A Few Ways to Promote Sunday School Attendance

Here are some of the things that have worked for me in churches of various sizes. Feel free to comment and make your own suggestions.

Make sure your facility and classrooms are attractive and inviting to kids and visiting parents. Beige and boring, dim and musty are unacceptable.

Make sure your approach to teaching is attractive and inviting. 45 minutes in a chair with a worksheet and a pile of pipe cleaners is a great way to make kids disappear.

Create "points of re-entry" for those who need a reason to "get back into the habit."  These points of entry can be special events, Sunday School service projects. They can also be as simple as asking a parent to come help.  (Conversely, planning a constant stream of events creates the impression that nothing is special.)

Have a plan for shutting the "back door" on attendance loss. Be aware of who's not there and why. Sometimes people just need to know they are missed.

Have a plan of regular communication with parents (not blurps buried in the emailed newsletter or tossed away with the bulletin).  If you are not using text-messaging, you are living in the past.

Promote "what's happened," not just "what's happening," and do it through visuals and social media. Help people see what they've missed, and remind those who attended that they were glad they did!

Have a thriving family ministry and young families ministry. This is probably the single greatest way to help families feel connected and responsible to each other. Doesn't have to be fancy or complicated.

Create "rites of passage."  Parents respond to special events where their children will be recognized. This can include "promotion Sundays," gifting Bibles, communion education.

Create events that attract the attention of neighborhood families.  Bouncy houses. Water game days. Free concerts and ice cream, and VBS-like programs that include something that gets non-church parents to stay and mingle. When parents start to feel a connection, they are more likely to send their kids. 

Organize and equip key families to identify and invite their friends and neighbors. Research shows that it's your members' connections that are the best way to recruit new members. This is an especially good strategy if your congregation's demographics are aging.

Make sure your church's "presence" along the road and in the community is KNOWN. When people start looking for a church, you want yours to be visible to them. 

When visitors with children come to your church, make sure the kids leave with something fun in their hands other than a piece of paper (a cup with a crazy straw for example, and the church's name on that cup).  And don't forget to follow up on visitors.

Take control of your church's webpage for children's ministry. Supply them with exciting photos of past events and "what it looks and feels like" to attend.  (Most church websites are completely boring.) Avoid the boilerplate "blah blah blah."

Bond your kids to each other. Friends attend to be with friends. One of the best things I ever did to boost Sunday School attendance in a small church was to start a children's fellowship that met once a month. Our teachers also helped (many of them were parents.)