Sometimes people tell us, “I tried Come Follow Me and it didn’t work well”. Well, we know it’s not perfect! Please send us your suggestions for improvement, as we always want to learn more.
But sometimes we ask those people, “why didn’t it work well?” and find that they had tried to use the course in a way it’s not designed for. That’s like saying, “I drove my car in first gear on the highway and it only crawled at 30kph. I wanted 100kph, so this car doesn’t work!” In fact, the car would have cruised beautifully in fifth gear - the slow speed was not the car’s fault.
To avoid some common mistakes, please observe the following:
1. DO NOT read through all the home study questions in the discussion time.
This is boring, it takes too long and it squeezes out time for personal sharing. Only a few of the home study questions should be used as springboards for group discussion. These are marked as discussion questions in the Advisor Guide and the most important are clearly marked 'for discussion' in the Study Book. The rest are there as teaching material for the learners to learn and absorb on their own.
2. DO NOT let group members come for discussion without doing the home study.
If they have not done the preparation, they personally will gain much less from the discussion, and it will be demoralizing for other members who have prepared. The weekly Review at the beginning of the group time is designed to hold members accountable to prepare before coming.
You as Advisor should do the home study first yourself too, and fill the answers in your own Study Book.
3. DO NOT teach the material as a seminar.
It is designed for discussion, not for a lecture.
If you want to use any lesson in a seminar setting, say in a 60 minute session, you could do it this way:
20 minutes for each participant to complete the lesson as personal study
30 minutes for discussion in small groups
10 minutes for feedback to the whole group on key things they learned.
Or if you want to teach a seminar yourself, you are welcome to use Come Follow Me as source material but make it your own. Don’t just plod through the questions in the classroom.
For more detailed questions of how to run a group well, and obstacles to overcome, click here.
Come Follow Me is a project of Word of Life, UK registered charity number 328492
