For Picture Passes, all small groups are focused on one leader. If you’re that leader, how can you keep attention and make a review of the same three Picture Passes fun for four weeks straight? And if you’re not, what can you do with your small group to keep them focused? Watch the video below and read on for some helpful tips and tricks.

Watch This
Here’s your chance to watch Picture Passes in action! Observe a leader leading kids through guessing what’s in Emily’s Adventure Bag while their small group leaders attend to their needs and keep focus.

As you watch, use this Picture Passes Leader Guide to follow along with the lesson.

Read These Tips

1. Start fresh. Kids need your help to press their reset button after finishing up with Movie and Music. Try these tips to keep your transition clear and consistent each week.
   • Use movement. Your kids have been sitting a long time! If they seem fidgety as a group, try doing three big bunny hops in place, touching their toes, or shaking out their wiggles.
   • Check distance. Ask kids to scoot close enough to their leader to be able to touch their knee.
   • Pick helpers. Reward kids who sit nicely with their small groups with the tasks of moving the star to the Picture Passes Picture Schedule Card, flipping the Movie and Music Picture Schedule Card over, or getting the Adventure Bag for you.
2.  Keep it small. When you lead Picture Passes time, monitoring every child’s behavior doesn’t automatically fall on your shoulders. Your biggest responsibility is to keep the activity fun!
   • For other small groups: Quietly let small group leaders take care of their own kids.
   • For your small group:
     • Ask the kids in your small group to save your spot for you while you lead the whole room.
     • If your small group struggles to stay put, ask another leader for support.
     • If a challenging issue comes up, address it gently and quickly to keep the rest of the room from losing focus on Picture Passes. Ask another leader to help if you need to.
3. Keep it big. You’re not in charge of making every kid behave, but when you keep Picture Passes time engaging and fun, there will be fewer behavior challenges for everyone to deal with!
   • Get attention. Try clapping or wiggling your fingers in the air and having kids copy you or saying something like, “If you can hear my voice, point to me.”
   • Let kids self-praise. You can’t praise each kid individually when the whole group is doing great, but you can tell kids to pat their own backs, clap for themselves, or give themselves a high five.
   • Use whole-group directions. Say things like, “Everyone touch your ears and listen to this!” or, “Pretend you have a bubble in your mouth. Don’t pop it!”
   • Be enthusiastic! Use excitement and humor to keep the kids excited about the Picture Passes, too! If you’re more nervous than excited, don’t worry—fake it. Little kids won’t know.
4. Find friends. Look for opportunities like these to reward individual kids.
   • Taking Picture Passes out. Kids get so excited and will sit very, very still if they know they might get picked to take a Picture Pass out of the Adventure Bag!
   • Holding Picture Passes. Once a Picture Pass is out of the Adventure Bag, everyone’s got to be able to see it! Pick kids to hold them up for the whole group to see.
   • Answering questions. (4-year-olds to Kindergarteners only) When you ask questions from the leader guide, look for kids who are following your directions. Choose them to answer!
5. Play games. Try some of these games to keep Picture Passes time fun (and hilarious) every week.
   • Act like you can’t find the Adventure Bag. “Find” it and act ridiculously excited, pretend you just can’t “find” it and enlist a kid to help you out, or ask kids to shout out where it is.
   • Pretend the Adventure Bag won’t stay on your shoulder until a kid puts it on for you.
   • Put the Adventure Bag on backwards and pretend you don’t know what happened to it. Ask kids to tell you where it went, and ask a kid to help you put it in the right place.
   • Pretend the bag is wiggling because the Picture Passes want to get out.
   • Ask kids to guess which Picture Pass you’ll pull out first, either by shouting it out or silently doing the motion for it.
6. Finish strong. Assign these jobs to leaders in your room so the transition to Story Time stays quick!
   • Put the Picture Passes back into the Adventure Bag.
   • Put the Adventure Bag away.
   • Give each small group leader a set of Story Cards and a Small Group Leader Guide.

Think About This
Different leaders can lead through Picture Passes each week. Content doesn’t change week to week for 2 to 3-year-olds, and the only changes for 4-year-olds to Kindergarteners are review questions, so it’s a great leadership opportunity for a new leader or a student leader.

Talk It Over
Now that you’ve read a few tips and watched a video, help the info stick! Talk over these questions with your Coach or a LifeKids staff member. Share what you’ve learned with other leaders in your room!

1. What do you think is the main goal for Picture Passes time?
2. What’s the biggest challenge you have, or you think you might have, when leading Picture Passes?
3. Which of the strategies above may help you to work through your challenges?
4. Which game do you think will fit your Picture Passes time best? Share any other games you use