Perhaps you are living the new craze! Rainbow Loom bracelets. They take the place of silly bands, slap bracelets, friendship bracelets, jelly bracelets . . . you know, it’s always something.

So of course, my six-year-old couldn’t wait to start making them. What seemed like something so simple, ended up being quite the complicated project. But being the determined person I am, I wasn’t about to let loom bracelets get the best of me. After all, most eight-year-olds could do this.

So, I did what any person would do, I turned to YouTube, and watched endless videos, professional videos of how to create these masterpieces. And I was still left tying myself in knots, literally. Then I kept searching. I finally found a few videos, from an eight-year-old little girl. I hit the jackpot. Want to know why? Because she said it simply. She didn’t give me the history of Rainbow Looms, she wasn’t talking to hear herself talk, or trying to impress me with her knowledge. She had one objective, to show me how to make a fishtail rainbow loom bracelet. And I did it.

This, of course, got me thinking . . . don’t we often do this when we communicate to kids and teens? We want to impress them with our knowledge, we want to give them the entire history leading up to the Bible story we are explaining. We give them detail after detail so that they will be impressed with our in-depth knowledge of the Bible. And all along they just wanted us to say it simply.

In Think Orange, Reggie Joiner reminds us of five things we can remember to “Say it Simply:” 

Say Less—What are you going to say?
Simplify what you need to communicate to the biggest concept.

Say What Matters—Why are you going to say it?
Pre-decide your content on the basis of relevance.

Say It Clearer—How are you going to say it?
Craft words that capture the power of the principle.

Don’t Say It—What is the best way to not say it?
Create an experience so the message can be processed.

Say It Louder—Where else can you say it?
Leverage every possible environment to reinforce each concept.

So, how are you ensuring that the message you are communicating is truly heard by your kids? We are bombarded by thousands of words every day, especially as social media continues to grow. We don’t want the words we say to become white noise. Our kids and students don’t need more words, they need simple messages that are crafted in a way that communicates timeless truths. That’s why the simplicity of our message is more important than ever.

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