The 2-year Cycle

Longevity pays off anywhere you work, but especially in Middle School Ministry.

For the past five years I've been bumbling through lessons and series, going back and forth between creating my own and adapting bought series, all the while trying to develop a solid two-year cycle of teaching. After five years, I finally repeated a series. And it was fantastic. Here are some reasons I love teaching off of a well-built two-year cycle in Middle School Ministry.

I have a plan. If a parent asks me what's going to be taught, I can give them the outline for 2 years. When I think of a topic that should be taught, I can visually see the best time of the year to put that into the cycle. I very rarely suffer from the "What am I going to teach next week?" syndrome.

My lessons get better each time. Instead of focusing on WHAT to teach, I can focus more on HOW to communicate it. I don't have to figure out the 3 points from this passage, I just have to refine and tweak it to make those 3 points stick better.

Great ideas stay great. So many times I come up with a "great ideas" that flops, simply because all my time was spent writing lessons. When teaching in a Middle School cycle, the lessons remain priority, but more time is freed up to make that great idea come out great for the students.

It takes a long time to know what Middle School students need to hear, and it takes longer to put it together in some semblance of order. But once you get there, you'll thank yourself for hanging in there. And even though your students will likely never thank you, you're making the time for them that much better.