Well since I do programming for Children’s Ministry thought I would give you the four things that we are always implementing at Brookwood Kids. It’s in a little acronym called FITE.
F-Fun. It’s really simple and yet difficult to achieve across different ages. Kids make a job out of having fun. If they aren’t having fun they aren’t interested in what you are offering to them. Simple yet very hard to achieve on a consistent basis. (fun for 3rd grade girls and 5th grade boys looks a little different!)
I-Interactivity. The kids need to interact with their environment and with the lesson. With the attention spans of children and the need to fit strong Biblical teaching in to your only one hour of connection with the kids during the week, it must be important to allow the kids to participate in what is happening. And when you honestly look at your Christian life, one of the greatest things that you get to do is PARTICIPATE! We don’t want to program into our kids that Jesus, and the life that He calls us to is one where you sit and soak.
T-Timing. This is where for most of you’re programming it could be different. For us at Brookwood Kids, we have about 30 minutes of large group teaching. We use centralized teaching and so it is imperative for us to give our small group leaders as much time to connect with them as possible. This is the part that I struggle with the most because I want the kids to get “it” everytime that I teach and so I embellish a bit 😉 Preacher in me I guess. But I understand that while the lesson is extremely important, the connections they make with their SGL’s on a weekly basis is even more important. Do you remember a lesson that taught you more and pushed you further in your walk with Christ or a person that invested in you? Sorry tangent- We make it a priority to time out all of our media elements and make sure that we try as hard as we can to give our SGL’s as much connection time with the kids as possible. And you must consistently work at doing this. (especially me)
E-Excellence. This one might sound very simple to those of you in the programming world, but this is the hardest thing for those of us in CM (or #kidmin 😉 ) to get. Why? Because often times you have to battle this “O it’s only kids, attitude”, “They won’t notice, they’re just kids” Those statements kill me. Luckily for us at Brookwood we have incredible support from everyone on our staff. It is unbelievably important to show the kids that you care about what you put in front of them. Be excellent in what you do.
Hope this helps some of you. I’m no expert but thought it would be really beneficial for any of you involved in CM Production!
What would you add to this list?
J.C.'s Online 