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What is your strategy for successful small groups?
Small groups are an important part of our YM and our church, so I'm hoping to get some input on the following questions regarding what has (or hasn't) worked for you:
Which works best for you and why: on campus groups or off campus groups?
In terms of curriculum, do you choose curriculum for groups, let leaders choose, or a mix of the two?
For those who do off-campus groups throughout the week, what has helped you communicate vision to your leaders and participants, since not everyone meets in one place?
Have you ever done an apprentice program where older students (seniors) help lead a freshmen or sophomore group with a couple of adults?
I'm just looking for your experiences here, so don't feel like you need to be an expert to answer!
- 3 Answers
- In Discipleship
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- Benjer
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- 2 years ago
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We do ours on campus after a very short large-group lesson...very similar to Steve and bdcurtis85. I would love to have off-campus groups that are self sustaining, however, I've had a lot of apathy and reluctance-despite my efforts at training-among many of my would-be leaders. Plus many of our leaders live a rather far drive from the church. In a church that does off-campus groups, I think this is a natural move for the youth group. Our folks see that idea and go "huh?". I do mine similar where I write the discussion questions. This is to cut down on the leader's prep time and ties it in to what I teach. My lesson is usually a 10-15 min overview of a text, then small groups go deeper. |
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My group is similar to bdcurtis85's. We break up into age/gender specific groups after our lesson. They last anywhere from 10-30 minutes and include follow-up questions plus time for sharing requests and then praying. I also encourage my volunteers to meet with students (1:1 or in groups) when they can. This works well, but most of my students can't drive so it's hard for them to do this. A few years ago I met once a week with three High School guys who would then lead our midweek High School guys Bible Study. This worked really well but it required having some guys with the gifts and maturity to do it. Right now there aren't any guys in my group who would be able to do that. I guess each group is going to lend itself to a different format. |
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right now we do our small groups right after the large group message (on sunday nights)...the small group leaders get an info sheet from me the monday before with scriptures to read/research, general discussion guide and conversation starting questions...we try to drive everything back to the central theme for that night (large group, small group, worship, games..it all ties in)...unfortunately the groups aren't the same each week so we're working to move toward small group leaders having the same set of students each week so that meaningful relationships can be formed instead of just adhoc discussion groups...we're switching to XP3 curriculum for the summer which includes age adapted small group info sheets for leaders |
