Award Ceremonies

A very important part of being a coach is helping your students feel like winners. This means you need to define what behavior you are looking for, and reward that behavior. We recommend rewarding the students when they have done the homework assignments, where they put the lesson into action during the week. Attendance and memorization are "training" and doing the assignments during the week would actually be the competition. Encourage your students that training is very important if they want to win. However, the real world competition is where they actually do win.

One idea is to have an award ceremony at the end of each month, when you finish studying each fruit of the spirit. For example, LOVE has 5 weeks of study. Those who did the assignment at least 3 weeks could win the bronze medal, silver for 4 weeks, and the gold medal for all 5 weeks. You could adjust how your students win the medals after the first month, as some villages or areas of town will need more challenging assignments than others will. Some zones will be more evangelistic, and you will need easier assignments so that they stay encouraged and want to continue with your class.

At the end of the year, have a larger award for those who won several awards throughout the year. This could be a trophy or a nicer medal. Make the awards even more special by giving them to your students on stage in front of the adults in church!