Administration of Training | Train Bible Teachers Blog

Teacher Training Over the Holidays?

Posted on October 16, 2026 by TrainBibleTeachers.com — No Comments ↓

The holiday season from Thanksgiving to Christmas to New Year’s seems to zoom by. Personal schedules get busier than ever. The Church plans special holiday programs, activities, and parties. Even Bible teachers who love to teach might struggle to find time and motivation to prepare lessons. To add teacher training over the holidays to an already stressed calendar may seem fruitless, perhaps a bit insensitive.

Will teachers attend a meeting? If they do come, will their hearts and minds be into it or too distracted? But, do you really want to lay aside training for this period of time? What alternative is there?

How to Maintain Teacher Training Over the Holidays

Who says teacher training requires a meeting? This Teacher Training Blog has already provided a series of posts about teacher training ruts. Review the various means for training listed in that post and you might find something that will work well over the holiday season.

And, why must training consume a lot of people’s time? Something simple and brief can leave an impact. Consider doing something like the following for teacher training over the holidays:

Think through one or two sentence teaching tips most relevant to your individual teachers. Make note cards with one tip per card. Every week during the holiday season, distribute a card to each of the teachers. Over the span of these two months, they will have received some good reminders. You can go the extra mile in personalizing the messages using their names or perhaps the name of the class they teach and/or decorating the cards for even greater appeal.

Compose brief messages relevant to the specific holidays to send to teachers through some form of social media, e-mail, or even postal mail. For example, …

for Halloween you might send a message reminding them that not everyone agrees with celebrating this holiday, suggesting how to handle differing views

at Thanksgiving you might send a message asking if their students know how thankful you are for them, explaining how critical relationship-building is in the teaching process.

for Christmas, you might send a message about the reason Jesus came to earth to be our Savior, leading into some tips for guiding their students to accepting Christ as their Savior.

at New Year’s, you might send a message about how the New Year reminds us of how God wants to make us new, emphasizing that the goal of teaching should be changed lives.

Notice how each of these ideas weaves together the holiday and training.

Make Training About Holiday Effects

Making the Most of Every Opportunity Even with Teacher Training Over the Holidays Teachers will feel the effects of the holidays in the classroom. Remind them of how God exhorts us to make the “most of every opportunity” (Eph. 5:16). This would be a good time to provide training on how to do that.

Make teacher training over the holidays about the holidays so they’re ready for the holidays!

Need help with training?

You could distribute this two-page document to them with some tips for teaching over the holidays: Intruders in the Classroom that Steal & Vandalize

And/or, you could send them links to the following articles:

Use Circle Response to Help Teachers Assess Their Teaching

Posted on July 24, 2026 by TrainBibleTeachers.com — No Comments ↓

Here’s an example of how to use circle response in Bible teachers training to help them assess their teaching. The session encourages them to look beyond their own assessment, and even beyond how students feel about their teaching, to God’s perspective.

About the Circle Response Method

Circle response is a method you can use to get everyone participating in a minimally threatening way. How personal the type of response you request could depend on how well your teachers know each other. Each person may only respond with one word, phrase, or sentence, depending on what you set as the criteria. The statements or questions used should generate more than one kind of response.

Prior to the session, arrange seating in a circle.
Start with the person who tends to be more outgoing and go around the circle having each group member give his/her response to your statement or question. Do not allow comments until you get around the circle.
Summarize their responses and follow up with discussion and/or added input.

Training Session to Help Teachers Assess Their Teaching

First go around the circle for responses to the following statements. Move from one statement to the next without providing commentary or allowing comments.

In one word, express how you feel about your teaching.
In one word, describe how you think your students feel about your teaching.

Next make observations about their responses. For instance, you may be able to note how some teachers used similar words to describe their teaching from both points of view while others used very different words for each. After making your observations, ask the following:

What criteria did you use to determine your responses to each statement? (Allow for some responses.)

Now reflect on how you think God feels about your teaching. (Give them a few moments of silence to reflect.)

What criteria would God use to assess your teaching? (Allow for some responses.)

Since His Word provides the standard, let’s reflect on some Scripture verses that should guide us in the way we teach. (Start by asking for some Scripture verses that have been meaningful to them. You can add into the discussion with verses listed in the post, Bible Verses for Bible Teachers.)

Training for Teachers New to Teaching the Bible

Posted on June 12, 2026 by TrainBibleTeachers.com — No Comments ↓

All teachers, regardless of previous experience, benefit from strategic pre-service training. People new to teaching the Bible need specific training prior to placement into a teaching position.

What Teachers New to Teaching the Bible Should Know Before They Begin

Start with a basic understanding of the Bible and its message.

Unlike any other book, the Bible’s uniqueness suggests that even those who have taught in a traditional school setting gain at least a basic understanding of the Text they will teach. People don’t need an exhaustive knowledge of the Word before teaching but at least a solid big-picture understanding. Even veteran Bible teachers continue to learn and grow. These training resources can help those new to Bible teaching gain that big-picture perspective:

Move on to a basic understanding of the Bible teaching-learning process.

New teachers also need a grasp on the goals of the Bible teaching-learning process. It goes beyond the acquisition of knowledge to addressing the heart as well as behavior. Beginning with head knowledge, it culminates in “bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God” (Col. 1:9-11). Teachers need to know how to structure individual lessons to increase the potential of their students reaching that end goal. Here’s a resource to help:

Teaching for Changed Lives Workbook

New Teachers Will Also Benefit from Other Basics

Know age level characteristics.

God made people to learn certain ways at different stages of their development. Though curriculum usually accommodates the age level, teachers will face teaching moments off script before or after class, even during activities. New teachers therefore need a basic understanding of the age they’ll teach. Here are resources to help:

Age Level Development Resources

Know how to effectively use curriculum.

People new to Bible teaching need to understand the role of curriculum as a guide, with the Bible being the real Text. While lesson preparation will tie into the curriculum being used, we need to study God’s Word and not rely solely on the curriculum. We need to depend on God’s Spirit to make truth known. We mustn’t underestimate the role of prayer in both preparing and presenting the lesson. Training should therefore include specifics about the curriculum itself but also emphasize the role of the Holy Spirit and prayer. Check out these resources:

If teaching children or youth, new teachers would benefit from some discipline basics.

Even with all of the above understood and implemented by new teachers, disillusionment and discouragement can set in if students don’t cooperate or pay attention. So teaching doesn’t become more about “crowd control” than actual teaching, new teachers need at least a basic understanding of managing classroom discipline before beginning to teach. These training resources provide some of the basics. In time, training on classroom discipline can go deeper.

Other training topics like methodology, creativity, time management, and more, are important but but people new to teaching the Bible may get overwhelmed with too much too fast. Begin with the basics and then continue with in-service training to fill in the gaps.

Training Session: Audiovisuals Because of God

Posted on March 13, 2026 by TrainBibleTeachers.com — No Comments ↓

Since God’s Word thoroughly equips (2 Tim. 3:16-17), we must “in every way … make the teaching about God our Savior attractive” (Titus 2:10) to grab and keep people’s attention. While these passages don’t reference the use of audiovisuals in teaching, we do have a God who created us to learn through our senses and who Himself communicates audio-visually. For this reason, Bible teachers will benefit from a training session on audiovisuals.

Begin the Training Session with a Forced Choice Activity

Which would you prefer … attending a lecture with visual aids or without? If you would prefer attending a lecture without visual aids, go stand on the left side of the room. If you would prefer attending a lecture with visual aids, go stand on the right side of the room.

Why do you suppose everybody (or, almost everybody) chose the right side? (Undoubtedly all will go to the right side. If not, almost everyone will go to the right side. — Let several people respond before having them sit down.)

Key Reasons for Using Audiovisuals in Teaching

1) God made people to learn audio-visually.

(Write the point at the top of the left side of a white or chalk board. Below it, draw a circle and divide it similarly to the one below. Put the percentages in as you speak.)

How People Learn Audiovisually

God made people with five senses through which we interact with our environment and hence learn. Studies show that how we learn breaks down this way:

3% through our sense of smell
3% through our sense of taste
6% through our sense of touch
13% through our sense of hearing
75% through our sense of sight

Obviously using all of the senses, where possible, would yield the greatest impact on learning. But, at minimum, to teach the way God made people to learn, we must try to engage people not only through the sense of hearing but also visually … audio-visually.

2) God Himself communicates audio-visually.

(Write the point at the top on the right half of a white or chalk board. Discuss the following questions. List their responses to the first question below the point. You’ll find input in the article, God Communicates Audiovisually, that you can add to the discussion if not already stated by group members.)

What are some examples of God communicating audio-visually?
Why do you think God communicates using audiovisuals?
In what situations might God be against the use of visual aids? (Ex. 20:4-6)
What does all this infer for us as communicators of God’s Word?

Tips for Choosing & Using Audiovisuals

Since audiovisuals are so important in teaching, it’s vital we learn to use them well.

(For this part of the session, consider ordering the reproducible Tips for Choosing & Using Audiovisuals Worksheet which you can distribute to each teacher. The worksheet uses an acrostic with the word AUDIOVISUALS wherein each letter in the word gives a tip.

If you have sufficient time, you could go over the tips together and then have them break into pairs or triplets to work on the two exercises. If your group is small, you might want to do this together. To benefit from the exercises, it’s essential to first review the tips.)