Making Good Better and Better Best
Vacation Bible School can easily become plagued by a pursuit of sameness. After all, if it worked last year it should surely work this year. Why spend time reinventing the wheel? However, if we are not careful we will find ourselves settling for good enough instead of striving for the best.
While I believe in finding what works and sticking with it, I also believe in looking for ways to make good better and better best. This is only achieved through regular and honest evaluation.
The idea of evaluation often creates a sense of dread and puts us on the defensive. Who wants to have their work criticized? No one I’m aware of. But evaluation should be more than looking for what we did wrong – there are plenty of people on the sidelines ready to help us identify the negatives. Evaluation should be a time of celebrating what went well and dreaming of ways to make it better.
I love this quote from Van France, one of the founders of the famed Disney University, “Are we growing with the show (what he calls the Disney experience) or just getting older? The trouble with people is that we get hardening of the mental arteries, cirrhosis of the enthusiasm, and arthritis of the imagination…”*
In other words, we settle for good enough instead of striving for the best.
For many of you “the show” (your week of VBS) is already behind you or will be soon. How will you evaluate the experience? Will you just be happy it is over with and move on to the next project, or will you spend time reviewing the week looking for ways to make good better and better best.
By the way, it is reported that Walt Disney often said, “Best is never the best.” He challenged the Disney organization to never stop looking for ways to improve. How about your VBS? Is it the best?
*Quoted in Disney U: How Disney University Develops the World’s Most Engaged, Loyal, and Customer-Centric Employees by Doug Lipp
I have had such an overwhelming response to the skits that I offered that I offered in lifeway a Facebook post.
I had written a skit for the bible story for each night of VBS. I offered them to anyone that would like to use them. I was overwhelmed with the response and request for these skits.
Has lifeway considered offering skits as part of their VBS curriculum?
I will be glad to continue offering them
Thank u. Joyce
I have been looking all over the curriculum to try to find the skits I have heard people talking about, so what I hear you saying is that there aren’t any there, is that correct. If yes, is there anyway we could have access to the skits you used.
Thank you for your time,
Shannon
Shannon, we do not create skits other than the ones included in the Worship Rally Guide which can be used (by tweaking a few words) for either an opening or a closing rally.
Why is there only one Bible memory verse and not a daily verse? What has happened to the Bible in VBS? No adult or child attends with a Bible – paper or tablet form. Our kids can memorize a verse per night with reinforcement in the various rotations. Why not hide God’s word in their hearts now while we can. What happened to kids learning the books of the Bible, Old and New Testament and how to find the verses (sword drills). So we include memory verses and books of the Bible in the opening, during crafts, music, mission, rec, and refreshments and not just during Bible, it just might open a kids heart to God.
Susan, there is an optional verse for each day printed as an optional learning activity in the Grades 1-2 and Grades 3-4 Leader Guides.
cool
I thought Submerged was one of the best in a while. Easy to decorate and great curriculum!!
Thank you for the reminder about striving for the best. We are in evaluation mode this week. We have one quick suggestion for the years to come. With the worship rally this year we had difficulties switching from the DVD to the CD for the songs and for the pledges on the CD. Is there a way to put all of the worship rally material on the DVD? Just a thought. Thanks for all you do to make VBS the BEST!
As to making VBS better, I really appreciate the split-track option on the worship rally CD that allows me to lower the recorded voices and allow our folks to hear the voices of our VBS children singing. I Wish, (Oh so very much!!) that you would also include a “Lyrics Version” with the split track option. It would make it so much easier to focus on just singing one or two of the songs with our children’s voices in the forefront without having the distraction of all the motions. My kids enjoy the motions, but they love JUST SINGING as well, and only having the lyrics version with full mix kind of defeats the purpose of the lyrics only option. Please, please add a split track, lyrics only option to the Worship rally or music rotation DVD!
This year the theme was wonderful and since I have done music for many years I especially loved the songs! The music was catchy and the words were great. My only concern is that the motions have become so involved that the wonderful words are lost because the kids are trying so hard to focus on the motions. I asked the other teachers, two were college students, and they concurred. Sometimes we don’t need motions just to have motions. Let the kids concentrate on the words and do motions that make sense and correspond with the words a little more.
Maybe I overlooked the material, but I could not find very much on evaluating our VBS. This was a new concept for some of our people. I usually use the simple formula of “What worked?” and “What didn’t work?.” Is there a more comprehensive evaluation floating around out there somewhere? I could really use the help.