Effective Church Communications

Canva—a GREAT way to edit MS Word Newsletter Templates!

9 October, 2022 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

I confess, I did not know you could do this!

I was looking up a totally different task and I found a video about using Canva for teachers, and it showed how you could modify an MS Word document in Canva. I tried it, it works fantastically, and I couldn’t wait to share it with you!

I have used MS Word literally since it was invented and though I love it for word processing, to try to do much else with it is an exercise in frustration. Images are a nightmare to try to place, columns do funny things, and any kind of layout with images is a huge challenge.

The “templates” available in MS Word and online might be useful if want to keep something almost exactly the same and only change wording, but sometimes you want to do more than that. When I heard you can open an MS Word template in Canva it seemed almost too good to be true. Then I tried it and was incredibly excited about what you could do!

After a little more experimenting on a newsletter, I created a video to share with you showing how EASY it is to make major design modifications on an MS Word document in Canva.

As always in the Effective Church Communications Canva videos, I’m showing you how to do things with real-world projects, in this case modifying a newsletter, and not simply a demonstration of tools in the program. BE SURE to subscribe and hit the notification bell on the YouTube channel so you'll be notified when I post the new Canva videos as I often get them done a few days before I sent out a newsletter notification.

Check out the video and have fun!

The Teal Pumpkin Project is a great service to kids and families with allergies

6 October, 2022 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

The Teal Pumpkin Project is a great service to kids and families with allergies.

One in 13 kids have a food allergy and for many of them and their parents, what is a fun candy fest for most kids becomes a nightmare of fears about sometimes life-threatening allergic reactions.

In response to this situation and because her son had severe allergies, one mom decided to do something about it. Here's her story from USA TODAY:

Back in 2012, a Tennessee mom named Becky Basalone had an idea: What if Halloween could be made a little less tricky for kids with food allergies?

Her idea became what is now the Teal Pumpkin Project, a nationwide effort to encourage families — whether their own kids have food restrictions or not — to offer up some non-food treats on Oct. 31. Participation is simple: You just put a teal-colored pumpkin or sign outside your door and offer trick-or-treaters glow sticks, spider rings, Halloween stickers or other non-food goodies, along with or instead of the traditional candies.

Food Allergy Research & Education (FARE), a non-profit advocacy group, first promoted the idea nationwide in 2014, with the help of a viral Facebook post, says Nancy Gregory, senior director of communications. In 2015, about 1 million people visited the group’s website to get information, and about 10,000 of them — probably a fraction of participants — put their homes on an interactive map showing teal pumpkin sites, she says.

This year, the group is thinking bigger, Gregory says: “Our goal is to have a home on every block in America with a teal pumpkin. We hope that it becomes a new Halloween tradition.”

from: https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/2016/10/23/teal-pumpkin-halloween-food-allergy/92285680/

For more of Becky's story: https://allergicliving.com/2014/10/23/the-origin-of-the-teal-pumpkin-project-interview-with-becky-basalone-facet/

How to participate

[Read more...]

Church Bulletins are STILL a vital piece of Church Communications, plus links to Four (one free) eBooks about them

3 October, 2022 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

As many churches work hard to build back ministries decimated by Covid, complete and frequent communications that contain the essentials of what is going on in the church are extremely important. Your church bulletin is a unique communication piece in how it can be accessed by anyone and can contain a tremendous amount of material along with links to where to find out more.

For decades I've taught, written about, and helped many churches make effective bulletins and have collected much of the material in the eBooks below.

***Check them out for both strategy and practical implementation ideas.

Four books on Church Communications, all from the Effective Church Communications Library

The first one is a FREE DOWNLOAD and is highly recommended as a foundation for why church bulletins are STILL ESSENTIAL communications for churches. Just click on the cover to go to it.

Are Printed Bulletins still needed in the church? eBook — In the time of digital communications and social media, many want to get rid of bulletins, but this short booklet might help you think again.

Church Bulletins, an archive of tips eBook — The church bulletin is often the first piece of church communication an unchurched person sees--what does it say? This book will help the experience be a positive one.

Church Bulletin Gospel Presentations eBook — The Gospel, the good news about Jesus is our most important message, here are examples of how some churches share it.

This is a collection of articles from Effective Church Communications about church bulletins that are both strategic and practical.

You asked for more on how to use Canva and I’ve got some exciting news for you! Announcing CANVA templates and videos on how to use them

3 October, 2022 By Yvon Prehn Leave a Comment

You asked for more on how to use Canva and I've got some exciting news for you—CANVA templates and videos on how to use them!

I don't know about you but I really dislike how-to videos about a program I really want to learn, but that has little to no relationship to any real-world product.

I'm talking about the kind that simply demonstrates "features" and you are left wondering how those actions could ever apply to your projects.

What I decided to do was to DEMONSTRATE the various ways you can use Canva by actually showing you HOW to do things with real Templates, and real projects you do. Not only does this make the learning more practical, but I discovered it is incredibly easy to link you directly to Canva where you can modify the templates I create for you.

Here is the first video I created for how to sign up for Canva and then modify Fall Templates.