Establish Expectations Before Beginning Your Bible Lesson

There is a difficult balance to strike when explaining Sunday School "rules" to kids.

On the one hand, we know that our God is worthy of respect and honor, and He is also a God of order.  We do not want to allow behavior in Sunday School classrooms that dishonors our great God.

On the other hand, encouraging "rule following" can be dangerous.  We do not want to create young Pharisees who know God's word and outwardly appear to be following it, but inwardly have a heart far from God.

This is a difficult balance to strike, and should be prayerfully considered.

Since kids feel safer and are more likely to learn when they know what to expect and what might get them in "trouble," setting expectations for kids can help you as you work out the difficult balance.

This shouldn't take a long time, but instead should be quick and concise, especially if most of the children are regular attenders and are already familiar with you.  If you have a lot of inconsistency with who is in your class every week, you will probably want to spend a little more time explaining expectations each week.

Each week, after praying:

Start off by giving a quick summary of the schedule for the day.  Tell students what they will be learning about and what else they will be doing (playing a game, practicing a memory verse, etc.).

Then, Explain how you expect the kids to behave during the lesson.  Can they get out of their seats without permission?  Do they need to raise their hands to talk?  What should they do if they need to go to the bathroom?  As you explain what you expect from students, try not to make these sound like "rules."  Instead, explain to them that following these expectations will make it easy for everyone to learn about Jesus.  Distractions keep people from learning about Jesus.

God has given us boundaries for our own benefit.  As adults, it is easier to see how what might seem like "rules" from God are actually boundaries that help keep us safe, sanctify us, and help us to thrive in Him.  Try to approach your classroom expectations in the same way, while always extending grace as God has extended grace to you.