Plan an assembly

Putting it all together

Let’s imagine I’ve been given the topic ‘spiritual life’ for an assembly with Year 10 students in a local high school. How am I going to put together some material for this?

I’d start by turning it into a question that I can ask the students. Although ‘Do you have a spiritual side?’ is a closed question, it’s a provocative one nevertheless, so I’ll make that the topic for the assembly. Then I need to assemble some possible components. At this stage I’m not too worried about the order, or even if I’ll include them all, I just want to get an idea of what might be possible. To help, I’ll go through the three key types of content:

Visual

There must be plenty of artwork on the subject of spirituality, both from classic and modern art. I’ll download some images from a Google image search and make them into slides to display as students are coming into the hall. The final slide can be the question I’m going to be asking and I’ll keep that up through the rest of assembly. Assuming I have a little time to organise this, I’ll ask some students to describe their spiritual side artistically, using drawing or painting. If possible I might seek the help of an art teacher and see if they can help. I’ll hope to end up with three or four images that I can use during the assembly, either holding up the finished pieces or showing slides of them. You can see the amazing ideas students have come up with on the topic of spirituality at the Spirited Arts web site, run by the National Association of Teachers of Religious Education. You could also use some of the winning art work as part of your assembly if getting your local students to contribute is impractical.

Participation

There are lots of ways I could involve some students.

• I could hand paper and pens out to the front row of students ( who’ll be sitting there longest waiting for the rest of the group to file in) and ask them to jot their immediate response down to the question. Maybe give them some choices : yes, no, what does that mean, don’t know. I can gather up the answers and use them later in the assembly.
• I could bring some prepared content from students: perhaps the results of a wider poll I took in a previous lunch break.
• I could put up on a screen some possible answers to the question and ask students to take a moment to think about which one makes the most sense to them.

Story

Again, there are lots of stories I could put in here. I could choose some different people from history and ask if they had a spiritual side. So, did Mother Teresa have a spiritual side? What about Robbie Williams or Simon Cowell? Most of all, I could answer the question for myself, perhaps telling a short story about a moment in my life that illustrates this. I could also make my own drawing about how I see my spiritual side as a Christian.

Reflection

There are lots of ways I could end the assembly, but the simplest is 60 seconds of silence. To help students focus I could put up a couple of relevant questions on a screen.

Looking at the materials I’ve put together, I’m now going to pull a final selection together that should last for 8 to 10 minutes in the assembly.

1. Slides of artwork on spirituality as students enter.
2. Introduce question and share responses from the front row of students who’ve already answered on post-it notes. Some will hopefully be deep and thoughtful, others may be funny and get everyone laughing. I’ll also tell students that I’ll be asking all of them to think about how they might answer the question themselves later in the assembly.
3. Show three slides of student’s work on ‘my spiritual side’ each with a short explanation and hopefully including very different views (I don’t have a spiritual side’, ‘I have a strong faith’ etc).
4. Show my own slide, a painting of how I see my spiritual side as a Christian. As I show the slide, I tell the story of an experience when I felt especially close to God during a downpour of rain. It includes plenty of humour and self deprecation! I’ll also talk briefly about how important Christian spirituality is to me.
5. I’ll finish with a minutes silence and, on the screen, two questions for students to consider: “Do you have a spiritual side?” and, alongside a quote from Robbie Williams about spirituality, the question “Do you agree?”

The key here is that I’m not using the assembly to ‘preach’ the point ‘YOU MUST HAVE A SPIRITUAL SIDE, AND IT MUST BE CHRISTIAN!” I’m using a question to get students thinking and offering some possible answers, including my own from my faith perspective.

The reality of taking an assembly

After all your preparation, it’s time for the assembly itself. This is where some flexibility is essential. Assemblies are prone to all kinds of interruptions and unexpected events, and you’ll need to be ready to fit what you have to whatever happens. For example:

• The assembly includes the PE staff reporting back on recent matches. They take a long time and you’re left with 5 minutes not 10. What are you going to drop from your assembly to fit in with the reduced time?
• The teacher starts the assembly by telling the students off for something. The atmosphere changes and you have to follow on with your presentation. How are you going to create the right atmosphere?
• Students are late and come in during your input. It disturbs everyone and you lose your train of throught. How will you cope?
• Anything technical you though was going to be there for you isn’t. You can’t use those pictures up on a screen after all. Will your assembly still work? If your whole presentation depends on something technical working, make sure you have a back up plan in case it all goes wrong (and it does from time to time!).

Some dos

• Do use humour, honesty, and a large dose of reality. Talk about issues that matter to young people and be prepared to admit when your own faith doesn’t have all the answers. Students can see through hypocrisy and spin in an instant.
• Do be sensitive. If your assembly touches on a particularly sensitive topic like death or suicide, make sure you talk to the school and check it’s appropriate, especially if you find, for example, there has been a recent bereavement for a pupil.
• Do have fun. Some assemblies are more serious than others, but having fun is a good way to engage young people, and even explore serious topics. As a guest speaker your assembly should look and feel a little different from the norm.

Some don’ts

• Don’t go over time unless it’s with the express agreement of the person leading the assembly. There may be a lesson in the hall immediately after the assembly which you will hold up, and teachers who have to head off from the assembly to teach a class won’t appreciate it when you make them late.
• Don’t create too much noise or over-excitement. Whipping a group of twelve year olds into a frenzy will not please the maths teacher who has to take their lesson straight after the assembly. Assemblies are often best when they contain humour and fun, but remember this is a very different context to a youth group.
• Don’t humiliate or pick on students to make a point. Be careful not to embarrass students by making fun of them or playing a cruel joke at their expense. If you are going to involve students in something substantial, you may want to arrange it with them beforehand. Of course, that doesn’t mean you can’t ask for volunteers in an assembly. You might also want to remember:
  
  • nobody (including boys) tends to like having their hair messed up!
  • nobody brings a uniform to school, so don’t spill anything on them!
  • some people blush very easily in public, especially if they have fair skin.
• Don’t preach. Assemblies are not churches or even youth events, they’re part of school life. As a guest, your role is to serve the students and school, not take advantage of the opportunity you’ve been given to do something inappropriate. Your faith is absolutely right to share as something that should create questions and reaction in those listening, but you’re not there to make converts.

Go for it!

As Christians, it’s a privilege to be able to visit schools and take assemblies. And, although you’ll make mistakes along the way, a well thought though assembly can make a huge impact. Be encouraged that you’re making an important contribution and share your experiences on the schoolswork.co.uk community blog.

Feel free to use and distribute this guide but please acknowledge schoolswork.co.uk as the source.