Incentives, punishments, sending kids out to sit with their parents, points on a chalkboard to earn candy...there are so many options, and none of them seem to work with some kids.
Here are some basic ideas we've used in kid's church when kids misbehave.
1. Don't send kids out to sit with their parents or an adult in the "big" church. Don't even threaten this as an option. It's SOOOO tempting, I know, but think about the message we send when we do this.
"Johnny, if you don't behave, I'm going to force you to go into a church service where you'll be really bored and won't get to play with other kids, and all the adults will look at you and cringe."
That's really setting them up to be able to enjoy the service when they graduate youth group...Not! (I'm old, I still use old catch phrases, ok?)
We need to think about the way this will affect their perception of adult services. If we keep setting them up to think it's boring, they will always believe that it is, and we will lose them after graduation! (Or whenever parents quit making them come, if they do make them come now.)
2. Make classroom rules simple and short. If there are too many rules, with too many words, kids won't remember them. We've used for our lesson times a short set of rules that all the kids have memorized and we repeat them before the lesson time almost every week.
Simply this:
Sit Down
Listen Up
Be Still
Have Fun
After we say them, I usually explain them in a silly way to enforce what we've just said.
When the kids get rowdy during a lesson, I just stop and shout, "Sit up straight." (and wait for them to do this.) "Hands on your lap, feet on or near the floor." and then continue. But I do it in a silly voice so they always participate because it's fun.
3. Incentives work best. Just don't overuse them! Incentives work, but if you're not consistent in the way you reward kids, it won't work. Set up a standard of expectations for rewards. For example, 1 point for bringing a Bible, 1 point for kindness to a friend in class, 1 point for bringing your offering, 2 points for bringing a visitor, 2 points for memorizing the Bible verse...
4. Behavior Charts can help! Over the years, I've made my own behavior charts. When kids can see how many points they have, it encourages them to keep going. They want to see how well they've done.
My favorite thing to use now is Class Dojo. www.classdojo.com is something I learned about when I was a teacher's aid in middle school here in town. Class Dojo allows you to enter the first names or a nickname for each child in your class. It then assigns a cute little monster avatar for each child.
You can then make your own award points by easily customizing the points for good and bad behavior. During class, you can click on a child's name and it will give you options for positive or negative behavior. Once you choose that, you can choose what you want to give the point for.
Negative points take away from positive points, or makes the amount go into negative if there are no positive points. You can do this with a laptop, a computer hooked to a projector, or use the free app for your smart phone. Android and Apple both have a supported app for this.
The account is free and is incredibly simple to set up and use.
When the class is over for the night, click on end class to store the points. You can add to them each week, or clear the points after each class.
I've asked people in the church to help donate small prizes for kids to earn. Stickers, pencils, coloring books, plastic rings, unopened McDonald's toys, etc. Once every six weeks we allow the kids to "shop" the store using a (Word Document) made up credit card. If you would like a template for this, comment with your email address.
What has worked for you? What has NOT worked for you?
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