there’s a great opportunity to give them tools to develop spiritual disciplines. I’ll have ot think about this one.
Pre-baptism class assignment/Baptism class tweak:
Okay, I love the baptism class and there is little that I want to change. As I wrote in my last post, I specifically cover the ABCs of becoming a Christ follower. the kids really connect with the presentation and as a result, many kids make decisions to follow Christ. However, for the last year or two I’ve been burdened. I feel like I’m leaving an important component out. With the ABC’s I cover the fact that we sin and that Jesus died for our sins, but I don’t feel like the kids really get why we need saving from our sins. It’s easy to talk about how Jesus died on the cross for our sins, but sometimes we don’t really elaborate the real problem our sin causes and why we so desperately need Jesus to save us. However, the baptism class is already a 60 minute class and I’m not sure I want to add another 15 minutes covering this and I dont’ plan to add another class. However, I could create a pre-baptism class assignment. Maybe a downloadable lesson kids can do with their parents or even some video driven content as well. By next summer I want to have this piece in place.
Post baptism process:
I really want to develop a “what’s next” process. Baptism isn’t the end. However, too many parents and kids kinda check-off their spiritual check list with baptism. I want to have a followup to the baptism class where kids and parents learn about spending time with God, growing in their relationship with God and maybe even preparing for communion. I know that attendance for something like this will probably be less than for my baptism class, but I’ll have to figure out how to communicate the vision for what we’re doing and apply the proper motivation.
Well, that’s it. Let me know if you have any ideas, thought or comments! Don’t just lurk!
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Kid’s baptisms: Parent assisted baptism class
Posted on12. Jun, 2009 by Kenny.
Lately I’ve been blogging about how we do baptisms for kids here at Gateway. My last post yesterday pointed to how I’ve changed things to where parents have a more active role in the class. Click here to read that post if you haven’t already.
So, here’s what it looks like. I set up the room with round tables with 6-8 chairs per table. Families or multiple families sit around the table. Once everyone has arrived and we’re about to begin, I pass out the Baptism Class – Parent Guide. I explain to my parents that everything I talk about is in this parent guide, including all the scripture fully typed out. I express my hope that parents will pull this out again to review with the kids later.
Essentially I talk about order. Kids are at the baptism class because they want to be baptized, but I explain that baptism isn’t first, it’s something we do after we’ve become a Christ Follower. I also take a minute to explain terminology. Depending on where they’ve been before Gateway or what they’ve heard other people say, becoming a Christ Follower can be confusing. Is being a Christ Follower the same thing as “getting saved” or asking Jesus into their heart? After we’ve explained terminology and getting to the heart of what this really is, I spend the next 15-20 minutes talking about the ABC’s of becoming a Christ Follower. I’ve been using this from the days of doing Lifeway VBS and of all the tools, it’s my favorite. I feel it’s easy to understand and hits the most important parts of becoming a Christ Follower.
After we’ve covered the ABC, I hand it over to parents. You’ll see there is a section for parents to lead. Basically there are some scripted questions that parents can ask to create discussion and inspire individual conversations. I encourage the parents to really probe their kids, find out if this is information is new. Have they done this before? Has this been new information? Does your child comprehend? Are they ready to make this decision? If so, pray with them now. I’ve even placed a scripted prayer based on the ABC’s that the parent can lead their child in right there. So far, I’ve had parents lead their children to faith every time I’ve done this class. That gets me very excited!
After paretns have 10-15 minutes with their kids, I come back and wrap up the class. I talk about baptism. What it is (a symbol) and what it isn’t (Salvation, washing away our sins). This last bit only takes another 10 minutes. Again, the focus is on making sure kids understand becoming a Christ Follower. We close up with questions.
Once we’re done I had out the Baptism Class – Response Form. This gives me a little feedback, but more importantly it tells me if and when the child has made a decision. The first time I did this class, I had these forms sitting on the table and I found that parents filled this out before the class was over which didn’t tell me if any kids made a decision on that day. So, now I hand this out at the end. This is very helpful!
Last of all, here are my Baptism Class – Teaching Notes. It’s actually most of the class completely scripted out. I’ve been doing this for so many years, I don’t need these. I’ll usually give this to someone else who’s going to teach in my place. I don’t expect them to do this exactly, but it’s a thorough example of my class. They can take it and personalize it. However, I do want them to do the ABC’s and the parent breakout. Everything else is up to them.
Well, that’s my class. I’ll wrap up my thoughts on Monday (I’ve got a few more things to say) What I’m doing now isn’t the end product, I know that . I’ll also start another series on why I swear by the ABC’s next week, leading a child (or adult for that matter) to Christ.
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