Play As Curriculum (Or, It’s Just As Easy to Teach a Fun (and relevant) Confirmation Class As a Boring One – Here’s How) – Transcript
Jim Latimer
Welcome to Coaching for Interims. We are about empowerment for interim ministry, best practices and quick help – wisdom from the field. This is our collaborative Wisdom from the Field project featuring short interviews with transitional interim ministers, and others, with practical help and wisdom to offer those engaged in transitional ministry. Thank you for tuning into this episode of Wisdom from the Field.
Jim Latimer
Today we have the honor, joy and great fun to have with us Reverend Niki Harvell. Niki is an ELCA minister. She has served in a variety of pastorates. As I have come to know Niki in the last several years, one of the things that stands out to me about her is her knack for helping congregations reinvent their ministries and activities, like meetings and things that happen regularly and have become pretty stale. And to reinvent them in ways that are authentically joyful, fun and true to the Gospel.
Jim Latimer
Play is one of her superpowers and using that in a way that releases that Holy Spirit energy. I wanted her to share her thoughts in this episode around play as curriculum. Niki, I know you’ve got some words on that, if you would share some of your wisdom, we’d love it.
Niki Harvell
Yes, of course. Play is incredibly important. It provides that release of stress and tension. But one of the biggest benefits that we find in play is around engagement and motivation, right? And so, it has become an essential tool for me, at least, in curriculum, because it gets me as a leader or a teacher to think about why is this important? Why is it important to talk about this, to teach this? Or what do I actually want as the end result? And it also offers a different level of engagement than what I think we have started to see over the last few years, if not longer, especially in curriculum, and I think mostly, in my experience the Confirmation curriculum.
Niki Harvell
So, in many cases, the confirmation classes or curriculums, when we look at those, we’ve seen this downhill slope as they’ve started to leave the area of excitement, for individual involvement and ownership over faith and church and community. And they started to sink towards a final task – a graduation type of mindset. And, quite frankly, you can teach a very boring confirmation class easily. But you can also have fun so easily. And that’s what I hope people start to pick up is how to play easily. With classes like that.
Jim Latimer
I love what you said at the very beginning about how play directly affects people’s level of engagement and motivation. No one would deny that engagement and motivation are important in whatever we’re going to do, but sometimes they’ll miss that play can be an entree to that – play is the missing piece. Once play goes into the mix it actually releases or really raises engagement, raises motivation. Certainly, with Confirmation, I’ve taught, led, or facilitated multiple Confirmation classes and they can get pretty darn rote. Whether it’s with Confirmation or something else, can you give an example of how play would come in – something concrete maybe?
Niki Harvell
Yes. You can do everything from having a short game at either the beginning or the end of each time you meet, to something more advanced such as creating a whole curriculum that centers all of its components into a game, which also works for virtual or distance courses as we’re seeing more of those pop up. So, the difference there is, you could start off with a quick round of jeopardy, to do some kind of trivia – asking questions for a unit that you just did. That’s a simple one-time game and then you’re done. It’s a great way to get them warmed up and in the right mindset.
Niki Harvell
You can also do a more advanced or involved game. For example, one of my favorites is to do a board game structure with literally a foam poster board, and thumbtacks. And I let them draw cards. They earn the cards based on what it is that I would normally otherwise assign for work. And so, they earn those moves through the game board. And so, the game becomes their motivating factor to do the work rather than, Well, I got to do the work because I have to do it! And you start to unpack this whole other world of their engagement.
Niki Harvell
At first you will see that their only interest is probably going to be the game, if that. But over the course of time, they start to realize that the more detail they’re giving, the more involved they are, and the more passionate they become. You can start to use those game components for intrinsic motivation and for rewards and opportunities that kind of move them along the journey. But you’re still having fun, which is really the end result.
Jim Latimer
I love it, Niki! And what would you say to the pastor or the person charged with leading the Confirmation class, if this person doesn’t think of themselves as a playful person or, if their most comfortable thing is simply a pencil and paper and reading approach. What advice would you give to this person to help them with something like this? To help them go into their play space, or whatever, but their self-talk isn’t helping them any.
Niki Harvell
The best advice I could give would be to just take one piece and just do a short game – a mini game, if you will. And then teach the rest as you’ve taught it for years, as you’re comfortable teaching it. But just do one short game. So, whether that’s a challenge for them, you know, if you’ve got a bunch of dice, then you could say, Okay, the first person to get all the dice on the same number, you are going to start us off! Or, You get to choose who does the prayer today! or whatever. It’s something simple like that. Or let them race around the church, right? Run a lap! – little things like that that have nothing to do with the curriculum, that you as a non-game person don’t have to be involved in. Some of those simple mini-games. Or look to board games that already exist. Find a board game that you are comfortable playing, and see if there’s a way that you can tie that in, or take a few minutes to say, Alright, if we get through this unit, then when you come next time, we’re just going to play games. Here’s a stack of board games! And just let them play.
Jim Latimer
I like that! Because I’m thinking there are a lot of pastors out there who are in your way of phrasing it – non-game people, or they see themselves as non-game people. So, that’s the reality, right? So, they limit themselves. So, let it be something really small. It could be the kids running around. The person, the pastor themself, doesn’t have to participate in it if they’re not comfortable. That’s great! Make it something really short at the beginning. And then I love your idea of, Okay, if we do this now, then the next time it’ll be games the whole time! Just give the kids a group of board games or group of things, and then let them choose what they want to do. That’s really nice. That’s good advice. Great! This has been very helpful. Is there anything else you want to add here before we wrap up this episode?
Niki Harvell
Nope. The only thing I would say would be to reach out to other colleagues who are trying this, or are willing to do this together. And try it once. Because it really does make a difference in how engaged our kids are in these classes.
Jim Latimer
And I would just say, again, if you’re a non-game person, or that’s how you see yourself, there probably is someone in the congregation who is a game person. Just ask for help. Say, Hey, who’s a game person here? Can you help me? And probably you’ll get several people who would say, Yeah. Sure. I’ll help you! And there you go.
Niki Harvell
Absolutely.
Jim Latimer
Niki, this has been great! Thank you so much for sharing your game wisdom with us. This is fabulous. Okay, take care. Bye.
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