You can enhance the fun and improve the effectiveness of your Sunday School program by involving students in active, hands-on learning activities.
The secret to an exciting and fun Sunday School program is simple. Active learning activities are more meaningful and more engaging than lectures, discussions, and worksheets. No matter what the age group or topic, active learning activities are the cure for boring programs.
Active learning takes place when the students are feeling a sense of adventure, when they are actively in doing something, when they feel an emotional connection to what's going on, and when the instructor takes time after the activity to focus the experience and helps the students make connections to their lives. The focus is equally split between the active aspect and the learning aspect.
Too many Sunday School activities involve only one or two of the components of active learning. For example, worksheets and crossword puzzles might keep the students busy. Their hands are physically occupied, but few kids feel a sense of adventure when filling in the blanks. They aren't generally emotionally involved in this sort of work, either. The teacher may or may not take a bit of time after the activity to help the students see connections. Even if the activity is ended with focus, two of the key elements of active learning are still missing. The missing aspects, adventure and emotion, move this activity out of the realm of active learning and into the realm of the mundane. Whatever learning takes place is probably temporary instead of permanent. The whole experience is likely to seem dull and worthless to the students. If given a choice, most will want to spend their time in other ways.
Contrast the worksheet activity with this object lesson about making time for God. Give each student a jar, a large bowl containing enough uncooked rice to fill the jar, and four marbles. Have them list things that keep them busy each day as they scoop their rice into their jar. When all the rice is in the jar, ask them to fit in the marbles one at a time representing prayer, Bible reading, worship and service. The marbles won't fit, of course, because the jar is already full of rice. Next, dump the rice back into the big bowl. Put the marbles in the jar as you talk together about putting time with God first in your life. Add the rice, and to everyone's amazement, it will all fit! Take a few minutes to discuss how God will bless efforts to rearrange life priorities and everything will get done, even when time is taken from a busy schedule to put God first.
This second example activity meets all the criteria for active learning. It builds a mild sense of adventure because participants expect to make a mess with spilled rice. Everyone is actively involved with the demonstration, because everyone is doing it for themselves. All will feel an emotional connection because we all feel too busy in our lives. Even children live at a breakneck pace, so this activity will speak to younger class members. Finally, the activity was focused by that final discussion. Try it out! Students invariably find this activity to be meaningful and memorable.
The switch to active learning takes a switch in the teacher's thinking patterns. Every lesson can be taught with active learning activities, but the teacher must work towards that goal. If the goal is simply to fill class time, to keep the kids quiet, or to occupy the group, active learning is not even a possibility. When the goals change to generating a sense of adventure, involving everyone, making an emotional connection, and focusing the learning, your Sunday School program will shift from mundane to dazzling. Best of all, it will also be more effective.
What sorts of activities can form the basis for active learning? There are lots of possibilities. A teacher should begin designing an active learning curriculum by setting learning goals. What knowledge or behavior changes should be the focus of the lesson? What concepts or ideas should the student take away from the experience? Make these decisions, then create activities to support the learning. Activities that work well for active learning include games, experiments, demonstrations, dramas, problem-solving, and arts and crafts. This list is by no means exhaustive, but is intended to be a starting point.
Games and problem-solving activities include any activities that the students will perceive as play. These are natural additions to an active learning curriculum because players nearly always become emotionally vested in the outcome. It is often a simple matter to model a game after an old favorite and change the terminology or details to reflect the lesson. For example, young children usually enjoy the game Duck, Duck Goose. Changing the words to Moses, Moses, Pharaoh, as your group learns about the Exodus, and you will set up a situation where Moses is chased by Pharaoh, just like in the story. A lesson on the dangers of lying would be complimented by a game of Human Knot for students aged eight and up, where players form a circle, tangle themselves, and another player must untangle the mess without anyone letting go of their friends' hands.
Experiments and demonstrations will intrigue your students and create that all-important sense of adventure when the outcome is unknown. Try closing a lighted match into an airtight jar to demonstrate how faith can't last long in isolation or blowing a ping pong ball within a boundary to show how hard it can be to stay on the right path by yourself.
Scripture is full of stories that lend themselves to drama activities. Passages with lots of dialog or action work well. You can also create dramas that illustrate Biblical truths or applications to daily life. Putting on a play or skit is not the only form of drama, either. Try charades, tableaus, flannel board, story-telling, and improvisation. Some students may enjoy creating a choose-your-own-adventure that presents the audience with choices at crucial turning points in the plot and allows them to decide the outcome of particular scenes.
Arts and crafts activities tap powerful learning avenues for many people. There are really two separate groups of activities here, even though the two are often mentioned in the same breath. Art is the creative side of the equation. Art activities allow creative expression of ideas, feelings, or personality. The end products will be as unique as each person participating, and are likely to be very deeply meaningful to the artist. Activities such as painting, writing, modeling, and drawing fall into this category. Craft activities, on the other hand, end up looking alike and are often exercises in following directions. Crafts serve an important purpose, though, by creating experiential and visual reminder tokens of the lesson. Try making replicas of a Biblical item or creating a beautiful centerpiece to celebrate God's goodness.
Students will walk away from lessons based on active learning with a sense of accomplishment. Because their minds are more actively engaged and they make an emotional investment, the concepts will be more deeply and thoroughly learned. Active learning is the key to a more effective and enjoyable Sunday School program.
