The Kidmin Huddle

New to Kidmin First Steps

• Amber Pike • Season 2 • Episode 127

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Whether you are new to kidmin or at a new church, there's a lot to figure out. Where do you start? What takes priority? 

This episode will equip you with 5 key first steps. 

Resources mentioned:

SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to the Kidman Huddle with Amber Pike, where children's ministry leaders get equipped, encouraged, and empowered to disciple with intentionality, growing God's kingdom one child at a time.

SPEAKER_01:

Welcome back to the Kidman Huddle. Congratulations, you amazing, wonderful children's ministry leaders. You are serving in children's ministry. Whether you are brand new and starting out or you have been in it for a while, I just first want to say good job. you're awesome. You have responded to the calling that God has placed in your life. Maybe you were called really early like I was. I started serving at 15. I was a helper in children's church and I just looked around and I saw that the lessons, everything, it just wasn't working. We were using old stuff. We didn't have all the pieces. And so I requested a meeting with my pastors and said, hey, can I be in charge? And they're like, Yes, 15-year-old, you can totally be in charge. And so at 15, I started writing children's ministry lessons and organizing volunteers. And I think they probably, in hindsight, maybe were a little crazy. I was very mature, and it is a very small church. But God was equipping me for what I, at that time, did not know was going to be my future. A year later, VBS, I'm 16 years old. I'm teaching threes and fours to go fish for Jesus during Rickshaw Rally VBS. And God says, Amber, I want you to do this for the rest of your life. And I have been doing it ever since. I have been serving in children's ministry since I was 15, and I love it. Maybe that's your story. Maybe you were voluntold you'll be helping. Maybe you were recruited out of desperation. Whatever the reason, you are here, and I am so thankful for what you are doing to disciple boys and girls, for pouring into them. And just, I first want to thank you and then remind you that it's a really big calling. It's important. You are helping to change eternities. You are helping to grow and disciple and change boys and girls, and it matters. If you've listened to this podcast before, you'll recognize I end every podcast with what you do matters. Well, because it does. And then my book, Intentional Children's Ministry, I talk about the importance of everything that you do. It all matters. Because we have a goal in children's ministry. I talk about this at length in the book if you haven't read it. Again, whether new or seasoned, this is an amazing resource for you. But our goal is to see boys and girls walking as lifelong disciples of Christ, to be lifelong followers of Jesus. That is our goal. And everything we do needs to flow in, out of, and towards that goal. Like, that's why we have church. That's why we have children's church, because we want to disciple boys and girls so that they can have a lifelong faith in Jesus. We are not at church to make friends. We are not at church to have fun. We are not at church just to entertain the kids while the big church happens for grownups. All of these things might be true and a part of it, but that's not the goal. That's not why we are doing it. Now, encouragement out of the way. I've seen a lot of questions lately from new ministry leaders. Hey, I just stepped into this role. What do I do? And honestly, there's not a lot of training. There's not a lot of training I would recommend for new children's ministry leaders. I have that schnazzy degree, right? Paid lots of money to get a degree for children's ministry, and it did not teach me how to be a children's minister. I learned it from doing it as a kid, as a teen, and then trial and error happened. So I am a much better children's minister now at 38 years old than I was at 16 because I have learned a lot of what not to do or what works well. I have refined my mission and my vision and curriculum writing and pouring into kids and equipping volunteers, you know, all of that stuff. But what if you're starting out? So my friends, if you've been in children's ministry for a while, don't check out on this episode because maybe I'm going to say some things that you need to hear or need to think about. If you're brand new in children's ministry, get ready to take some notes because these are the first five things that I would do if I'm new in Kidman. And this would also be the first five things I would do if I'm in a new job at a new church. Step one, I'm going to observe and assess what is happening in What are the kids learning? What is the systems, the programs? Just get a notebook, get a piece of paper, a pencil, write down, take notes, observe and assess. And every facets of it. So, okay, what curriculum are the kids using? How is it going? Are the kids growing? Do they enjoy it? Is it deep and meaty? With that, I'm gonna try to assess where are the kids at spiritually? Do I have a bunch of kids who are already saved and we're growing as a Christian? Or do I have a bunch of kids who their biblical literacy is pretty much nothing and we need to start at the basics? Do the kids like the curriculum? Is it age appropriate? Is it engaging? Is discipline an issue during lesson time? How are my teachers doing? What does my volunteer situation look like? Who do I have? Are they doing a good job discipling? Are they following the curriculum? Are they struggling? What are families like? How many families do we have? Are they active? Are they engaged? Are they discipling at home? Are they being resourced and equipped? What are the standard events that happen? Is VBS a certain time every year? Is there a certain curriculum that you need to be using? Is there always a something that happens at whatever time of year? And if you get rid of it, you're going to be tarred and feathered. You don't want to go in and start making changes right away. much as you might want to sometimes you have to lead people into and ease them into also you need to know what's working what's not working what are the pain points what is a huge win go in observe and assess while you're doing this this is like point that was 1a this is like 1b start building some relationships if you go in first two weeks proverbial like guns a blazing and you change all of this you're probably going to turn people away most likely but if you go in and you observe and you obsess or obsess you know and you begin building relationships then when you make those big changes you've got some buy-in because people are understanding your heart and also you're understanding them and their needs and So I'm going to get to know my volunteers. I'm going to do some relationship building stuff to where, hey, we're a united team. I'm going to get some of their feedback, even if I know where we want to go. Let's say they're using curriculum XYZ and I want to switch it to curriculum AB. Okay, let's get some buy-in. Hey, what's working for you guys? What do you love about this curriculum? What do you think about this? I'm going to move them towards. You also just need to be building relationships with kids and families because I Ministry is better with relationships. I'll give you a prime example. When I started at my last church, a family came to me and told me, hey, my third grade son is struggling. He does not want to be at church. He doesn't have friends in his age group, and he's just, he's ready to check out. So I knew, ooh, third grade, that's an important time. Not that any time is not important, but a third grade boy, you're getting ready to enter into that transition phase. And if we don't capture his heart for the church, we might lose him. So when I started, I knew that he was my mission specifically. Again, small church had a lot of things that, you know, I'm observing. I'm trying to figure out next steps, what's happening, what to do, all of that. But I also knew that this one boy was needed to be a priority. So the first Wednesday night he's there and I find out he's a sports kid. I'm not a sports person. I understand sports. I played them in school. I don't watch sports now unless I know someone on the team. I don't really enjoy sports. We stopped even watching the Super Bowl. We just have snacks and watch a movie now. It was about the snacks anyways. But I knew that's what he was into. So that was my goal. I used what I had on hand, which was not a lot at that point. They didn't have a robust children's ministry by any means. I found a laundry basket and a beach ball. And so we played literal basketball with a laundry basket and a beach ball. I met him where he was at. I connected with him. And within two weeks, he was drawing me pictures of us playing beach ball with a laundry basket and a beach ball. And this relationship was formed and it was such a blessing to me. He would hold my son's hand at a zoo trip. My little guy was like, And he would hold his hands at a zoo trip and he would sit with me. And I loved at one point I had these three, you know, he stayed really close to me and then we gained a couple other boys. So at one point I had these five, these three fifth grade boys and they would sit with Miss Amber while our church worshiped. We were the traditional, you worship as a church body and then you're dismissed to children's church. So I had these boys just crowded around me singing from a hymn. And at one point I'm just like, this is beautiful. I focused on the relationship because I It was really important to this child. He wasn't saved until he was in high school. He had kind of fallen away from church a little bit, then started coming back. And who was the first person at church that he told when he accepted Christ that night, the night before at his home? He went back to Miss Amber. because relationship was there. Relationships are so important. So while you are observing what has been happening, maybe making some plans on what needs to happen, work on intentionally building those relationships with kids, with parents, with volunteers. Relationships are key. The next thing that I'm going to do, it's the very practical, I'm going to find out what I have. Resources. What kind of game supplies do you have? What kind of technology do you have? What Amount of volunteers do you have and what capacity volunteers are they? Also, big one, budget. What kind of a budget do you have? So you might go in and you look and you see this classroom. This furniture is not going to work. I had that with my current church. It was a kidney bean table. If you guys know those tables, they're horrible. And whoever invented them, I swear, has not met children. This is a personal pet peeve. It's the half circle tables with a cutout at the back. That's where the teacher sits. Why do I hate these tables so much? Because you cannot get more than five children at this huge table because of the legs and like the flat spots. And it's just a huge waste of space. It's made for like preschool, kindergarten classrooms. I'm very picky about my furniture. Here's a side tip about classroom furniture. Do not get children's furniture unless it is a strictly preschool classroom and no other age groups use it. Why? I want you to think about the biggest kid that you have. Now, I, as a female, I'm 5'10". I have been that height since sixth grade. I have long legs. So some of your children's ministries, which include fifth, sixth graders, are those kids' furniture chairs and tables actually going to be comfortable for someone who's 5'10"? Or think about the children who are very obese. You have them in your ministry, most likely. How are they going to feel when they're very uncomfortable in a little tiny preschool chair? I do not do kids' furnitures for this reason. We'll go back to this kidney bean table that my current church has. It is made for five, six-year-olds. Well, five, ten mom, six, one dad, we have very large children, right? So my, at the point, seven-year-old, six, seven-year-old, she could not sit with her knees under the table. So she could not just sit in her chair with her legs on the floor. She had to kind of slant her legs to be able to get them under the table with the kids' furniture. She's tall. Don't do kids' furniture. Use adults. Most kids are used to living in an adult world. They're fine. I have stackable chairs. They're lime green from Amazon and a table from Costco. Works great. I do love Easy Risers, which are made for kids, but they're not kid size. They are stacking size. It's great. I love them, but maybe I go in and I do not have$3,000 to buy new furniture. You make do with what you have. You get creative. You plan, but you have to know what do you have. So what resources are at your disposal? Budget. Curriculum, game supplies, craft supplies, and then the people as a resource. So let's say you have a really small budget, but there's a lot of stuff you need. Who can you go to at your church and ask for some money, some donations? If you're new, you likely won't know this. Your pastor will. There will be parents who can help you, but check with your pastor first, the pastor, the church secretary, perhaps even the finance person, whatever you call them, who's in charge of collecting the church money. Hey, we have some expenses that we really need to kick off this new start to the ministry. Who could I go to to ask? This is something, too, I really recommend when you're looking at summer camp or any kind of events. You likely have parents that cannot pay for it. But there's someone at your church who has a heart that will give the money, won't want recognition, but will want to make sure no child can miss out. Get to know what you have. And then you're planning accordingly. You're deciding what I can get right now, what needs to wait. You're ranking things in priorities. So we've observed. We've assessed. I keep saying obsessed. Can you tell what's on my mind?

UNKNOWN:

Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

We're seeing what's happening. We're seeing what we have. And then you can begin to make a plan. But before that, number three, curriculum and programming. Those are the first things that I'm going to look at when it comes to changing things. The goal is discipleship, to see boys and girls become lifelong followers of Christ. Is the curriculum doing that? My last church, I walked in and I was looking at the Sunday school. I didn't have to teach Sunday school. There were teachers in place when I started. So I'm just like, hey, I'm going to come sit in. I'm going to see how it's going. And the kids hated the curriculum. It was just, it was kind of weak. It hopped around story to story. So it was not teaching the biblical narrative well. But really the worst fault, because it wasn't unscriptural, it was just a little fluffy, was that it was not age appropriate. So the first lesson that I observed with him, the fifth grade boys were supposed to be acting like a dog and barking like a dog for the activity. They hated it. Curriculum got changed real quick. I met with the leaders and I'm like, yeah, we don't love this either. Can we change? Yes. So then we switched to Answers Bible Curriculum. We did that. It was a four-year cycle. At the end of that four years, I went to the teachers and I'm like, okay, it's time to be choosing. Would you all like to continue this or would you like me to look for something else? And they unanimously said, no, we want to stick with this. Let's start this one over. So the curriculum and the programming structure, is it discipling? Is it cost-effective? Is it meeting the needs of the kids that you have? Is it age-appropriate? Is it engaging? Is it scripture-based, gospel-centered? If you are not sure about your curriculum, if you go to the Renew a Nation blog, church.renewanation.org, we have five curriculum questions that you need to ask yourself. We did a training on this in the Family Ministry community with these questions. It's going to be an article in our fall issue of the Renew Nation Review. Some great questions to ask. Is it working? When you're looking at your programming, are you doing midweek? Are people coming? Is it the right day of the week? How is the lesson time structured? Is there a meal? You know, all of those questions. Now is the time to decide what needs to be changed, tweaked, switched, thrown out. That's going to be my big focus when I need to come in and make some changes. The goal is to grow boys and girls in Christ. So curriculum is top priority. All right, number four, just as important, safety and security. These are things that I'm doing right off the bat. What is a safety and security policy? I don't care if you are a five person church or a five million person church, you still need a safety and security policy. So what has been in place and then what needs to change? The bare minimums that you need, you have to have a background check policy on every volunteer. You need to have a two adult rule. You need to have some sort of a screening, a vetting process for volunteers. This has to be put in place immediately. There are so many other facets of safety and security, but that is your minimum. Who has access to your kids? Should they have access to your kids? I'm going to give you another real life example. Small church, lady came in, visited the first time. and meets with me. She's got a daughter that she has partial custody of. She wants her to come. Also, I would love, I love kids. I want to volunteer. I would love to have your daughter. Then I get the email from her. She got my email that daughter, he was like 10, couldn't emotionally handle being away from mom. So mom has to be in the classroom the whole time. Now, the fact that she had already emphatically told me how much she wants to volunteer with the kids is Then telling me that a 10-year-old can't be without her. I had some little warning bells going off, some red flags. And I did not feel comfortable with this. I feel like, okay, 10, you're in school. You'll be fine for an hour without mom. It's honestly not even an hour. It's like 40 minutes. I just, I don't feel like this is right. I feel like this is a, and she doesn't have full custody either. So she's not with mom all the time. I'm like, I think this is someone trying to get access to kids. Now, I was not going to let her be a volunteer at this point anyways, because you walk in your first day at this church and you're like, I'm going to volunteer. not because there's a policy in place. Now, my policy at this new church, I'm a volunteer at, my policy was just in my head. There was never anything printed out, but it's the same policy I've always operated by. You better believe that week it was printed out and it was sent to the pastors, the deacons, anyone who was needed. We already were doing safe practices. Anyone who had access to kids was background checked. My dad is our security man and he goes and he locks the doors of the building that we are in. One door is left unlocked and he has a line of sight during church. He's also on speed dial. And let's see how many, one, two, three, three of his grandkids are in my class. So you better believe he has a vested interest in making sure we're safe. So this lady, I came up with a compromise and I talked to my dad who is, he's like 6'2". He's a large man and we live in Kentucky. So that tells you about his level of protection, if you know what I mean. So I talked with my dad and I said, hey, this woman wants to help her child be comfortable. I have some red flags. I would like for you to be in the class the whole time with me to give an extra, you know, what if I'm distracted by a kid? I got a little guy who sometimes needs Miss Amber to help get his pants back up. I'm like, I would like you to be in the classroom the whole time, please. I told this lady via email, here's what we can do. You cannot be in the class every Sunday. You have to be a member for six months prior. I think for her, I told her a year because I had red flags with a clean background check and vetting. But what I will allow, because I understand first times can be a little intimidating. If you fill out this background form, we will get it ran. If it comes back, okay, you can be with your daughter for that first time. We have extra security in there because it is just our policy to keep everybody safe. Guess what happened? She ghosted me. Never responded. I think she was trying to get, for whatever reason, access to kids. You have to have a safety and security plan. You might think, oh, it couldn't happen to me. Friends, I am small church in Kentucky. That's one of my stories. If you remember about, if you follow Kentucky News, about 13 years ago, 12, 13 years ago, I was at the church where the worship pastor was arrested by the FBI for purchasing a 10-year-old off Craigslist. It happens in small churches, just as it happens in large churches and medium churches and multi-site churches and everything in between. You must do a safety and security plan as soon as you start if there's not one. If there's a plan in place, look at it, assess where are the weaknesses, what needs to be strengthened up. You can't disciple kids if parents don't feel their kids are safe. So we're observing, we're assessing, we're building relationships, we're figuring out what we have. We're taking a look at our curriculum and our programming. We're making sure our safety and security plan is tight and kids are going to be safe. Then I'm looking to see what is my plan to make sure parents are equipped? That might seem like a weird first step to you. Maybe you think I should be focusing on events or outreach or missions or whatever. Why would I do this? Okay, I started at 15. Had no clue what I was doing, right? I was just kind of modeling what I'd grown up with. Went to college, started at my first church at 21. My first Sunday was my 21st birthday. Fun fact, I fell and like skinned my knees at my 21st birthday and it was a non-denominational church. I grew up Southern Baptist. So I thought that the purple communion that day was purple grape juice, which I preferred over white grape juice. No, it was wine on my 21st birthday. That was a shocker. It was a fun story. Learned about family ministry pretty early on at my first church when I'm very young and thought I started doing family ministry well. Mom and dad biblically commanded to disciple Deuteronomy 6, 4 through 9 and press upon your children over and over, train up your children. Awesome. Let's give them some great resources. And I perfected resourcing. I resourced well. By the end of my last church, I'm at 20 years of ministry. I'm resourcing well, but I really wasn't fully equipping parents. I had lukewarm parents. I'm not taking all the blame because it's a heart issue, but I could have done a different and better job of equipping parents. So I'm starting out at a new church. What am I doing? I'm making my plan on how I'm going to equip parents. What does this look like? This looks like informing parents of their role, training them on how to do their role, equipping them with resources to do so and encouraging them. There's a whole other facet of things that should be talked about. Like, are we addressing marriage in our church? Are we addressing biblical education in our church? Are we ministering to the individual units of the family? And I'm not talking silo ministries. I'm talking about care resources, divorce, finances, mentorship, you know, all those things. But the key, you know, kind of narrowing it in, how are parents knowing that it's their job to disciple and How are you training them to do so? That is a huge piece that we miss out on. That's one I took to light of an approach and I wish it would have been firmer. And then resourcing. So what's my plan for this? What budget do I have for this? What are my key resources I want to get? So I just started at my new church. I've been resourcing. I've been training through my events. I'm choosing to train through events. Since I'm a volunteer, I don't actually hold a staff position. I'm just kind of going in. And I can, as a new girl on the block, go in and say, hey, you need to do this. So I'm training through the events. I'm informing them of their role, training them on how to do the role, sending them home with the resources to do so. I'm doing videos on my YouTube channel. They're being watched. It's going good. So I just did a resource station. We needed one. I'd been sending out resources, but I want to be able to catch some visitors too. Well, I have a list of things that I would start with as a first time resource station. What resources do you need to start with? Do you have the relationship to where you know what these families need? We have to resource our parents. We have to equip them to disciple because they have the most influence on their child. So you can have the most amazing ministry ever. But it's not, one, how God designed. God did not say, children's ministry, you are the first disciple makers, the primary disciple makers. No, that's mom and dad. And it's not going to be as effective as a parent who has the most access to their child. Children's ministry is awesome. Love it. Do it. Do it well. But we need to be ministering with this family first mentality where we are equipping parents to lead, putting positions to lead. That's a whole nother conversation. Definitely read the book. I'm not going to say that I regret the first 20 years of my ministry, but I say this in complete sincerity. I would do 20 years differently. Could I do them over? I did children's ministry well. Lessons were deep. They were theologically sound. They were engaging. I had relationships. We did camp and VBS and all of those wonderful good things. But I didn't equip parents the way that I needed to. And I tried and I learned from things, but I would redo a lot of stuff. So those are my five things that I would do if I'm starting out in children's ministry, first five steps. If I'm starting out in a new church, first five steps. Now, I'm going to give you a couple of resources that are going to help you in this. If you have more questions, please reach out to me, apikeatrenewnation.org, apike0292 at gmail.com. You can find me on social media, Amber Pike, Instagram, Facebook. Reach out to me. I would love to help. A couple of resources, intentional children's ministry. I... Packed in decades of experience in this, and it is a very practical book, including the back. I think I went to like M or N in appendixes, and I literally have forms that you can take and use. If you need a digital copy of a man, just email me. But there are forms, a registration form, and... An event form, release form, talking about like follow-up and planning sheets. Like so many practical things are in here because I'm a very practical children's minister. So I'm giving you lists. I'm giving you ideas, steps. Check out Intentional Children's Ministry. With this, I also do coaching if you kind of need a one-on-one thing. I am a big fan of Facebook groups. If point number five, the equipping parents piece, gave you some questions or some pause, I definitely recommend you should check out the Family Ministry Academy. Nine months, all online, an amazing resource. This is what changed my view of family ministry and made me realize I wasn't doing it well because I wasn't doing enough. I was just resourcing well and a little bit of like, hey, mom and dad, it's your job. The Family Ministry Academy is going to equip you to do so. It's also a fifth of a master's if you're a school person or have been thinking about going back to school. It's accredited through Northwestern University and it's a fifth of your master's. for way low cost. Number four, resource, a Kidman planner. You can get it on my website, amberpack.org. You can get it on church.renewnation.org. This is what I use each month. I made it because like I needed something for me. So it gives me my overview of my lessons. It gives what resource am I putting in hands this week? How am I equipping training volunteers? Who do I need to send some happy mail to? It's kind of like your lesson, your month overview at a glance. And I also have a week version. And then safety and security. I think the best group out there is KidCheck. You do not have to use their check-in system to use KidCheck. They have tons of blogs and resources, training pieces. If you are unfamiliar what a good safety and security policy and plan should look like, please go check out KidCheck. Wonderful people just with a heart to keep kids safe because they know the kids can't hear the gospel. They can't grow in Christ if they are not safe. And we have to protect our kids so that we can disciple our kids. That's a lot. But I hope wherever you're at in your children's ministry journey that you are growing, you are learning. Friends, I am 20-something years into it, and I'm still learning and growing, and I make mistakes, and I learn from them. I would love to hear from you if you have questions. If you are struggling with something, please reach out. Remember the goal in everything you do. We want to see boys and girls become lifelong disciples of Christ. We're not babysitters. We're not entertainers. We're not time fillers. We are disciple makers. And remember, what you do matters.