Sunday School in trouble. Please help!

[kaitco]

Hello.

I am very new here, so if this is in the wrong sub-forum, please move it to the correct one.

I have recently become a Sunday School teacher at my church, teaching the Young Adult class which is 17 - 25 year olds. The class is perfect for me since I am 22 and there is something special about spreading the word among your peers. I enjoy our Sunday School and I love teaching, but now we are facing many problems.

I am not sure if other churches experience this problem, but our Sunday School attendance has been very low and even dwindling. Our Pastor started the Young Adult class for people in the age group who did not want to be grouped with the "little kids" in the Senior class, but also did not want to be in the class with the "old people," and that has helped a little as I run our Young Adult class as more of a discussion rather than a sermon, but attendance throughout all the classes is still so low.

This past Tuesday we had our Teacher's Meeting and we were discussing the fact that we have so many children in our church and that their parents bring them in droves to choir practice and when the children's choir sings on the first Sunday of the month, they are practically spilling out of the choir stands. Yet, on no Sunday since I began attending church have there been more than 20 kids in all the Sunday School classes combined. The sister who teaches the Senior class (12-16) says that sometimes she asks the kids who do show up for Sunday School if they even understand the words they are singing on first Sundays and the problem is, they do not. She breaks down the words to the songs like "Hosana, Hosana. We come to give you all the glory and the honor" and ask questions like "what does 'Hosana' mean?" or even "why are we giving all the glory and the honor?" and the kids do not get it. It is very disheartening to realize this and we having trouble thinking up ways to get the kids as excited about Sunday School as they are about singing in the choir.

To make matters even more strained, the teacher for our main Adult class and his wife, our Sunday School secretary, are moving several states away. While another teacher has stepped up to the plate to teach the Adult class, our other teacher was one of the deacons and could bring the word like few others. I worry that with attendance as it is and with the departure of our deacon, our Pastor might do away with our Sunday School, which I think would be absolutely detrimental. Sunday School lessons give us our foundation so that when we hear our Pastor's words, we have a deeper understanding and have a better relationship with Jesus.

I only returned to the church just last year, (Monday will be exactly one year, actually) and I know a lot of my personal growth has come from something as simple as attending Sunday School. I feel that without a Sunday School, we will have one less avenue of getting to know the word, something I will be sure to mention to our Pastor, but I was wondering if anyone could give suggestions as to how to get people excited about Sunday School.

We offer coffee and doughnuts during the period after classes and before the morning service starts, but even that has not helped stop the dwindle. We have also started having an 8AM service which brings a larger number of people who just happen to stay since they are already there, but it is only a few who stay.

We are a small church with less than 300 members and we can only do so much, but I am open to any suggestions that anyone can give. I have racked my brain all week and prayed and prayed about it, but nothing is coming. If anyone can give any advice, our entire congregation would be appreciative.

Many thanks from your sister in Christ!

[Free in Christ]

Many churches are facing the "Sunday School" question. Actually, we were just talking about this yesterday: What is the future of Sunday School? As Christians we need to connect with one another and meet to learn, uplift, pray, etc. This can be done in Sunday School and has worked for many years. Is the delivery system changing/evolving? In other words are these connecting needs being delivered in a different way? This could look different in each church but I think the overall substitution right now is small groups. Our church has been promoting small groups and I think that is taking the place of Sunday School. There is a point of too much time commitment. We continually add programs in church but rarely do we stop anything. God wants us to have a balance in life and that includes family time. It is easy to get over committed, especially in a smaller church.

Any thoughts or ideas are appreciated. We need to keep praying about this.

[HeIsEnough]

Hmmm.

I can only relate my experience.

Virtually all my growth was done in the word, on a few occasions in the pew, rarely if ever in SS. I didn't grow up in the church. We started attending SS again a couple of years ago. The discussion was fairly stifled, it wasn't very open, I spoke on a few occasions to what I thought needed spoken about, it didn't go all that well. We quit attending. The biggest problem I saw, not only unequally mature believers, was in the structure itself. It was not a fellowship of any sort, it was "top down" teaching. May work well at a young maturity level, doesn't work so well with mature believers. If I were to say what kind of SS would attract my interest, it would be one where it wasn't 'school', but fellowship in the word where everyone is required to equally participate. The closest thing I know of is just a bible study, which we did for quite a few years with several friends. Can't say I could explain it better than that, I hope you understand what I mean. Shalom.

[Patty13]

Our church has Sunday school but they also have small groups that get together once a week at a person's house that is in that particular small group. People in them usually live near each other. Seems to do very well. Maybe you or someone else could visit other churches in your area and see what they do. Below is a link to my church. If you go under ministries you can see what we have.

http://www.davisville.org/index.php

[Praise Warrior]

It could be a number of things. It could be that the lessons are not at that level. I've gone to many college-aged youth things where Bible lessons were taught, and there was never anything newto me that was presented, and it was quite boring. Those I talked to agreed that they didn't get anything out of the messages either, but went because of friends. Perhaps make a better effort to separate not so much of physical age, but also of spiritual maturity.

I think small groups/discussions also make it easier to swallow "relative" truth that may be off the mark Scripturally. Like, is what your friends or whole group thinks the take-home truth, or is it what the Bible study or Scripture says the take-home truth?

I think also with the small groups, that it allows people to pick and choose what Scripture they want to study and learn about. I'm not sure that is entirely a good thing. Tends to lean towards the hear what the ears want to hear idea.

I've also been in groups where I have had to do the teaching, that were off, that I was more spiritually mature than the "leader", and things also didn't go well.

It seems to be a seeker-sensitive thing. I'm not a fan of the seeker-sensitive movement.

In all my years of going to these college-aged things, I know that the leaders tried to choose relevant topics, but to be honest, in the end they ALL chose the same topics. Relationships. Godly women/men. God's will. Drinking/alcohol. Peer pressure. Putting "God" in a box. Wearing "masks". In the end, it doesn't become so much of a learning issue as it is an obedience issue.

Just a few thoughts to take or to leave as they apply.

[kaitco]

Hmm...it seems like the smaller groups seem to work best when it comes to older folks, and by older I mean, out of high school.

As I teach the young adult class, I try to keep it from becoming any kind of sermon because I am not older than all of them and only a few years older than some. I try to create an atmosphere where we can discuss the lesson, but I also like it when we get off the lesson by discussing pertinent topics in today's society. Like today, for example, our lesson was "Our New Home" as described by John in Revelation 21. We discussed what is said in the text, but our conversation turned to how there are those who can read the same text, but not be filled with spiritual wonder, and from there we talked about atheists and the homosexuality.

For older Christians, I like the idea of small groups, but does anyone have any ideas about children? Or perhaps thoughts on how to suggest to parents that they need to bring their children to Sunday School and also stay for lessons themselves?

[TheOddBall34]

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[GreenEyedLady]

I
This past Tuesday we had our Teacher's Meeting and we were discussing the fact that we have so many children in our church and that their parents bring them in droves to choir practice and when the children's choir sings on the first Sunday of the month, they are practically spilling out of the choir stands. Yet, on no Sunday since I began attending church have there been more than 20 kids in all the Sunday School classes combined. The sister who teaches the Senior class (12-16) says that sometimes she asks the kids who do show up for Sunday School if they even understand the words they are singing on first Sundays and the problem is, they do not. She breaks down the words to the songs like "Hosana, Hosana. We come to give you all the glory and the honor" and ask questions like "what does 'Hosana' mean?" or even "why are we giving all the glory and the honor?" and the kids do not get it. It is very disheartening to realize this and we having trouble thinking up ways to get the kids as excited about Sunday School as they are about singing in the choir.

T!

I am sorry you are having such trouble. I would definatly ask the pastor if you can have a rule that those who are faithful in SS for the month are the only ones who can sing in the choir. In fact, maybe you should stop doing the once a month choir thing for awhile until this rule becomes effective. There is no reason to have a choir filled full of children who are not faithful to SS and don't understand what they are singing. Even if the pews are packed, its not about numbers but what they are actually learning.
This is what I suggest. I doubt seriously that it is because SS is boring, but seems parents don't want to get up early 3 other Sundays during the month.
Does your church have a bus ministry?

[Clay Man]

Sorry if this gets a little long, but I need to give you some background. Maybe I just need to tell someone too.

Our church is very small, maybe 70 people. I teach the teen group and my wife teaches kids 3 to 12. Her class size varies from 3 to 14 kids on any given Sunday. Mine is 3 to 10 teens.

The attendance for my wife’s class depends solely on the attendance of the parents. When they come, the kids wouldn’t miss Sunday School for anything. My wife wrestled with class content for a year before she dug her heals in. She now teaches scripture with no holds barred, and the kids are thriving.

She just finished teaching on the ten commandments. She said it got a little unnerving for her when 4 and 5 year olds started asking about and discussing adultery. Then she realized what these kids see on TV nightly, and some are from what we call “blended” families. It’s sad, but they are not innocent. They are eager students now, and what they retain is amazing.

She has met some resistance at first. We have had a couple of parents offer to come in and “help” with crafts. They said the kids aren’t having enough “fun” and they need more crafts. Their kids went home and talked about Sunday School and made them uncomfortable, but the kids NEEDED to learn what God says. Delicacy is a virtue in those cases, but truth can’t be sacrificed.

Things have improved, and now those parents are attending more regularly, and it seems there life is changing too. Who knew Sunday School would be what God used to reach the parents?

I wish I had as much success. The teens have had three different teachers in the past couple of years. The last one quit, restarted, and finally quit again saying he couldn’t deal with the apathy. I’m 50, would fill in occationaly, and am probably the least likely candidate to lead a teen group. I got the job until the pastor could hire an intern, but it seems that’s not happening, and I’ve decided that I’m not going away until the pastor takes the job away. He seems relieved by that.

The teen’s didn’t like it. The kids I get are drug to church. A couple don’t come to class now, preferring to sit it out with their parents. They were the most disruptive in the group anyway, so I don’t worry.

The classes use to be about “teen issues” and what they thought was relevant, usually a pile of mush with a verse thrown in occasionally. More often it was just another chance for a bunch of teenagers to get together and talk about movies, games, other kids, anything but the Bible. If I started a topic it wouldn’t last for more than five minutes. Some felt it their duty to see how fast they could drag the group off topic.

After a couple of classes like that, I got positively unpleasant. I made them sit up, shut up and listen. I made it clear that they could leave if they didn’t like it. Some stay because their parents make them, but a couple are hungry and seem to be picking things up now. I think they felt they had to play along with the others before, and now they can take things seriously. Those who just sit there are getting God’s word by default, but I have gotten a bit of positive feedback from parents.

I get the most concerted attention, questions and discussions when I hit on prophetic topics. It’s the same with the main congregation. (I fill in for the pastor when he’s away.) It seems the teens share a hunger with the adults to know what’s going on.

Long story, sorry. The point is you can’t start too early. You’re getting people long after they should have a foundation. I’m looking forward to having a couple of the kids from my wife’s class get old enough to come to the teen group. Right now the best solution is to go deep, and challenge. Hit the hard issues. Some pretend that it doesn’t interest them. For some it doesn’t. For others it’s more important than they admit. Also, unfortunatly, you can't help everyone. In the end though, it just comes down to being faithful.

[GreenEyedLady]

Thats good you got ahold of the teens like that Clay!
I do puppets in our Jr. Church and they LOVE it.
I have a sort of mascot.
I use some of the skits from www.fishingforkids.com
they have a free curriculum.
I take my puppet and I make him live real issues that I know the kids are going through. He is just like one of the kids.

They love him. I think puppets for the young ones work great.