I was young, on my own, struggling to make a living. Then a friend said, “Pssst. You wanna write some Bible lessons? You’ve been going to Sunday school all your life. Maybe you could create some curriculum and pull in some extra cash.”

Those probably weren’t the exact words—it’s all hazy to me now—but I started writing Sunday school curriculum for adults and teenagers. My first client had been around for decades, one of the giants in the industry. This company had time-tested ways of writing lesson plans, and I needed to follow them. A prayer. An opening icebreaker question. A Bible text. Some discussion questions. An inspirational thought. I did all I could to create excitement within that structure, but it was difficult.

Then I got connected with a couple of young punks who were starting their own line of Bible study materials, openly flouting the rules, empowering teachers and group leaders to try new things. Old templates were tossed away. These rebels helped to shape my curriculum-writing.

But a new challenge arose: video. Suddenly every lesson needed to have some well-known speaker on screen for ten or twenty minutes. Now I had to include questions and Bible passages to develop the speaker’s themes. One upstart video company ran a magazine ad, looking for a writer. I answered it—and I’ve been writing curriculum for them ever since.

Lately I’ve been thinking about what wisdom I could share with a new generation of lesson writers. Even if you’re not writing, but teaching a Sunday school class or facilitating a small group, you might benefit from these ideas as you plan your sessions.

1. Use icebreakers to connect with the text.

Some preachers start every sermon with a joke that has nothing to do with anything that follows. That might liven up the room with laughter, but wouldn’t it be better to find a joke that connects with the preaching theme? In curriculum, icebreakers are like that. You want to get a group started on a positive note, create some energy, and build community. You could ask a silly question or play a silly game—but with a little more thought you could find an opening question or activity that matches your theme. So if you’re teaching about the body of Christ working together, create a game in which people have to pool their talents to succeed.

2. Don’t skip the 5 W’s.

Bible students (and teachers) often read a text and rush into interpretation. They scurry to talk about what a passage means before they see what it says. Take the time to ask the basic questions—you might follow the 5 W’s of journalism—who, what, where, when, why (and sometimes how)? What specifically does the Scripture say about the situation, whether it’s a story or a prophecy or an exhortation? This leads to a few fill-in-the-blank questions, which even the least experienced group members can answer. (Who “so loved the world”? What did he do about that?) Then dig deeper into the meaning.

3. It’s all in the questions.

Some teachers like to load up with information that they deliver to the group—their interpretation of a text; their answers to the questions that arise; their ideas about what God is saying to the group. But the best teachers put the same effort into crafting questions that elicit the same sort of information from the group. They may have background information that they dispense as needed, but they know the group learns better by processing answers to thoughtful questions.

4. Make something happen in the room.

The writer’s job is to give a leader resources that can be used to start a chain reaction within the group. If curriculum is a strict, deviate-at-your-own-risk script, and if the teacher uses it unswervingly, there’s little excitement in the room—no matter how brilliant the writer and teacher are. But as a group interacts with Scripture, discussing questions and connections, they may discover new energies in the text that the teacher never thought of. In a way, it’s an improvisation. The teacher prepares thoroughly, equipped with the writer’s plans, but the Spirit creates a unique happening in the room.

5. Push for action.

The Bible consistently challenges us to put its teaching into practice. Curriculum can help define that. When it comes to applying biblical truth, students of Scripture often go for the vague, ordinary and easy options. Be nicer to people. Give to the church. Think about God more. Writers and teachers can strengthen application with creative options, bold suggestions and challenging questions. Learners will always need to fill in the details for themselves, but leaders can push them to identify what people are hardest to love, at what point giving might become sacrificial, and what entertainment they might replace with meditation.

I don’t know what the future holds for Sunday school lessons. We’re nearing a point where every student will access resources on a phone. They’ll have access to all the Bible background they could dream of—but they’ll still need to know how to process that data. We’ll be holding small groups by teleconference and message boards—but guidance will still be necessary, perhaps more than ever.