How to Communicate More Effectively to Middle Schoolers

What's the best way to communicate to middle schoolers today in this day and age? You ready to find out? Because it's time.

You're listening to the Church Digital Sidekick Podcast, part of the TCD Podcast Network.

Hey Heroes, my name is Tom Pounder and this is the Church Digital Sidekick Podcast. This is the podcast where we bring on ministry leaders and we talk about how you can do ministry more effectively in this very digital and online world. And I'm really excited to bring back a friend of mine who hasn't been on the podcast in a while, but she's back and her name is Ashley Bohintz and she is working with Orange. Actually, she's been working with Orange for quite some time and she heads up the middle school programming and she actually has a brand new book out about how to communicate effectively to uh middle schoolers and again the one thing we talked about this a little bit in the interview but one of the things i love about it is that there's not a ton of great content out there a lot of great books or resources out there for communicating to middle schoolers there's lots of great communicating to high schoolers or creating to teenagers, but specifically to middle schoolers. And Ashley has been working with middle schoolers for a long time, well before she even went on to working with Orange. And so I have her on the podcast and we talk about her book. What was the reason why she wrote the book? What can you expect when you read the book? I highly recommend this book and I can't wait to share it with you So without any further ado, let's get in the conversation right now with Ashley With me right now is Ashley Bohintz. But Ashley, how are you?

I'm so good. It's so good to be back on the pod.

Oh, listen, I'm so glad. It's been way too long. I mean, I feel like COVID hit and then everything just changed. And now I'm trying to catch up with old friends. And it's like great to see you on the podcast.

I agree. I know we've both done a lot of ministry since the last time we talked. A lot of like things we wouldn't have expected, right?

Well, exactly. Exactly right. And so one of the things I love about you is, again, you're right on the forefront of really trying to adapt and change things because you work with Orange. And Orange is just a fantastic group of people that are helping ministers share about Christ and helping family ministry people, helping the church in general. So why don't you just start off in case no one's ever heard you before, which I would be surprised no one's ever heard you before. But tell everyone what you do.

Sure. I currently serve as the director of middle school strategy at Orange, which just basically is a fancy way to say I work on a team of people who creates resources for either the people who work with, lead, or live with middle schoolers, and then directly to middle schoolers. And prior to that, I was a middle school pastor at two different churches. And prior to that, I was a middle school health education teacher. I've been working with middle schoolers for almost 20 years now. um also you know not just um education settings and ministry settings but also in athletic settings as a coach so it's been really interesting to learn and observe like middle schoolers and their conversations and like what it looks the same in all those spaces what sounds different and so it's been it's been a unique journey and i'm so grateful for it

Well, again, I speak from me, personal experience in my church. We use the Orange Curriculum for middle school and high school ministry. Actually, our children's ministry uses it as well. And it's a fantastic curriculum. And it's well-written. It's well-created. There's lots of great options for it. I love just getting the packet every week and just looking at all the different resources and ideas that you guys share. It really helps us minister to middle school kids. Again, from a guy who's been in ministry for a really long time, I get tired of trying to come up with new ideas and fresh ideas. And here you guys have, you guys just give it to us and it's fantastic.

Hey, it takes a whole group of people to pull that off. I mean, I feel, I mean, sometimes I feel the way you just described too, you know, that's why we have like over 75 people who help create stuff because, you know, there's only so many ways my brain thinks about this one thing. And then it's like, you bring in some people who have fresh energy around it. You're like, I never thought of it that way. That's so fun. Let's do that. You know? Yeah.

Well, that's awesome. I love your curriculum. And before we get actually into your book, I do want to just highlight this real quick. Can you tell me again, we're recording this a little bit after the Orange Conference. How was it actually being back in person with thousands of other people at the Orange Conference?

Oh my gosh. Okay. I mean, I'm not going to lie. Like I was like, this was my first like big event being actually being around more than a handful of people, to be honest, like in the same space. So I was also like, what's this going to be like? Um, but I was just, I had so much fun. I felt like I was on 10 the whole time. Like my team was like, Ashley, are you okay? I'm like, I'm so excited. I'm so happy to be here. with other ministry leaders um there were so many first time people who had never been to orange conference there so many people who are brand new to ministry or who had started ministry right before the pandemic so it was amazing to talk with people who are like we all just made it through we're here we're all here we made it you know we're still in this we got this and what what do we need to cheer each other on in and what do each of us need to hear from each other and what what breath needs to be breathed into our lungs again and how do we all come together and feel like we're not alone in it because ministry has felt lonely for a lot of people and overwhelming and like none of us have a lot of margin to give and so i would say it felt for the first time at least for me and i think with a lot of people i talked to like just time to be poured into and i know like for our team we're behind the scenes a lot creating stuff for the heroes on the front lines And to not have a chance to talk with our people over two years, I needed that time personally. Like it was a shot in the arm for me. It was like, okay, yes, I'm ready to keep going.

Let's keep doing this together.

So it felt amazing. People were really respectful and because of the way we structured the breakout days and stuff, like there was a little bit more space, which was lovely. And for people who didn't feel comfortable being in like large crowds or whatever, like there was space for them to spread out. So I appreciated that a lot.

That's awesome. I missed it. I loved, I saw the first night session on the live stream and I definitely had that FOMO, you know, the fear of missing out and just a little bit of jealousy saying, I really wish I could have been there this year. And I just can't wait to be back there next year because I think it's going to be awesome. I've always enjoyed those conferences and connecting with people and going to breakout sessions, like breakout sessions that you lead. Those are awesome as well. all right so well let's get into the topic today we're going to talk about your new book yay let's talk about it tom i love it i love this uh okay so your book is entitled communicating to middle schoolers a guide to developing and delivering messages that stick okay so let me ask you this first question is this your first book that you've ever written by yourself

The first book by myself. I co-authored a book called The Art of Group Talk for Teenage Girls with my friend Crystal Chang. But this is my first like sole author book. And it's been like the book I've wanted to write for so long. And so I just, I'm so excited. And ministry people are the best because they have been as excited about it as I am. And I'm like, you guys are the best. Like, thanks just for being excited. And they're like, what are we excited about? I'm like, they're like, I'm just excited because you're so excited.

like see this is why you're my people i just i can i can see again if you're watching the video of this you can see how excited ashley is but you can hear it in her voice if you're listening to the audio this is exciting so tell me why you chose to write this book in particular

um okay so you know my degrees in education i feel like a lot of teachers um they might start or do a few years in the middle school ministry schools like the school system but it's typically not where people are aiming for sometimes it's just the first job they get or the first group of people that they were trusted with and then they like move on to high school or back to elementary school and they're like this is my people and i feel like the same is true for middle school ministry um and so i for me my undergrad degrees in school of education which is basically you're a youth pastor without being able to talk about jesus to talk about all the same things like decision making and relationships and goals and passions and all the things um so i feel like because a lot of people don't choose this space like i was so excited to teach middle schoolers because i mean they're so impressionable anybody who has a middle schooler living in their house anybody who has been around middle schoolers know that they're impressionable they're also can be like very terrifying and frustrating at times i get it um but as i like kind of you know years and into it i think i started to realize like i think people just underestimate this age group and it's easy to get frustrated with them and want to move some to a different space because there aren't a lot of resources that exist in this age space and so i was i started getting really frustrated especially hearing youth pastors who would say things like well you just take the high school stuff you dumb it down a little bit or you water it down for the middle school and it's fine it works fine or they would put middle school or with middle schoolers with the high schoolers and not even acknowledge middle schoolers in the room and i'm like but you they're so impressionable like you're missing this phase this is so huge and so important especially for something like faith And then I felt like a lot of times in conversation, I felt like what we thought a lot was behavior issues was really engagement issues. And so I had this beautiful season in the classroom where I was the only adult in the room. So I got to try a lot of things and fail and not be embarrassed by it. So experiment with like, what does work and how do I make this more engaging? And okay, that worked okay, but let's see if I can try something different and just experiment with different approaches. to how to make something more engaging. And I feel a lot of times, I still do. I'm still trying to figure things out. And, but I feel like, well, if we can be more engaging as communicators and speak on their level, then not only do we have developmentally have an opportunity to hardwire spiritual truths in their brain as their brain changes. But we also have an opportunity to influence the inner narrative that they're going to tell themselves and the life choices that they're going to make moving forward in life because we were able to speak in a way that they heard and understand. Yeah.

Well, that's awesome. OK, so tell me about the book in general. Do you have certain sections that you focus on? Do you work us through a certain process throughout the book?

Do I have certain sections? yes like in regards to like do you do you talk about what it means to hook them or how how do you work through the book oh that's good so there was a lot of conversation around like the structure like where do we start in this conversation and i think just even think about the title when we were talking about like the cover of the book we're like okay maybe we need to have something on the cover that like shows like communicating maybe it's a microphone maybe it's like you know what are other ways people communicate maybe it's a megaphone like whatever it is but i was like yeah but like this isn't the only book on communicating and that's not really like the main like yes this is a book on communicating but so then we were like well maybe it's the subtitle developing delivering messages that stick maybe it's the stickiness factor the hook and then we're like i mean that's true But the thing that is the most that sets this book apart is that it's communicating to middle schoolers. There's a lot of awesome books out there on communicating and a lot of awesome books on making effective sticky hook statements. But this is about middle schoolers. So we actually decided to start the whole book with knowing your audience. And so we were like, all the best practices about speaking and delivering all that, we'll get to all of that. But who you're talking to should determine how you're going to approach this talk and this sermon. And so we said, let's start with that, know your audience. And there's really two ways to know middle schoolers. You can know them culturally and you can know them developmentally. And the truth is, is you can know them culturally and have no clue about them developmentally. You can know them developmentally and be totally out of tune culturally. The hard thing about knowing them culturally, and that's things like what words are they using? What influence are they following? What games are they playing? What's the latest gaming system? Like all of those things is like a cultural way to know them. The hard thing is, is culture changes and it changes fast. So you might have had a conversation in middle school or two weeks ago and then. it's it the app they were telling you about two weeks ago is no longer cool so you know it changes faster you have to ask often and then developmentally um even though culture changes developmentally you can anticipate what's happening in the body the brain the heart the mind of a middle schooler and so knowing them both is really important and i think we as youth leaders Sometimes we know one really well and feel like, no, I know this space, but we don't have language around the other one. What we wanted to do was start from a place, let's give everybody a common language on how to talk about middle schoolers. Obviously, there's an exception to the rule. There's going to be kids who are the first through puberty and the kids who are the last through puberty. This is like the average middle schooler. I would say we start with the audience of who we're talking to.

because everything that we do from that point on should best serve them not just make us the best communicators we can be yeah you see i'm really glad that you focus on that developmentally part two because again i've worked with high schoolers and middle schoolers for a long time in this grade six through eighth a sixth grader looks so dramatically different than an eighth grader more so than a ninth grader looks dramatically different than a 12th grade now they do look different But in that matter of three years, it is so different. And so your communication has to be different to them. And so you have to know them developmentally. Was there anything that you learned while you're working through this that you thought, man, this is really good and we really need to share about this from a developmental perspective?

I mean, I could, I could, there's a reason there's a whole chapter on this. Like you're telling me to pick one thing. I'm like, but they're all important.

And see, this is a good teaser of why you need to buy the book because you have to check this out because again, Even, I will say this, even as me working with teenagers for a really long time, I was just telling Ashley before we started the podcast, you know, I had a middle schooler who's going to be in the ninth grade next year. I can't wait for her to get in ninth grade because these middle school years have been so challenging as she's grown from a little kid. to this young woman now and it's like who she was in sixth grade is so different than who she is now as an eighth grader going into ninth grade and so it's it's so important to understand who they are developmentally to really be able to speak to them

Yeah, no, that's so good. I mean, I feel like it's obvious all the physical changes that are happening in the life of a middle schooler, but I would argue that what's happening in their brains is even more fascinating and more like it i'm telling you you just do a little deep dive into brain science of especially during puberty and it is like oh my gosh what an opportunity but basically to make a long story short like as the brain does a complete rewiring during puberty like literally the brain changes more during puberty than at any other time of life except for the first couple years of life it's it's it's wild and as the brain rewires yes like middle schoolers forget things because literally the part the brain that was wired is no longer wired in that way so they literally actually may have forgotten since the last time you told them which i mean don't tell middle schoolers this so they use it as an excuse but i'm just saying but what i thought found was so fascinating is like as the brain is rewiring and the brain is speak the all the different parts of the brain are speaking to each other like there's a saying like those that fire together wire together so every time you tell a truth to a middle schooler as their brain is rewiring those neurons are firing together those that fire together wire together so if we are repeating truths through a phase of life where their brain is literally rewiring the more that they fire together the more that they wire together we are literally hard wiring truths And if we don't say it in a way that they get what we're saying, it literally, we miss the opportunity, like chill bumps on my whole body. Like the words, if we want to reach middle schoolers with the words that we're saying, the way we said that matters a whole lot for that brain science reason alone.

wow, that's it. We can stop the podcast right now. Seriously, that is awesome right there. I mean, that is so true. And now I'm convicted as a parent. I'm like, how have I done this with my kids? And that's the thing. I'm going to backtrack just a second. But you said, even though this is about communicating to middle schoolers, this isn't just for middle school ministers, right? Other people are buying this book. Who else is buying this book?

yeah i mean we've had a lot of um you know youth pastors who have a combined middle and high school you know environment and they maybe if they're being honest lean more towards high school and they're like okay these middle schoolers are in the room and all they do is throw things at each other and talk while i'm talking like what how do i reach them So I've had a lot of, you know, combined environment, high school pastors, which makes me so happy, but also children's pastors, which makes sense because the middle school ministry is the handoff between kid men and student men. And a lot of times churches leave middle school in kid men and student ministry is just high school. So it makes sense. It's the handoff in both bridges in and out of middle school ministry. industry need to care about this because you're sending them off in both directions and preparing for that and learning how to have those conversations is huge but also like worship middle school worship leaders which i mean it makes sense nobody sets out to be a middle school worship leader i mean i shouldn't say nobody just very few so it makes total sense somebody who's a worship leader is trying to figure out how to break a song down for middle schoolers and it makes sense because you're using really abstract language in a lot of our worship music um hosts like from a stage who are literally not teaching a message but they're hosting the middle school service small group leaders parents i mean i have been totally wowed with the response of people who are like no i literally want to read this even if some of the stuff doesn't have to do with me i'll contextualize it it's fine i want to understand middle schoolers better and i'm like oh my gosh this is making me so happy let's let's reach middle schoolers all over the world together can you imagine if all our coaches and worship leaders and small group leaders and parents and teachers if we were all speaking the same language oh my gosh

Yeah. And see, again, back to what you all do with Orange is that you guys just don't take research from one certain area or this particular data point. You guys do so much research in what you do. and so i know that this book that you've been working on is really going to be filled with research and true data that's going to help people be more effective in communicating to middle school students and so i i think this is such a such a needed resource in an area as you and i have talked about where there's not a lot of middle school resources out there especially with communication yep Okay, so, okay, we'll kind of work through this a little bit more, but again, I love digital. And I also know that with COVID, there came a lot of progression digitally. You know, we took leaps and bounds digitally. You guys did the Orange Conference digitally. I mean- Yeah, we did. Which I can't even imagine how you guys did that like that. But the reality is digital has become a big deal with middle schoolers and has been a big deal with communication. So what do you talk about in your book a little bit about that for digital?

yeah great question yes we actually um made a bonus section in the book um and i in that i included a section on combined environments if you don't have the ability to separate middle and high school and you have a combined environment here are some really great things you can do to make sure you're reaching both and not just talking to one and making the other one listen And then the other one, digital environments and communicating digitally what we're learning, not just learned because we're all still learning. Yes. But I think this is especially tricky in the middle school phase because middle schoolers, parents are very involved in their, you know, their. digital freedoms and maybe what time they can be on a digital platform or what platforms they can be on, where in the house they have to be on a platform, which I totally respect all of that makes total sense. Middle schoolers need to be coached in that space, but it does make it trickier to reach them, especially if they don't have phones or they share a tablet or they don't have access to WiFi, which all of that was the reality in COVID. um but i think one of the things we talk about a lot at orange is you know now that we are hopefully coming out of the pandemic and a lot of churches are back to meeting in person how do we not lose what we gained and i think what we were all forced to do was figure out how to try our best to reach teenagers middle school and high schoolers wherever they are on digital platforms and it's hard we're all trying to figure this out right now, you know? And so, I mean, for those, some people were experimenting prior to the pandemic, but a lot of times what it was, it's just a live stream of what was happening in person. And one of the shifts, you know, we used to do that at Orange Conference. And one of the shifts this year for Orange Conference was, no, we literally wanna create a unique environment for those who can't be in person so they don't just feel like they're watching what's happening in person but they actually feel like there's an environment for them digitally and so we had in-person orange conference going on and then we had digital conference going on and so we really were trying to practice what we preach in this and it's not easy it requires more people it requires more creative energy it requires more hands on deck in a lot of time in a lot of ways um and i think that's where like knowing culturally where your students in your specific part of the country are in terms of like what social platform or what is the digital platform they're using to connect with people on you may have to try 10 different things they all not work until you figure out what works and maybe that's the 11th thing but i would say making sure you're creating a digital platform that is specific for the digital platform and not just a live stream of what's happening in person and we all felt this before covid like i mean hello all of including myself would get frustrated where oh so and so's at a tournament again they are not going to be present at youth group or so-and-so can't be here because you know they are out of town with their family again you know like there's a million things that happen and as school decentralizes the church decentralizes how do we as ministries not just expect them to come to where we are but we how do we go to where they are and what does that look like because it definitely doesn't look like me logging on for 20 minutes and talking at them

they're like no thank you you know right yeah so yeah that's awesome uh again everything you just said hits right at home i i think the last two years have been crazy but i love what you guys were talking about how can you keep what you gained and just continue to evolve and adapt with it and as the world changes you know we got to learn how to communicate most effectively And that's why I think it's exciting that you're releasing this book now. We're kind of coming out of this pandemic, although it's still considered a pandemic, but we're making progress on things. And so whether you're in person or whether you got some hybrid model, I think this book will be great. It'll be a good refresher for leaders and for parents to learn, hey, what does it look like for me to communicate effectively so that the message is sticking with the students? So, well, Ashley, this has been awesome. We could probably talk about this for a really long time, but I know you've got a lot on your plate. So here's my question for you. Where can people get your book? How can they connect and get your book?

Yes. If you go to communicating to middle schoolers dot com, you will find links directly to Amazon or the Orange Store. And there's also a free resource there that is basically a communicator cheat sheet for like breaking things down for middle schoolers and. we broke some words down idioms down christian phrases down and not that this is the only way to say it to a middle schooler but i said here's a word we use a lot here's one way i might break it down for a middle schooler not because they can't handle big ideas it's just breaking something down and separating into smaller pieces and one way to do that is by defining things or ex it requires more words though it's funny we often think when you're teaching middle schoolers use less words because you have less time to reach them but it's like actually breaking it down means i have to use more words which means the words i choose because i have to break it down for them the words that i choose better matter a lot so anyways communicating to middleschoolers.com you can buy the book at that site and you can also download this middle school communicator cheat sheet that hopefully will help you yeah it will most definitely do you have a kindle version of this It's coming.

Yes.

Yes, it's coming. And an audio book version. I can literally read you the entire thing and I can guarantee you one thing. It is not monotone because I literally am the reader of the book.

That's awesome. Oh, my gosh, that's awesome.

Yeah, that was a lot on my throat. I didn't know what it felt like to read 55,000 words in two days, but my throat was, you know.

That is awesome. I'm a big Kindle guy. I like to download books rather than collect books these days. So I will be downloading that when that comes out. I'm excited to read it. I think it'll be fantastic. And I know this will be a great resource for a lot of people. So Ashley, thanks so much for being with me today.

Thank you so much for having me. Keep doing what you're doing, friend.

All right, so what did you think? What stood out from you from that conversation with Ashley? She's awesome. I love talking with her. She's so fun and carefree and she's got just a great personality. I love talking with her and I hope that I get to see her next year at the Orange Conference when that goes back up and I'm able to go. But what stood out from that conversation? Are you going to buy the book? And if so, what are you most excited about? Definitely put it in the comment section below or hit us up on Twitter. You can talk to me at TAPounders by Twitter handle. I would love to talk to you and carry on this conversation a little bit more. Lots of great opportunities for us right now with middle school students. How are we going to best communicate with them? I'd love to hear what you're learning from Ashley's book. And if you haven't read it yet, what you're looking forward to reading from it today. All right, heroes, well, that wraps it up for another episode of the Church Digital Psychic Podcast. Thanks so much for joining me and being with me today. As always, you can subscribe to this. It's on YouTube. It's on iTunes and Spotify. Or you can find it at the Church Digital, where we've got lots of other content, lots of other podcasts that will be encouraging and inspiring for you in your ministry today in this very digital and online world. So I hope you can check it out there and subscribe to it. All right, heroes, well, I hope you have a great rest of your day. And until next time, have a great one.