Last night at youth group didn't happen. Iowa's weather iced us out of the church and we canceled the evening. That's just fine, I was in Anaheim, CA networking with other youth ministers anyway at the 2013 ELCA Extravaganza. During the Extravaganza I led a workshop about games, from big groups to small groups, each workshop hosted 10-20 people eager to play and learn some games.
Since I failed to provide a handout for the workshops (which will no doubt be reflected in the evals) I did promise to post the list of games that we played at each workshop. You'll notice that we didn't play the same games in each workshop, just due to different spaces and amounts of people.
What would you do if...
Pictionary Relay
Balance
Animal Pairs
Jello
Spell My Feet
Chicken on a Hill
The Bus Game
Evolution
Knights and Dragons
Over the River
Head to Foot
And some of your ideas that I can't wait to steal:
Battle Bots
Capture the flag (with spies)
Trigger
Giant angry birds
Zombie sardines
Lutheran lutheran baptist
Silent ball
Entourage
Secret agent
9 Square
If you attended the Extravaganza and can't remember some of the rules to the game we played or you want a more comprehensive list of other games that we could have played, I'm happy to oblige. Just shoot me an email by clicking here: Email Andy
Also: if you're wondering what those 4 rules were that we start our events with they are as follows: Everyone Stays, Everyone Plays, Everyone Prays, Everyone is Okay. Catchy, memorable, and maybe the title of a book that I would write!
Monday, January 28, 2013
Monday, January 21, 2013
Suicide Prevention
Last night at youth group we hosted an intense faith story from a set of parents who's teenager died from suicide several years ago. The evening was okay, not a spectacular event, but a good evening together. What I'm most happy with though is that we did it and did it well, including sending emails to parents ahead of time to give them some context for Sunday night's group.
To start with we invited a speaker who does suicide prevention talks at area schools to come and share her faith story. The story could have been a little better told, it was clear that she was used to sharing the prevention side rather than the story of her son, but it was captivating for the teenagers and she and her husband had lots of good God connections.
We also invited a team of suicide counselors to meet with our small group leaders ahead of time, spending 30 minutes talking through the subject, potential questions that students might have and thinking through prevention outside of youth group. This time could have been better organized, but it was comforting and good to get our leaders into the right perspective before we met. These experts stayed throughout the evening, just in case there was something out of the ordinary or need for more help, but we didn't need to use them.
We began our evening with our normal gathering, followed by a quick game of Family Feud. I homemade this edition of family feud by monkeying with power point. Basically I just listed the 10 answers in columns and then put white boxes over each answer that would disappear when clicked on. Very simple and it allowed kids to guess answers randomly. I also tweaked the format to make the game more fun. Each round I invited 3 boy students and 3 girls students to participate. They each gave one answer a piece to try to get on the board, scoring one point per answer. Then I asked 3 leaders to guess a correct answer too, which meant three teams scoring points. The style was great, everyone had a chance to participate, we didn't drag on any of the categories, and the leaders beat the kids... a perfect game.
The last piece of our evening that went well was the small group conversation after the faith story. I had created two small group sessions in case there was discomfort with the suicide lesson, but we didn't end up using the Bible study that I wrote because each group dove into the suicide discussion so smoothly. The Bible study would have been about Naomi and Ruth, emphasizing the compassion to stay with each other during grief, but we'll save that for another time.
To start with we invited a speaker who does suicide prevention talks at area schools to come and share her faith story. The story could have been a little better told, it was clear that she was used to sharing the prevention side rather than the story of her son, but it was captivating for the teenagers and she and her husband had lots of good God connections.
We also invited a team of suicide counselors to meet with our small group leaders ahead of time, spending 30 minutes talking through the subject, potential questions that students might have and thinking through prevention outside of youth group. This time could have been better organized, but it was comforting and good to get our leaders into the right perspective before we met. These experts stayed throughout the evening, just in case there was something out of the ordinary or need for more help, but we didn't need to use them.
We began our evening with our normal gathering, followed by a quick game of Family Feud. I homemade this edition of family feud by monkeying with power point. Basically I just listed the 10 answers in columns and then put white boxes over each answer that would disappear when clicked on. Very simple and it allowed kids to guess answers randomly. I also tweaked the format to make the game more fun. Each round I invited 3 boy students and 3 girls students to participate. They each gave one answer a piece to try to get on the board, scoring one point per answer. Then I asked 3 leaders to guess a correct answer too, which meant three teams scoring points. The style was great, everyone had a chance to participate, we didn't drag on any of the categories, and the leaders beat the kids... a perfect game.
The last piece of our evening that went well was the small group conversation after the faith story. I had created two small group sessions in case there was discomfort with the suicide lesson, but we didn't end up using the Bible study that I wrote because each group dove into the suicide discussion so smoothly. The Bible study would have been about Naomi and Ruth, emphasizing the compassion to stay with each other during grief, but we'll save that for another time.
Monday, January 14, 2013
Bible Tags
Last night at youth group we played a skit-based game involving Bible stories. Even as I write these words today I get nervous that it will flop if we ever did something like this again. However, the game worked great, so maybe I ought to be changing my perception and giving my kids a little more credit. The game began by giving each student a sticky label that contained a word which would be identified with a Bible story (trumpet, donkey, burning bush). Kids were directed to find other students who would be part of their story and then sit down together at tables labeled with story titles and the total number of people who should be in the group (Jericho - 4, Christmas - 5, Exodus - 5...). Once everyone found their group, they could turn over their title page and read the story together in order to create a skit retelling this story in 30-60 seconds. I gave groups 5 minutes before I started calling them forward to perform.
All the Bible stories were relatively familiar, but of course there are always new kids in the groups, always different levels of biblical knowledge, and different personalities. For our large group though, it worked really well! Our leaders all participated in groups which helped them steer groups, and the kids did a great job making the skits funny. Telling the story in 60 seconds or less was critical to the comedy as teams got really creative in their approach, some even getting done in 10 seconds, laughing the whole time. The labels mixed the kids well and we made sure to give new kids to the group easier labels.
This game also setup our discussion nicely about John 9. For the first time ever, I began our lesson by reading a poem about perception! then I summarized the story as kids followed along in their Bibles. The blind man who struggles to find a new identity because he is judged by who he used to be... it was perfect for teenagers. They really dove into discussions about judgement and perception, revealing who they are and how hard it is to change in a social group.
Our evening concluded with worship and our announcement again that God loves them and that God has judged them as worthy!
All the Bible stories were relatively familiar, but of course there are always new kids in the groups, always different levels of biblical knowledge, and different personalities. For our large group though, it worked really well! Our leaders all participated in groups which helped them steer groups, and the kids did a great job making the skits funny. Telling the story in 60 seconds or less was critical to the comedy as teams got really creative in their approach, some even getting done in 10 seconds, laughing the whole time. The labels mixed the kids well and we made sure to give new kids to the group easier labels.
This game also setup our discussion nicely about John 9. For the first time ever, I began our lesson by reading a poem about perception! then I summarized the story as kids followed along in their Bibles. The blind man who struggles to find a new identity because he is judged by who he used to be... it was perfect for teenagers. They really dove into discussions about judgement and perception, revealing who they are and how hard it is to change in a social group.
Our evening concluded with worship and our announcement again that God loves them and that God has judged them as worthy!
Monday, January 7, 2013
Leader Hunt
Last night at youth group we played a camp favorite in our building called Leader Hunt. The entire evening was centered around getting to know each other better, getting to know our adult leaders better, and getting to know God better.
Leader Hunt was a perfect way to get our kids exposed to our leaders, and show off their more silly sides - and it was super simple. I collected a list of 5 strange facts from each adult leader then made a list of all the facts randomized. For my purposes, I also dropped one of their strange facts, and I also made a master list of who's facts belonged to whom and photocopied for the leaders. Then I dismissed the leaders to hide throughout the building and asked teenagers to get into pairs or triples. While the leaders hid, I read through the entire list of crazy facts with the students and went over rules, then dismissed them for 30 minutes of running around, asking questions, and getting to know our leaders.
We returned to the youth room and counted up scores. With 48 items on the list the highest score was 13. we probably had too many crazy facts, but it worked out. Once back in the room I read through the list again and asked kids to shout out correct answers which was rewarding for leaders and enlightening for students. Then we broke into our new small groups for the spring semester. The tedious process that I used was to do a role call, sorting each leader into their group and their kids. I've tried to think of other ways, but given that we had 6 friends join us last night, and about half of our core group was missing, this was the best way. it only takes a minute or so to read the list and get everyone to the right space.
In small group the kids got to know each other better by using a few small group resources. The Comfy Chair is a deck of cards that has three questions on each card of varying depths. the choice allows a student to answer one question depending on how comfortable they are with the group. The Ungame is a similar card deck with one question per card. I asked students to read the card aloud and and say the name of someone in the group who was to answer the question. then the card reader could also respond. And finally I also used a milestone bowl for one group. This item has a mousepad with 10 milestones on it, and a clay bowl with 10 matching tokens. on your turn you randomly grab a token, match it to the milestone and then talk about the corresponding milestone in your life: high point, low point, new beginning, quest, gratitude, remembering, loss...
We closed our evening with our normal prayer and praise - a few songs, then a devotion from John 8:31-38. I invited students to think about what they learn about God from a passage like this, then I read it aloud, and after a moment of reflection I asked them to share aloud. good answers for that huge group and that quiet space!
**an added bonus to the leader hunt game is that we can carry it over for the next few days. I'll be posting these crazy facts to the facebook walls of teenagers who didn't make it to youth group over the next few days.
Leader Hunt was a perfect way to get our kids exposed to our leaders, and show off their more silly sides - and it was super simple. I collected a list of 5 strange facts from each adult leader then made a list of all the facts randomized. For my purposes, I also dropped one of their strange facts, and I also made a master list of who's facts belonged to whom and photocopied for the leaders. Then I dismissed the leaders to hide throughout the building and asked teenagers to get into pairs or triples. While the leaders hid, I read through the entire list of crazy facts with the students and went over rules, then dismissed them for 30 minutes of running around, asking questions, and getting to know our leaders.
We returned to the youth room and counted up scores. With 48 items on the list the highest score was 13. we probably had too many crazy facts, but it worked out. Once back in the room I read through the list again and asked kids to shout out correct answers which was rewarding for leaders and enlightening for students. Then we broke into our new small groups for the spring semester. The tedious process that I used was to do a role call, sorting each leader into their group and their kids. I've tried to think of other ways, but given that we had 6 friends join us last night, and about half of our core group was missing, this was the best way. it only takes a minute or so to read the list and get everyone to the right space.
In small group the kids got to know each other better by using a few small group resources. The Comfy Chair is a deck of cards that has three questions on each card of varying depths. the choice allows a student to answer one question depending on how comfortable they are with the group. The Ungame is a similar card deck with one question per card. I asked students to read the card aloud and and say the name of someone in the group who was to answer the question. then the card reader could also respond. And finally I also used a milestone bowl for one group. This item has a mousepad with 10 milestones on it, and a clay bowl with 10 matching tokens. on your turn you randomly grab a token, match it to the milestone and then talk about the corresponding milestone in your life: high point, low point, new beginning, quest, gratitude, remembering, loss...
We closed our evening with our normal prayer and praise - a few songs, then a devotion from John 8:31-38. I invited students to think about what they learn about God from a passage like this, then I read it aloud, and after a moment of reflection I asked them to share aloud. good answers for that huge group and that quiet space!
**an added bonus to the leader hunt game is that we can carry it over for the next few days. I'll be posting these crazy facts to the facebook walls of teenagers who didn't make it to youth group over the next few days.
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