A Barna survey found that nearly half of parents believed the church should take the lead in their children’s discipleship, while 95% of church leaders believed the home was the primary place where children learn about Jesus. Because children I know kids don’t want to be bored because boredom isn’t fun. But when routine settles in and our limited options get stale, people stop expecting and hoping that something interesting is going to come along. A hope deferred makes the heart sick. It becomes easier not to hope.
So how do you interest kids in something when they’re bored? Here are a few ideas that have helped me:
Make them move. Most any worksheet can become a physical game instead. With a couple of whiteboards, verb conjugation becomes a running relay. To discern character motivations, play charades. Where kids’ choices and creativity come in, things get even better.
Make them laugh. You don’t have to be a comedian. You just need to be willing to try something unexpected, like wrapping yourself up in tape. In that case, I was teaching the Latin root for to stick, which shows up in sticky words like adhesive and coherent. At last report, that memory was still sticking.
Make them question your sanity. I once had a science teacher who held up a Ziplock baggie containing his own kidney stones. If I’m walking on my desk in English, we’re talking about prepositions today. If I crash into my desk and cry ”Owww!”, we may be discussing interjections. If kids expect the unexpected, they’re going to be paying attention.
Make it social. If it’s planned well, almost every activity can be better with a friend. Regularly reading for an audience pushes writers to the next level.
Bridge to their interests. I’ve never taught music, but once I noticed I had a class full of musicians. We got them on stage in togas and camo, performing a popular song in Latin for their friends…including the full guitar solo. Learn about kids’ interests, then build a bridge to those interests where you can. It requires creative effort, but that same effort shows kids that you see them.
Break the box. We were reviewing old vocabulary, and even I was bored! So we used one of our word roots to invent a brand new word. Our goal was to get somebody who wasn’t us to use it. This succeeded beyond our wildest dreams when some guy in England wrote a complete blog post about it.
Ask for help. A parent who was a chef put on a Roman banquet for my students. Another friend showed our students how magic tricks (illusions) really work – that there’s actually no magic involved. If you have a special talent or random hobby, let the teachers in your life know about it!
The good news is that no one actually enjoys being bored for very long. So when kids see you taking a risk to shake things up, even if it’s flawed, they’ll often jump in and help you!
—A classroom veteran, George Rietz encourages teachers, teaches homeschoolers, and invents new tools to reshape education.
Contact him through ExploreMyWriting.com .
