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*Guide To Using Resources – Essential Reading

As you will find, more and more Youth Work resources pop up over the internet and in various magazines etc, however we thought it would be good to offer a good practical guide to using these resources.

Read The Resource beforehand

It may sound like common sense but it is absolutely essential that you carefully read the resource in advance and maybe show it to your other youth leaders so that they are also aware what is happening. It could be good (if practical to do so) to meet with the other leaders to discuss the session and make sure people know what they are doing and make sure that you know what you will need to run the session.

Don’t use them as black and white guides

Ready to use meeting guides are not black and white anymore-so than every bible study group is the same. Every group of young people are unique both in group dynamic and size of group, some of the things in our ready to use meeting guides might not be suitable for your group, some of the illustrations might be ones your young people could struggle to relate to and some of the games just might not work with the group you have, so when you read before hand be thinking about if each part will work with your group or not and don’t be afraid to change it.

Don’t make a habit of using them

Ready to use meeting guides are great and have been valuable resource in my own youth work, both for using as sessions or within session planning for ideas however I would personally advise that as youth workers you don’t get into the habit of just finding one each week to use, it is good to be aware of your groups needs and write your own appropriate sessions for your groups, this can be good for you as the leader because you know exactly what each part of the session is meant to achive, and it can be good for the group as it is written for them so should work with the group dynamic. However don’t feel that all sessions have to be your own stuff, you can research online and take various ideas and games, just weave it together with some of your own stuff. It can be good to plan whole sessions with your leadership team too!

If you’re a church without a youth worker then don’t worry if you don’t have the resources to write your own just be sure to take time when choosing pre-written sessions and allow time in the week to spend time reading through the session.