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Building Community . . . from the Archives

The first minutes of a session can set the tone for the rest of the time with children and youth. Everyone arrives with differing attitudes and experiences from their week. Some may be excited to be there, while others may need more sleep! Each Shine session begins with an activity to help you welcome everyone, get acquainted, and feel at ease with one another. Hearing their names spoken aloud is one important way for young children to feel a part of the community. Activities that include movement can ease some of the awkwardness of sharing among elementary-age children. Older children and junior youth find sharing easier when given a prompt or sentence to finish. Some activities connect to the Bible story, but the primary focus is helping children and youth get to know each other. For this blog post, we’ve taken a stroll through our curriculum archives to bring you some of Shine’s best building community activities!  

PreK–Kindergarten 

Writers of Shine’s curriculum for young children often include easy chants or “to the tune of” songs at the beginning of the session to welcome children.   Gather in a circle. Have children sit with their legs straight in front of them. Say the following “Light of God” chant, shining a flashlight as indicated. Shine the light toward each person’s feet during the chant, rather than at the body or face. Give the flashlight to the child you named and have that child shine the light for another verse. Continue until everyone has been named. Light of God, shine on ______________. (Shine light toward the named child.) Light of God, shine on me. (Shine light on self.) Shine on everyone I see. (Shine light toward everyone in group.) Teaching Tip: If you have a large group, use multiple flashlights. Before saying each verse, have the children holding the flashlights choose one or two people to name.   Welcome each child and gather in a circle. Clap along as you say this welcome rhyme or sing it to the tune of “If You’re Happy and You Know It.” There is a place for _______ (name), there’s a place. (2x) When you come here, you can pray, you can learn, and you can play. There is a place for _______ (name), there’s a place.  

Elementary

Creative props help engage this age group and encourage them to share. Do you remember the Octo-tell? Make your own by copying the template from the Extras page onto card stock. You can find the template here. Tip: Assembling the Octo-tell takes a bit of time and patience. 😊 Sharing our life experiences is an important part of shaping and strengthening community. Use the Octo-tell to talk about the previous week together. Let each child roll the Octo-tell and use the sentence starter on the side facing up as a springboard for something that she or he would like to share with the group.   Playing Charades is an activity where sharing happens nonverbally. Learning to understand the feelings and needs of others takes practice! Get to know each other better by playing “Emotion Charades.” Have one child act out an emotion of his or her choice using facial expressions as well as body movements. The rest of the group should do their best to identify the emotion. Examples include happy, sad, angry, scared, excited, contented, nervous, confused, and so on. Remind children that if we’re unsure of how others are feeling, we can always ask.   During one quarter, several sessions began with a sharing activity using tealight candles and a spoken refrain by the teacher to transition to the spiritual practice. Examples from two sessions are below.   Welcome children and gather in a circle. Turn on a tealight candle and set it in the middle of the circle as you say your name and talk about a time you tried something new—for instance, learned to ice skate, swim, or speak a different language. Talk about how you felt. Go around the group, inviting everyone to turn on a candle and say their name and talk about something new they have tried. How did they feel? Move all the candles so that they form a circle. Say: We all do new things sometimes. (Point to the circle of candles.) God is always with us, especially when things feel hard or scary. We are never alone. (Turn on the pillar candle and set it inside the circle.)   Welcome children by name and gather in a circle. Turn on a tealight candle and set it in the middle of the circle as you say your name and one thing you like to do at church. Go around the group, inviting everyone to turn on a candle and say their name and one thing they like to do at church. Move all the candles so that they form a square. Say: God does not live inside a church building. (Point to the square of candles.) But God is with us here today. (Turn on the pillar candle and set it inside the square.)  

Junior Youth

Teachers of junior youth often find it challenging to get youth to share with one another. The classic “Would You Rather” activity is a great way to get youth up and interacting without needing to talk! Help youth feel comfortable interacting with each other by asking a few “Would you rather . . .” questions. Draw an imaginary line in your space and point to one end or the other as you ask each question. Youth can stand along the line according to their response. Here are some examples: “Would you rather time travel to the past or the future?” “Would you rather have dinner at a pizza place or a fancy restaurant?” “Would you rather work on a science project alone or with a friend?”   Here are two activities that can be used later in the quarter when your group may feel more comfortable sharing with you and their peers. Distribute paper and writing utensils. Ask youth to write ten personal descriptors, such as student, daughter, musician, African-American, brother, teenager, soccer player. When everyone is finished, invite each person to share two or three of the descriptors she or he wrote. Make a large list on a whiteboard or poster board. Then ask:

• Which parts of your identity were you born with and can’t change? Would you change them if you could? Why or why not?
• Which of your characteristics might other people want? What are the advantages of those characteristics?
• Do any of these characteristics keep you from doing something you wish you could do? Or keep you from being a part of a group you wish you could be in?

  Greet youth by name as they arrive. Have youth pair up for a sharing and listening activity. Give each pair ten blocks or LEGO® bricks. Tell youth to share five things about themselves, stacking one block or brick for each thing they say. Then reverse the activity. Remove one block while recalling the five things that the other person said. This encourages active listening, an important skill in relationship-building.   For more ideas to build community in your group, visit the Shine “Getting to know you” Pinterest board: https://www.pinterest.com/shinelivingingo/getting-to-know-you/. Share your group’s favorite get-to-know-you activity on our Facebook or Instagram pages.