Is there a worse way to teach Elder's Quorum

[San Juan Sun]

than to read paragraph by paragraph out of the manual and read the questions to the class word by word?

I generally like my brethren, and EQ could be a really good thing. As it stands, we waste 30-40 minutes on Sundays with mundane, boring lessons that nodoby has prepared for beforehand (our fault, to be sure).

There has got to be a better way.

[TripletDaddy]

Better ways I have discovered:

iPad.

Not attending.

That's all I've got for now. I'm open to other suggestions.

[San Juan Sun]

[QUOTE=TripletDaddy;539901]Better ways I have discovered:

iPad.

Not attending.

[QUOTE]

Those are ways to distract me from the bad lesson. If possible, I'd like to improve it.

But I have an iPad just in case.

[DU Ute]

In my in-laws ward last year we had a lesson I could only describe as "Prophets! #&*@% YA!!!! The lesson consisted of a very enthusiastic brother asking quorum members to name prophets for him to write on the board, after which he would loudly and excitedly extol the virtues of that particular prophet before moving on to the next one. In case anyone is wondering, no amount of enthusiasm can make up for a blatant lack of preparation.

[pellegrino]

Better ways I have discovered:

iPad.

Not attending.

That's all I've got for now. I'm open to other suggestions.

My wife just got called to the primary, which means I'm in charge of the 1 year old. I've never hung out in the foyer this much. I can see how it can become habit forming.

[YOhio]

EQ can be fun when the teacher is unprepared. Just ask a really awkward question or give an off the wall answer. It doesn't ruin the lesson because it's already bad and you get to see some squirming.

[Moliere]

I feel bad for EQPs. My brother is an EQP and he literally gets the scraps when it comes to counselors and teachers. Well, I guess he gets one good counselor and one "project" counselor, but his teachers for the most part are the guys that the YM don't want and sometimes even the primary doesn't want. He's often remarked that his quorum is made up of him, and couple loonies that aren't yet high priests, and a bunch of guys that come to church because their significant other expects them to attend.

[Jeff Lebowski]

This is all I remember from EQ meetings:

EQP: "OK, who has the lesson today?"

(silence)

EQP: "Brother Smith, is it your turn?"

Brother Smith: "No, I am next week."

EQP: "Brother Johnson, do you have it?"

Brother Johnson: "Nope"

EQP: "OK then, everyone open your manuals to page 231. Can I get a volunteer to read the first page?"

:igiveup:

[Surfah]

My wife just got called to the primary, which means I'm in charge of the 1 year old. I've never hung out in the foyer this much. I can see how it can become habit forming.

This is pretty much my Sunday too. Second hour I am in the foyer. The little bun usually falls asleep sometime during this hour and then I just lug her around for Priesthood.

[Katy Lied]

Why dont the brethren feel the same shame that the sisters feel when they're not prepared?

Seems like it is much more common with priesthood. In my experience in RS a teacher was unprepared... 0 times in my entire adult life.

[Babs]

Why dont the brethren feel the same shame that the sisters feel when they're not prepared?

Seems like it is much more common with priesthood. In my experience in RS a teacher was unprepared... 0 times in my entire adult life.

So now we know why women can't hold the priesthood...you'd make them all look bad.

[Surfah]

Why dont the brethren feel the same shame that the sisters feel when they're not prepared?

Seems like it is much more common with priesthood. In my experience in RS a teacher was unprepared... 0 times in my entire adult life.

I think a big part of it is that a bulk of the priesthood have served missions and therefore think they can all teach, and worse off the cuff. But most missionaries are not good teachers.

[il Padrino Ute]

Why dont the brethren feel the same shame that the sisters feel when they're not prepared?

Seems like it is much more common with priesthood. In my experience in RS a teacher was unprepared... 0 times in my entire adult life.

Because unlike the sisters who still try to do a good job even if they would rather not teach, the brethren would rather feign incompetence in order to get out of teaching.

Of course, the incompetence may not necessarily be fake, so I could be wrong.

[wuapinmon]

I've been called to teach the 2nd Sunday lesson in EQ (in addition to my youth SS calling). I started my lesson today, it was the one on "service," with this opening:

When I was prepping for this lesson, I was really bummed because I thought, 'man, this is going to be so boring that no one will even care what I say.' The manual is a gloss and doesn't really tell us anything that we haven't all heard before a million times. Then I thought that I would have to mention home teaching, missionary work, and serving your spouse. Of those three things, I really find home teaching to be a chore, missionary work to be a drudgery, and serving my spouse the only real joy. So, where do I start? I'll start with asking yall why we should do service, and don't give me some canned line like, "when you're in the service of your fellow man...." we've all read the Book of Mormon. I want to know why you, Brother Cole, why do you come to Church every Sunday?"

It went from there and I had them participating actively, save the 78 year old; he was in a happy place. It was a good lesson, because I mostly stood there and helped steer a discussion by the quorum members about why we're altruistic, and how you serve someone who you can't stand, and why Christmas in April is great, and how our local interfaith food bank needs help during the week, and why your marriage is in trouble if you only serve your spouse to avoid being nagged, etc.

[Green Monstah]

To answer your question, no.

I must be fairly lucky, however, b/c I've never been in an EQ where we read the manual line by line. Some teachers were better than others, but pretty much everyone at least took a stab at supplementing the manual.

On the other hand, since I was called to teach SS, I've been spending third hour at a nearby pizza joint during third hour, so I may be missing some pretty crappy lessons. Soon we'll be moving into a new building that is nowhere near the pizza joint. I'm pretty torn up about it.