Sticky Lessons

I recently fielded a critique from a pastor who was concerned that students in their Sunday School were not retaining the lessons that were being taught. He suspected that the curriculum was at fault. That was hard to hear, but it gets me thinking.

What Makes a Lesson Stick?
What are the keys to memorable lessons? How can we teach so that children retain the stuff we want them to learn? What is is that we want them to remember in the first place?

Gospel First
It is enough, I think, that children come away from Sunday School convinced that God loves them, that Jesus sacrificed Himself so that their sins are forgiven, their life restored, and a place prepared for them in heaven. Yes, I'd love for them to know how to live as God's children. I'd like them to be able to replay the Bible account and provide accurate details, even a week, month, or year later. I'd like them to be able to connect the Bible account to a chronological framework of the Bible, understand its context, and know the broader narrative for which it is a part. But it is enough if the children can honestly sing, "Jesus loves me! This I know, for the Bible tells me so."

Memorable Classroom Moments
What will make the lesson memorable? The possibilities are too numerous to list here, but some that top the list: connect the lesson to the child's life, be relational, involve emotional content, know and cater to the students' preferred learning styles, start with things the students know and add on that foundation with new knowledge that makes sense.

Repetition and Review
Moving knowledge from short-term memory to long-term memory is a subject worth tackling on its own and one that I won't try to write about with some personal study (not enough parked in my long-term memory). But repetition and review are tried and trued techniques. Our Growing in Christ lessons include some deliberate review tools and procedures. I wonder how many teachers skip them? The lessons I edit probably do not have enough specific instructions about review lessons from the last week or the weeks before that. That may be an oversight worth correcting. Growing in Christ repeats most Bible accounts on a three-year cycle; a student who is faithful in attendance will study a lesson three or four times in the course of his or her Sunday School career, each time in an age-appropriate way, building on previous knowledge. That review will reap a harvest. All review, however, depends on that faithful attendance. If I review a lesson three times, but the student is present only once, that's not much review.

So, I'm bold to ask:
What do you do to make Bible lessons stick?

What more can we do as your publisher to make memorable moments happen in your classroom?

God bless your efforts to teach God's children His Word!