This summer, we will be changing up the way we structure our teaching time on Wednesday night. During the school year we have a sermon followed by small groups where students break down the message and then exhort each other in community.
While this system has served us well, the groups, divided by grade and gender, tend to be larger and quickly get off track. Our Small Group Leaders do a great job facilitating discussion surrounding the message, but you can only wrangle 20 7th grade girls for so long!
This summer, we’re going to switch it up a bit. The goal is for students to own their faith. Students need to learn what they believe, why they believe, and know how to talk about what they believe.
We are going to seek to achieve this by getting students into small groups led by both Small Group Leaders, upper classmen, and our Summer Interns. Our system will include a master teacher teaching in short 5 minute bursts and then initiating discussion questions that will be carried out by the table leaders. Table leaders will then seek to get students talking about what they believe and why they believe. Am I a little nervous about protecting correct doctrine? Sure. Am I a little worried about what will be discussed at each table? Sure. But I know that students “getting it right” will only be a by-product to students first learning to think critically as they verbalize their thoughts and feelings.
[shareable]If youth workers answer all the questions, students are robbed of opportunities to think, process, and develop faith. @YMinBlog[/shareable]
With this in mind, what do you do to get students talking? How do you give students the opportunity to verbalize their faith? Comment below!
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David Hanson: Texas native, Texas Tech Red Raider, M.Div. at Truett Seminary, husband to Ashley, father to Ava & Ben, Student Pastor at The Fellowship in Round Rock, Tx, table tennis (ping-pong) extraordinaire, addicted to coffee. For anything else…you’ll just have to ask.
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