RAISE: Children's Leaders Training

All children's leaders:

• A mandatory course for children’s leaders before they are commissioned as YPSMs, Children’s Ministry Team Leaders or Junior Soldier Sergeants.
• A highly recommended course for all those who work with children.
• A highly recommended course for teams of children’s leaders in a corps to learn and journey together.

The course is hosted on iLearn, the online learning platform of The Salvation Army in the United Kingdom and Ireland Territory.

It hosts a variety of formal and informal courses to support the development of officers, employees and volunteers.

The modules can be worked through at your own pace. The maximum time required is 9 hours.

There is a comprehensive resource list of additional content for those wishing to deepen their learning in a specific area.

While the course can be completed at your own pace, Youth & Children's Ministries want to create a learning community to share experiences and knowledge.

You will be invited to join a private Facebook group to share experiences and resources going forward and stay connected as local children’s leaders.

Children’s leaders who complete RAISE will be encouraged to join the bi-monthly online Children’s Leaders’ Network for ongoing learning.

To register for the course, please complete the online registration form. 

This module explores key considerations of outreach to children.

The Salvation Army has found many creative and innovative ways to reach children over the years, from weekly children’s clubs and summer camps to volunteers leading school assemblies and classes. 

Our corps offer exciting opportunities for children to serve as junior soldiers and to be involved in creative ministries as part of musical sections and discipleship groups. 

However, research by Scripture Union tells us that a staggering 95% of under 18s in the UK don't have any connection with church.

Though the task of reaching children with the good news of Jesus may seem enormous, so too are the opportunities.

This module considers children with additional needs and how we can be more inclusive in the way we work with and support them. 

As children’s workers we want to ensure that children of all abilities and needs are included in our ministry. However, it can be hard to navigate the right path through this difficult and complex area. 

There are many kinds of additional needs. We want to be welcoming, caring, inclusive and supportive to each child, and their families, while not losing focus on the needs of the rest of the group.

This module helps individuals work from a trauma-informed perspective and develop relationships that cultivate safety, trust and compassion.  

As children’s leaders it is important that we are aware of the individual circumstances of each of the children that we work with so we can offer spaces for them to feel safe, secure, nurtured and cherished. 

Trauma-informed practice is the ability to view a child from a strength-based point of view. Their behaviour may be a response to trauma and should be seen as a sign of strength and resilience.  

In understanding what has happened to the child in the past, we can then try to organise the world around them in a different way.