All posts tagged Family Ministry and Resources

Kids Sunday: Let Your Kids Run the Service!

By Lindsey | May 26, 2011 | Holidays and Events | 2 Comments

Flickr by Resurrection Lutheran Church - Spring, TX

A few months ago we did something completely out-of-the-ordinary for our church. We handed the service over to the kids. All but the sermon, that is. They greeted. They passed out bulletins. They led the worship. One said the morning prayer. A few did the announcements. All in all, it went surprisingly well. It was a great chance for the kids to feel like they were a real part of the body of Christ (they are, after all!). It was also a great time for the congregation to see what super kids we have here at church!

Interested in something similar at your church? Here’s a few tips to consider:

Practice, Practice, Practice!

After we picked out the songs for the day, we practiced them about a month before hand. We do motions with our songs, and that seems to help kids learn the songs better. I’m a big fan of sign language (I get my motions at aslpro.com) — this keeps the motions consistent for all the songs. Even with all that practice, I still stood in the back of the sanctuary to do the motions for the kids as they did them on stage. This helped with the stage fright factor.

Pick appropriate songs.

Older congregation members aren’t going to want to dance around and spin during worship time — especially if you have a pretty traditional church. We did some upbeat versions of hymns and a few slower choruses.

Try to fit in something personal or fun.

Our pastor is a big cowboy hat fan and he loves to say the phrase “God is good all the time. All the time, God is good!”. We sang the song God is Good (Group Publishing), but before we started, we had all the kids put on cowboy hats. Everyone got a big kick out of that.

Train Your Greeters and Ushers

It’s one thing to watch greeters and ushers each week. It’s quite another to actually do the job! Have older kids do these jobs and have a “practice service” where they can perfect their skills before the big day. Recruit a few congregation members to act like they are attending a church service and have kids greet them and pass the offering plate like it’s the real deal.

Write Announcements Down

For kids who are doing announcements, give them a notecard with their announcement on it. This will help with stage fright. Also, you might want to write on the top, “You go after….” and fill in the appropriate name.

Have a Stage Director

Recruit one of your team members to let kids know when to go on stage, when to come down, and everything in between. You want the service to flow smoothly, so this part is pretty important.

Pray, Pray, Pray!

Of course, cover the day in prayer. You may draw in some parents, grandparents or other family members that don’t normally attend. What a great opportunity to show them that everyone is important in the body of Christ.

Hope it goes well for you!

Rio Curriculum (David C. Cook): A Review

By Lindsey | June 12, 2010 | Elementary Age | 7 Comments

Recently, I received some samples of David C. Cook’s Rio curriculum. I took a look at the materials and here are my thoughts:

What’s Good

1. The strong emphasis on Bible reading.

I love the fact that you go again and again to the Scriptures as different parts of the story unfold. We’re trying to emphasize the need for bringing your Bible to church to our kids and something like this would fit perfectly with this goal.

2. The month long memory verse.

I can’t remember where I read it, but kids are not actually capable of learning a new memory verse every week. It’s just not in their cognitive make-up yet. What you end up with is a bunch of jumbled verses or discouraged kids. Wouldn’t it be better to learn 12 verses really well then try to cram a 50 or so in and maybe end up with the kids not remembering any? Good move here!

3. Break Out Sessions:

There are several opportunities for kids to break up into small groups and work on an activity or craft for a few minutes and then return to the larger group. We have four small group leaders and I know sometime they feel like “I’m not doing anything” since our current curriculum is designed for one main teacher. This would be a great change of pace and allow small group leaders to connect with their kids more.

4. Crafts/Activities:

From what I saw in the samples, the crafts seem meaningful and could certainly carry a lasting impression for the kids. Making family trees, altars, packing lists, etc. Seems fun and interesting.

5. Kids can get involved in the lessons:

Reading, skits, you name it. Lots of opportunity for Kinesthetic learners to get plugged in.

What’s Not So Good

1. Scope and Sequence

This seems to follow the ever popular Genesis + Jesus format. You have the typical patriarch stories and then a bunch on Jesus. There are a few “lesser known” stories, like Nehemiah, Daniel, Philip, and Elijah, but not a whole lot of “new” stuff here. As such, you will probably be repeating a lot of the same stories/lessons you’ve done with your kids before.

2. The Vocabulary Flashcards:

What is this all about anyway? I just think it’s a little much. It appears that unfamiliar words from the memory verse or passage are put on flashcards for kids to learn. I applaud not using some watered down verson of the Bible, but the vocab cards just seem like too much work.

3. The Waiting on the Lord journal page:

We’ve done journals before (with Faithweaver Friends) and they were not a big hit. It seems like more of a fight to get kids to write things down than a “time of reflection”. It’s especially hard for the younger grades who don’t write well yet.

Other Thoughts:

Looking at the Elementary packet, I got the feeling it was a little too old for most of our kids. We have ages 4-10 on our mid-week program and I’m not sure even the oldest kids will be able to fully grasp some of the concepts introduced in the curriculum.

I checked out the Early Elementary packet second and it seems perfect for our group. Love the skits and activities. No journaling, but more “hands-on” learning activities instead.

I’m not overly impressed with the preteen curriculum (which is too bad, because we’re always looking for something for this group). The activities seems like a stretch to connect to the lesson and our kids aren’t that into music, so I can’t see incorporating a “time of worship” each week like the curriculum suggests. Biblical content is pretty solid, but I would like to see something to liven the lesson up a bit or to make it more engaging.

The Three Tenets

I must say, I LOVE the “three tenets” of Rio: Relational (authentic relationships), Intentional (knowing God, not just knowing about God), Overflow (reaching kids by sharing your own faith journey). I also really appreciate the idea of “family-friendly” curriculum, although I don’t really see the connection to family in the samples.

For more information, check out David C. Cook’s website for more information.

Pricing:

$14.99 per leader book (budget friendly version)
$129.00 for everything you need for 1 leader and 10 kids (activity pages, etc)
$25.00 for 5-pack of activity sheets
$25.00 for Family Cards (3 month supply for 10 students): ways to weave faith into life at home

In Conclusion:

I might take a look at the Early Elementary Leader Guide. If the Scope and Sequence wasn’t so filled with the “familiar stories”, I wouldn’t hesitate. This is a beautiful looking and well-written curriculum. I would like to see a little more “Family involvement” besides the Family Cards. We’ll see what happens when we’re done with our current series, but I think it might be worth a closer look.

Another Children’s Ministry Worker is planning on using this. After he recieves his full curriculum pack, he plans to do a review on his blog at www.joemcalpine.com. Be sure to check it out.

Other Curriculum Posts:
Bible in Life Early Elementary
Bible in Life Elementary
Voice of the Matrys: Kids of Courage
The Lads Preteen Curriculum
Group’s Faithweaver Parent

Our Home Is Like a Little Church (Official Review)

By Lindsey | May 11, 2010 | Elementary Age, Preschoolers, Reviews | 5 Comments

Sojourn Community Church has recently put out a great little book to help dads become the spiritual leaders in their house. Published by Christian Focus, the book does a great job drawing parallels between things that happen in church and things that happen at home, spiritually. The quirky drawings (did you see how flexible dad is on page 6?!) and rhyming words will keep kids interested while the overall message is one of encouragement and inspiration to parents. I love that so many elements of the Christian faith are included such as prayer, fellowship, worship, salvation, and the idea that God is always with us. Even with all this content, the book moves quickly and keeps audiences interested.

I was just commenting to my husband the other day about the lack of Christian board books for kids. The only thing that would make this book better is if it were a board book!

It is available for purchase at Amazon and WTS Bookstore.

It’s official page is here.

Be sure to check it out — it’s a great resource for a great price. I know many churches are considering giving them out for Father’s Day. A great idea, especially with the 20% discount currently being offered at WTS Bookstore.

Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from Sojourn Community church as part of the book blog tour. I was not required to give a positive review.

Collaborate Books Are Out!

By Lindsey | April 15, 2010 | Reviews | Comments Off

For those of you who pre-ordered your copy of the new Collaborate book, Michael Chanley’s collection of 34 authors writing about family and church, you should have received it by now! Mine showed up in the mail on Monday and I dove right in, eating up 50 pages before it was time to head to bed (I was a little tempted to stay up late and finish it, but since the baby doesn’t sleep in, I thought better of it!). I’m really liking the book so far, and I think it has some great ideas that I’d like to implement at our church over the next year (I’m trying not to do “too much too fast”). So far, I’m reached Chapter 12 and these are my favorite ideas (in order of appearance):

Parent Liaison Team (Chapter 2)

Milestones Method (Chapter 5)

Parent Fuel Packs (Chapter 7)

Child Dedication class (Chapter 12)

So far, a number of great sounding books have also been mentioned that I’ll be checking out. I like the fact that each chapter is “bite-size” — it’s something I can completely see accomplishing in my ministry. So often, I read ministry books and am amazed at the great ideas, but feel overwhelmed about where to actually start. This book has a great format — you could just take one chapter a month or one chapter a quarter (after you’ve gobbled up the whole thing first, of course) and begin to implement the idea found there. Well, I better get back to reading!

Our Home is Like a Little Church: Book Review

By Lindsey | April 12, 2010 | Parents, Reviews | 1 Comment

A new book has hit the market, a kid’s book, which can help families build a stronger faith. It’s called “Our Home is Like a Little Church” and it teaches both parents and kids (in an easy to understand way!) how the home is to resemble a church. In a home, the father is like the pastor, helping to lead the family to a stronger faith. The book gives simple ideas on how dads can lead the family in that way.

You can pick up a copy of Our Home is like a Little Church: Sojourn Community Church at Amazon.com for just $4.99!

Special thanks to Sojourn community church for writing and sharing this great resource!

Family Faith Talks: Getting Started

By Lindsey | April 7, 2010 | Parents | Comments Off

Building a Family Faith

Without a doubt, parents are the #1 influence in a child’s faith. Churches are always thrilled when parents chose to let us take part in your family’s faith journey, but we realize that much of the responsibility of raising a child who loves God still lies within the four walls of your home. That’s why we want to do all we can to give you the tools to raise “a child after God’s own heart”. A great place to start is family devotions. You can be begin these at any time, no matter what age your child may be. Even if they seem too young to understand, you are building a habit that will stick with them (hopefully for the rest of their life). So, what are family devotions all about? I’m glad you asked! There is a great resource on YouTube called “Family Worship: How to Get Started”. It’s a quick, two minute video that gives the basic elements of family devotions (link found below)

For you visual learners, here is a summary of the video:

Family Worship Consists of Three Basic Elements:
#1 Reading the Bible
#2 Prayer
#3 Singing

#1 Reading the Bible:

You can read a Children’s Bible (storybook format) or an adult Bible. If you’re using an adult Bible, pick a few verses or maybe a paragraph to share with the family.

#2 Prayer:

We can praise God, thank Him for things, ask Him for things, and share our concerns with Him

#3 Singing:

Pick some appropriate songs for your family. The songs could be up-beat or slow. Modern or Traditional. Kid’s song or hymn. It could be the same song for a few weeks or a new one everyday. Group Publishing has some great song downloads on their website that help teach kids memory verses (added bonus)! Also check out Seeds Family Worship and Yancy not Nancy.

Family devotions can be anywhere from 5 minutes to 15 minutes.

The important thing is not how much time you spend at first, but that you START! Enjoy!