Sep06

Fall Kick Off Ideas

by Erik w/a "k" on September 6, 2013 at 1:05 AM
Posted In: Speaking, Volunteers

Summer has come and gone…again! Ugh. We all love the change of pace that summer brings us, but there is something about getting back into the normal swing of things in the fall that brings a great deal of excitement. Today we wanted to give you a few ideas for your fall kick off.

KickOff* Photo Directory – as students arrive, make sure you get everyone’s picture. Have a small dry erase board or a bunch of strips of paper ready. Have them write their name down (legibly). Write down grade numbers on different pieces of colored paper and hang them on the wall behind where the pictures will be taken. Have students stand in front of the appropriate sign. When you are done taking everyone’s picture (it might be good to do this for 2-3 weeks) put them together in a little directory that you can give to all your volunteers. This way they will get to learn the names of all your students.

* Name Tags – you may not be a fan of name tags, but it is a really good idea to use them your first few weeks. This takes away the embarrassment for a leader who may have forgotten someone’s name that they have known for a while. It also helps everyone for sure know who is who. (The hard part is not letting your eyes drop down when they are looking at you. Then you are busted. Haha.)

* No Inside Jokes – when you use inside jokes that many of your students will laugh, but any first timers will feel totally left out. You don’t want that to happen.

* Put Your Best Foot Forward – use your best game; if you have multiple worship teams, include your best musicians; spend a good amount of time prepping your message. None of this is to fake anyone out, but first impressions mean a lot. They stick. Usually there are new people when you get back into school routine and you want them to see that you care about what you are presenting.

Have fun as you get back into a new routine of youth ministry life.

What kinds of things are you doing for your kick-off?

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Aug19

Creating a game out of what you have

by Erik w/a "k" on August 19, 2013 at 11:21 AM
Posted In: Games

It’s easy to wish we had the money to buy all the coolest games out there so we can look cool or make a fun experience for our students. Then we look at our budget and realize that we don’t have the money to do it. I saw a really cool game that cost about $500!!! It is a great game, but not everyone has that kind of money to spend. What if you figured out a way to have a great game with things you already have in your storage closet?!

The idea for this came when our former intern said to me, “You have a game ready to go for tonight, right?” Just moments before we were going to start. He had forgotten to ask me and realized that as soon as he saw me smile. I told him I would come up with something, but that it would likely cost him something. I knew I had about 15 minutes before it was time for our game, so I went to the storage closet and began to look around for what we had.

What I saw brought delight to me heart and a twinkle to my eye. There were some hula hoops, several different sports balls and clothespins. I had my game! I was pretty excited.

Game play:
3 leaders stand at varying distances with hula hoops in the air over their heads.
Student stand at the front of the room and has a football, a beach ball and a frisbee.

Points:
They get to throw each of the “balls” once.
2 points for the closest hula hoop
5 points for the second hula hoop
10 points for the furthest hula hoop

Winning:
The winner for this game is every student that plays. Remember I said he would have to “pay” for it? The points were traded in for clothes pins. Each point a student had, they got to place a clothes pin on my interns’ face.

The students loved it and my intern graciously smiled his way through the pain.
sports stuff

If you want to do the same game, minus the pain, give away 1,000s* of points and give a prize to the winner.

You can always spend money for great games, and that is good, but look around at what you already own. You might just find a gold nugget sitting around. Bring some of your creative types with you and ask them what games they see when they look in the youth area.

*I’m a huge fan of giving out lots of points instead of 1 or 2. They don’t cost you anything and it mentally feels cooler to get 10,000 points for something rather than 1 point. It truly builds more excitement for everyone involved.

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Jul02

Creative Announcements Part 1 (app review)

by Erik w/a "k" on July 2, 2013 at 10:37 AM
Posted In: Announcements, Apps

Announcements are, unfortunately, necessary. We all do them. Usually we get up front, read through the list of announcements and hope that they all stick. Every announcement is important to us, but is it important to your audience? That’s the great question. You need to get the word out about upcoming events, but when you deliver them from the front, reading off your printed/handwritten list, it gets dry and monotonous.

If you really want to get your audience to listen, you need to change things up. This first “announcement installment” is a musical one. Sort of. There is a great app (FREE) for iPhone and iPad called IAMBEATBOX, made by Savage Apps and another one by them called Dub Step ($.99). They both take on the same concept. There are 5 circles* at the bottom of your screen that you can drop into one of 20 squares. Each circle represents one type of sound. It could be a basic beat, a synthesizer, a clap sound, a repeating vocal, a beat box sound, etc.

You can take the circles and move them all around to get the sound you want. There are also preset sounds that you can use as they are or tweak any way you want. It goes for 8 measures and the loops around again. You can also record a track moving around your circles as much as you want. It’s a pretty amazing app.

So here comes the announcement part. Set it up to loop for the 8 measures or record your own track and then give students the announcement you have written out. Then they have to rap the announcement. You can either give it to them ahead of time and have them write the announcement or you can write the announcement and have a different student rap each of your announcement and make it into a game.

There are several things that happen when you try this one out.

* It is something different and change always makes you listen up.

* It is fun to see the audience dance around a bit as the beat gets started.

* You get students some stage time to do something fun.

* If you have a really creative student you get to platform their unique ability.

 

Here’s a quick example of a rap you could do:

It’s summertime and you know what that means
All the grass turns to brown from green
Listen, there’s lots to seek
When you start thinking about what to do each week
Sign up for summer camp
Don’t sit in the corner like a table lamp
Beach trip on the 31st
Make sure you bring water to quench your thirst

Have fun!

*This review is on the Dub Step version. The Beatbox version is slightly different, but same concept. Below is a screenshot for the Beatbox version.

iphone version

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Jun20

Take Advantage of your Surroundings

by Erik w/a "k" on June 20, 2013 at 10:28 AM
Posted In: Youth Room

Every week you meet in the same place.  It’s good.  There is a sense of “home” there.  It’s good to be in a place that is familiar.  There are lots of upsides to this, but of course there are some upsides to change from time to time too.

Changing locations spontaneously (at least to students) adds a sense of adventure to the repetitive weekly meetings.  Throwing a curve ball into your weekly meetings is fun and can lead to some good memories.  It also can lead to breaking down walls that student’s have put up in their lives because it takes them out of routine.  This is especially true if you encourage your leaders to take advantage of the walk or ride** to the new location by having a conversation with a student.

Many of your churches are in prime locations in your towns.  Often times you are within walking distance of a park, school, fast food joint, or near a house of a member of your congregation. Once a quarter or in the summer time take advantage of the community you live in.

Here are some ideas:

*Go to the park and play a field game or a team building exercise and then come together and give a talk in the grass.
Enter Field
*See if a member of your church would be willing to host your group for the night.  Set up board games. Buy popsicles (or hot cocoa depending on the season) and give everyone a snack.  Then gather in the living room for a short message.

*Go to the nearest (and cheapest) fast food restaurant and buy everyone a small ice cream cone.

*Set up a scavenger hunt around the area.

*Even moving out to your parking lot with your chairs could do the trick.

What change of scenery activities have you done with your group?

**If you are leaving your regular meeting property it is a good idea to let the parents know.  If it involves a drive it is a good idea to get release forms/permission slips.

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Jun12

Seating Change

by Erik w/a "k" on June 12, 2013 at 12:16 AM
Posted In: Youth Room

Has your youth room seating arrangement been the same since you set it up 5 years ago?  Maybe its time for a simple change tonight.  It’s amazing how the feel of your room can completely change with just a few small re-arrangements.  Sometimes it can seem like a whole new room even.
couch
Circle Up.  Arrange the chairs in a wide circle around the room.  Sitting in a circle makes it so that everyone can see each other.  This type of seating is helpful when you want to encourage an atmosphere that is more like a conversation.  You can either do your message from the center of the circle or sit in the circle with everyone else.

Face Each Other.  Divide the room in half and turn one half of the chairs towards the other half.  This makes it so that each person can see at least half of the people in the room.  This type of seating also encourages conversation but it allows for students who may not want to stand out as much to be more comfortable.  This set up is optimal for a fun back and forth game too.

Huddles.  Arrange the seats so that they are in groups of 5-10.  This type of seating sets up small groups.  It works great when you want smaller groups to answer questions you ask up front.  It creates a less intimidating conversational atmosphere and saves time if you want every person to answer the question.  If you have small tables available, you might place them in each huddle.  Suggestion: have one adult or student leader in each group to keep groups on topic.

Turn Around.  I recognize this won’t work perfectly for everyone, but you can likely do some version of it.  To mix things up just change the direction the students are facing.  Students will be curious as to why and you wont really have a reason. If you have a youth room with a stage, you may need to get creative.  Maybe this is just for one meeting.

Have fun messing around with your room.

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