How To Create A Youth Work Session Plan – Part 1

I did try to warn you that I was part administrative nerd.  

My name is Shae Pepper and I’m an Excelaholic. ‘Hi Shae.’ I LOVE Excel. And Word, Publisher, Outlook and PowerPoint but please don’t get me started on that red-headed step-child that is Access (it’s ok, I’m red-headed and a step-child – I can say things like that).

I use Excel to create my youth work session plans, although I have to admit that I was trained up in the way I should go by the fantastic staff at the Plantation Cafe.

I’m able to plan my entire year’s worth of sessions in ONE Excel spreadsheet. You can do your session plans in Word tables, but using Excel means you can keep them all together.

I even have an overview of the year on the first tab. I include my session evaluations in them so I can look back when it’s time to plan the next year’s sessions. This helps me to see what worked and what didn’t, as well as why or why not for any session.  Plus – everything is color-coded; it’s an admin nerd’s dream.

Having a clear youth work session plan will help your session run smoothly. You can easily see all your necessary resources, who is doing what and the timings. If things are ahead or behind, you can easily change your plan around because you’ve given careful thought to your plan from the outset.

Here are the first 7 items I include in my youth work session plans:

1. Date and Location – This is helpful when you run several sessions a week at various locations
2. Team Leader Name and Assistant Team Leader Name – Different people led on different days, by specifying who was leading which days and who was assisting it gave clear direction for the team for each day
3. Time – A list of times that each activity starts so you can be time-sensitive
4. Activities – A list of each activity that you will be doing for the day, including break times, etc.
5. Resources – A list of what resources were needed for each activity and game – that way, you can easily identify what needs to be gathered for the session’s activities
6. Leader – Who was leading each activity throughout the day (either the Team Leader’s or Assistant Team Leader’s initials)
7. Support Staff – What was the role of the person not leading? Facilitating a discussion, preparing for the next activity, monitoring behavior, etc.