We regularly let students teach in our student ministry. I believe it’s far more beneficial for the one getting the experience of teaching than it is for the rest of the group to have a more experienced teacher every week. Why? The one teaching learns far more in those moments, they integrate the material far more than had they been just listening, they build confidence in front of their peers, and they practice leading for the day when we’re not there to coach them through it. It’s also better for their peers; teens listen to teens better. They want their friends to succeed. They relate in a different way. They also tend to behave better when it’s a peer up front.
I was going through some old photos the other day and I came across the one above. That’s me. Teaching in children’s church when I was around eighth grade or so. The man sitting with the kids in front of me was my youth pastor. Kinda wild to think how many decades ago this photo was taken! Mark, my youth pastor, let a middle schooler who asked to teach do it. He supported me, cheered me on, and sat through it. It might be part of what landed me on the path I ended up on. It’s certainly part of the reason why I love sharing the stage and podium with others today!
Young people want to serve, they want to lead, they want to have responsibilities that carry weight. For some of them this translates to a desire to teach. We let high school students teach middle school in our ministry frequently. We let older high school students teach high school occasionally in the summer. But we try to set them up for success. We give them resources, coaching, and then when they teach, we give them feedback on how they can grow. Mostly I like to celebrate what they did right and maybe suggest one thing to improve. The reality is they are their own biggest critics so they already have a list of things they think they messed up … what they need is a lot of affirmation on what they did right. Part of setting them up for success means giving them strong materials; in our context that tends to be Coleader Roadmaps series. They’re high quality, give a teacher everything they need, and they look good, too. My preference for students teaching is to give them topics I know they’ve heard adults teach on before; maybe not the same curriculum, but the same topic, so they have a good frame of reference. It’s one of the reasons why our students are frequently the ones teaching our HABITS series these days.
To be clear, adults still teach most of the time. But if you aren’t letting your teens have a chance at it from time to time, you’re missing out on a tremendous blessing for everyone in the ministry!