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Student’s Life Application Study Bible

By Joe Felim

Totally updated and expanded, the Student’s Life Application Study Bible is a one-of-a-kind Bible designed for teens who desire to deepen their relationship with God. Engaging notes, questions, and graphics challenge readers with the Bible’s relevant message. Today’s teens will quickly discover God’s perspective and learn how to apply vital truths to the situations they face daily. Now in a convenient size for carrying to church and school.

Ever feel like God and life just don’t make sense together? Like the situations you face are beyond anything your parents-or even God-can understand? The Bible can help-it has a lot to say to teens. Advice that can really make a difference. And truths that relate to even the toughest situations you might encounter.

The Student’s Life Application Study Bible helps bring God’s Word to life. It helps teens progress from a simple understanding of the Bible to making a real life-change through applying God’s word to everyday situations.

student-life-bible-study

Student Life Bible Study

By Joe Felim

Student Life Bible Study makes preparation easier than developing my own curriculum from scratch and challenges me to think about what the students need to really hear. It also doesn’t bind me to too ridged of a format that doesn’t work for a given Sunday.

I like it. It’s very relevant. It gives me lots of choices, and you can use what will work for your youth group. Our kids get really involved in it. They look forward to the DVD clips and really enjoy doing the dramas. Regardless of what type of youth group you have, there are enough options provided that can get this curriculum to work for your kids.

It’s not just a Bible study. The extra games and videos help make it more engaging and draw the kids into the lessons. All my leaders love the commentary and feel like they are learning more as they prepare the lessons.

The ability for multiple teachers to access the Bible study from their home allows for great flexibility and preparations for the lessons. This allows me as the leader to bring in more people to use their teaching gifts and share leadership responsibilities.

student-life-application-study-bible

Creatively Teaching Youth

By Joe Felim

Choosing Bible Study curriculum is like choosing new clothes. Few have the resources, skill, or the time to tailor their own. But you are not stuck with creating your own or using something that doesn’t fit. There is a third option - adjusting it so that it does fit. Bible study materials are often written to fit a wide variety of needs, but with a little planning and a little adapting here and there you can get something that fits.

We need to be very careful that we are not buying a Ballerina outfit for a Soccer Goalie. One may be elegant and beautiful, but no matter how much adjustment we do, it will never serve our purpose. Different occasions demand different materials. And the boys soccer team may need a little something different from the mom’s cross-stitch class. “One size fits all” rarely fits! To be most effective we need to know the sizes (spiritual maturity) of the people for which the material is intended. Finally we need something that is practical for the skill level of the teacher, the time constraints and the resources available. Discover the various interests and needs of your students and their teachers and you will be much more effective outfitting them for life.

Isolate the main idea of the lesson, and how it should be applied to life. Then put it into one simple statement. Materials will often do this for you and call it the “teaching aim” or “central truth.” These are only suggestions and should be rewritten as necessary so that it is meaningful and applicable to YOUR youth in YOUR church. Your objective is not to cover all the material in the Bible passage, forcing your youth to “sit still while you instill” all the Bible content into them. Rather your goal is to help each to discover the ONE main truth of the passage and apply it to his or her life. Our goal is not Bible Drill Champions, but Biblical Christians. If the youth leave with one truth per week and truly apply it to life, you will have been incredibly used by God and might even create a few Bible Drill Champs in the process!

Once you have identified the central truth, everything you do during this lesson should focus on this truth, shed light on it, look at it from different angles, help youth discover it, and eventually to see its application. Read the focal passage, the lesson in the student book, the background material, and teaching helps with your specific main idea for your youth in mind. Remember that games and activities for the mere sake of activity are meaningless. But games and activities that help youth to experience the main truth, to draw attention to it, can be the key to making the lesson memorable. They can be a hook, a hanger, on which the student can hang the lesson instead of getting lost in the bottom of the closet of their minds. When choosing activities and teaching steps, always ask the following question: “How does this activity or step reinforce the Focus of this lesson?” If you have several activities to choose from, identify which would be the best reinforcement and most likely to work with YOUR students.

Use a variety of engaging teaching methods to seize the attention of your students and draw them to the central truth. Different people learn in different ways, have had difference life experiences, have different interests and concepts of fun, different gifts and talents, and have different needs. It is impossible to teach to all these variables at once, but variety allows you to reach more of them. You want to shine a bright light of attention on all the various facets of that diamond of truth you have chosen so that all its sparkle and all its various angles and perspectives are illuminated. You want to make it so attractive to the learners so that they want to interact with it and explore it in all its detail. The worst teaching method is the one that is repeatedly used as it will progressively become more ineffective with each use. Most teaching materials will provide a couple of alternative options for each key teaching point. Identify the key idea or purpose of each activity. They are options and you can pick and choose as you wish. You may even add an option of your own if you can achieve the same result with another activity. Remember EVERYTHING in the materials are SUGGESTIONS! ADAPT!

If you wish to use alternative ideas you need resources. Why waste your time trying to come up with all your own ideas when there are some great helps already available from which to draw? If the focus of the lesson is for example “compassion,” then you can often find another lesson on compassion and add or replace activities in your lesson. There are many good books and resources that are just that, sources of teaching ideas for you to adapt as needed! And when your creative juices ARE flowing and you have a creative idea, type it into your computer or jot it down on a notecard and store it in a file for later use. You never know when the same idea could be used again with a different group of youth later. Just categorize them by subjects and key words (i.e. what does this activity teach?)

“We don’t teach the Bible, we teach YOUTH.”

Remember our goal is not “Content” but “Changed lives,” not “facts,” but “followers.” Our goal is to see youth grow and develop in preparation for a lifelong walk with Christ, to be faithful followers of Jesus. Many people know about God and Christianity without really knowing God and living as Christians. An effective teacher will know the needs, the likes and dislikes, and the learning preferences of youth and be able to integrate these into the lesson so that youth become a part of the lesson and can understand its application to his or her life. As you prepare for your lesson, you should keep in mind the needs, experiences, and personalities of YOUR youth. The key is to guide the lesson with YOUR youth in mind.

You need to connect all the parts of the lesson together and most importantly build a connection between the lesson and the students and even between yourself, as the teacher, and the students. “Youth don’t care what you know until they know that you care.” Youth need to know how one activity relates to those that have preceded it. After you have analyzed how each activity or step relates to the main lesson you only need to phrase it in a simple sentence and it serves as a great transition to the next step. You might also let youth know how this lesson connects with previous lessons. Finally youth need to know where the lesson connects with everyday life- (i.e. how does it apply.) They want to know why the lesson is important.