Mistakes Sunday School Teachers Make and How to Avoid them (Part 4)

Being too friendly with the children is a big mistake. It is natural to want the children to like you, but it is essential that you, as a teacher, maintain distance from the children. Creating an environment of friendship and teaching in the same classroom is very dificult, and it usually results in failure. Teachers who attempt to be too friendly with children lose their credibility when they try to revert back to “teacher mode” to regain control or lead the session. When children see their teachers as friends instead of superiors, they can lose respect for the teacher.

Along with a loss of respect, your classroom environment will change dramatically if you portray yourself as a friend instead of a teacher. Your desire in being friends with the children is to create a safe, fun, enjoyable environment where children feel comfortable around you and look at you as someone they can trust. If you become too much an equal, they will see the space as void of any power figure and take advantage of the “no adults” feel. When children begin to take over, you lose the safety of the space, as they feel that they are then in charge instead of learning. While it may turn into a fun space for them, it is no longer a productive one, which makes it less fun for you. Your feelings are transmitted to the children, whether you know it or not, so they get much of their attitude about Sunday school simply from your body language, facial expressions, and perceived enthusiasm for the session.

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Editor note

Sunday school lessons for 3 - 11 year olds
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To keep yourself from becoming too much of a friend and too little of a teacher, try to strike a balance, in your mind, between the teacher you want to be and the teacher you know you need to be. You may have a perfect picture in your head of a teacher-friend who maintains control but does not need to, because
his/her children respect him/her to the point where rules are not necessary. While this is descriptive of a friendship, it is almost never the case in a classroom, where there is one teacher and many children. To maintain the respect and control you deserve in a classroom, you must be friendly with children but not overly so. Show that you are the boss by laying out specific rules, explained quite clearly, and enforce them. Tell the children that you have developed certain consequences for poor behavior, and do not hesitate to discipline children as you have planned. The first time you hesitate, the children will know it, and they will look at that as an example of how you plan to proceed in the rest of the sessions.

However, having said all that you can be friendly with the children. In fact, you must be. To run a successful classroom, you must develop a good rapport with the children, so that they feel comfortable sharing their feelings and ideas with you and other children. It is important that as a teacher, you make the children feel unique and cared about, something a friendship also provides. You must make an effort to get to know the children, learn about them and feel comfortable with them, but you must separate yourself from them from the beginning. There needs to be a clear distinction between your role as a supportive teacher and leader and them as children coming to learn. While this separation might not give you the level of intimacy you desire with the children, it will give you a classroom you can manage and a receptive audience for your Christian teaching.

Easter lesson for Sunday school