Category Archives: Children’s Church

What better way for helping children develop into people who love, worship, and serve the Lord than for them to see it demonstrated in the life of those who influence their lives. Hence, a children’s church teacher’s life can be a vital teaching tool.

How a Children’s Church Teacher’s Life Serves as a Model for Loving, Worshiping, and Serving the Lord

Children need teachers in their lives who do more than tell them what they should do. They need people to come alongside of them and show them how — coaching, mentoring, and discipling them toward loving, worshiping, and serving the Lord. But, even that will have minimal effect if our attitudes don’t match our words and actions. As teachers, we need to model …

• a wholehearted devotion in loving the Lord (Matt. 22:37), not holding back.
• a joy or pleasure in worshiping (Ps. 100:2), not merely going through the motions.
• a fervency in serving (Rom. 12:11), not just doing enough to get by.

Even if the teacher has a more introverted personality, these kinds of attitudes, passion, and enthusiasm would still shine through if it’s there. — As water reflects the face, so one’s life reflects the heart. (Prov. 27:19)

A quality essential, then, to being a model for loving, worshiping, and serving the Lord, is authenticity. Genuine devotion, joy, and fervency in our lives serves as a contagion for children, stirring up a desire for the same in their lives.

Out of authenticity comes consistency. Only when it is deep within our hearts will we consistently model what it means to be a lover, worshiper, and servant of God. When that happens, our lives reinforce over and over for children how good it is to love, worship, and serve our Lord.

With the goal of helping children develop into people who love, worship, and serve the Lord, a children’s church teacher’s methods and materials must lead to the accomplishment of that objective.

If the children’s church program is structured to be an extension of Sunday School or a replacement for it, methods and materials will also be like that already described for a Sunday School teacher’s methods and materials. But, you can still aim for the broad objective suggested above which leads to methodology mentioned below.

Methods and Materials That Lead to a Children’s Church Teacher’s Overriding Goal

The best methods to help children become more fully devoted followers of Jesus, learning to love, worship, and serve Him, involve that which enable them to observe and then put it into practice.

• Demonstration shows them how. (in-class demonstrations, drama, field trip to adult worship service or where they can see people serving or video clips of the same, modeling)
• Doing reinforces what they’ve learned. (projects, role play, simulations)

So, we’re not just teaching them about worship but giving them opportunity to worship. We’re not just telling them they should serve the Lord, but fanning into flame the gifts God has given them to serve (2 Tim. 1:6) and then providing opportunities for them to engage in ministry right there in class.

• Participating lets them see it is something they can do now, not just when they’re older.
• Practicing under the mentoring, or discipleship, of the teacher, helps them learn by experience with the needed feedback, support, and encouragement.

The most effective visual aid is that of a teacher’s life, modeling what it means to be a lover, worshiper, and servant of the Most High God. — More about that in the next post.

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Since churches vary in what they do about children’s church, part of a children’s church teacher’s goals should be to align with that purpose. Yet, teachers can certainly have personal goals for impacting children’s lives that could include a broader objective.

What a Children’s Church Teacher’s Goals Should and Shouldn’t Be

No matter how one’s church handles children’s church, individual teachers can make it their goal to be wise in making the most of all opportunities to teach children (Eph. 5:15-16). As a result, teachers will view this time as more than keeping children occupied while parents attend the worship service. If we see our role as more of a babysitter, we will be less likely to invest our time and effort into it.

Rather than merely supervising children until the adult service concludes, teachers can use this opportunity to impact lives, helping children develop into people who love, worship, and serve the Lord. They can do that by:

• presenting to children a God who is worthy of their devotion and adoration so they learn to love the Lord
• planning ways for children to worship in accordance with their age level so they learn to worship
• providing opportunities for children to take part in preparing, leading, and some aspects of worship and teaching so they learn to serve

Even in a church that uses children’s church as an extension of Sunday School or a replacement for it, rather than a mentoring ground for learning to worship, this broad goal and means of getting there can still be incorporated. Teachers simply need to keep this focus throughout the lesson and implement methodology that helps students develop into lovers, worshipers, and servants of our Most High God.

Training Resource: The Teacher’s Role in Discipling Students to Worship

We often call the program for kids during the adult worship service Children’s Church. Varying opinions exist for whether to have a separate program for children or to include them in the church’s corporate worship service.

If you do have children’s church program, what should be the cut off age? Should you have it for the entire service or only for the sermon? And, what should happen in children’s church? These are great questions we should all think and pray about rather than just doing something out of convenience or tradition. The answers to these questions could be unique to your particular setting. What does God want you to do?

Tips for Training Teachers for Teaching in Children’s Church

Because this blog is about teacher training, we will not even attempt to discuss the above questions. Since you are reading this post, it will be assumed you have a children’s church program and want to train your teachers. Many of the topics and issues related to Bible teaching apply to children’s church teachers but there are a few ways you can specifically help teachers in this kind of setting.

1) Make sure children’s church teachers know the purpose of your particular program.

Some use Children’s Church as an extension of Sunday School, carrying through with the same theme. Others make it an entity to itself. And still others use it as a training ground for preparing children to join the corporate worship service … teaching them what worship is, how to lead worship, etc.

So, the first thing to do is to narrow down the purpose of your Children’s Church and make sure your teachers understand it along with what that might mean for the way they teach.

If more of an extension of Sunday School, then some of a previous post about Sunday School Teachers Training should apply. But keep in mind that you will possibly have children who come to Children’s Church who were not in Sunday School. Make sure teachers are aware of this possibility and know how to provide some kind of recap for those who weren’t in Sunday School without boring those who were there. The curriculum you use might have this built into it in which case teachers should be helped to understand its importance so they do not skip over it.

If more of an entity to itself, teachers will not have these kinds of concerns for students who were not in Sunday School. The lessons can stand alone without prior knowledge being necessary. Teachers still need to know how to make visitors and those not in Sunday School feel welcomed and a part of the group already together for an hour or so.

If more of a training ground for joining the corporate worship service, the teacher’s role will be quite different from that of a Sunday School teacher. To be most effective, the teacher will work with individual children as mentors and guides so they understand their parts. Help teachers know how to be a good trainer.

2) Help children’s church teachers know what to expect when teaching in this kind of setting.

They could possibly have more visitors in attendance, sometimes children who are not accustomed to “church life.” Consequently they could face certain discipline situations, especially if they do not take time to make these children feel welcomed and instruct them on how to be a part.

They could possibly be expected to teach a broader range of ages than what is typically found in a graded Sunday School program. That can bring some challenges for them to know how to keep older children from boredom but yet not be over the heads of the younger ones.

They could possibly be using a curriculum that moves children from large group instruction / worship to small groups. Small groups can be more intimate and relational. Help teachers know how to make the transitions from one grouping to the next as well as how to best utilize these different group sizes.

3) Help children’s church teachers know how to prepare.

Some churches will have children’s church for the length of the entire adult worship service whereas others will dismiss children only during the sermon. Teachers need to prepare for the amount of time children’s church generally lasts. Yet, at times, more in some churches than others, that time may be shortened or lengthened. Children’s church can be a setting where teachers do not have control over the time element. Teachers must prepare for the possibility of a longer session. And, they should learn how to cut the session without losing flow or important connections. They need to know how to extend or shorten the lesson in the moment.

Help teachers understand the challenges of teaching in this setting and you will tend to have less frustrated teachers.