Thank you to everyone who completed our survey earlier this year. We've really appreciated the thought and time you put into your answers! We've worked our way through them and identified some patterns; we thought you'd like to see some of our key findings.
Who responded?
No survey result is complete without a pie chart, so here are four...
Feedback on the publishing schedule
To those who are sent magazines, we asked whether our current publishing schedule works - publishing resources 2 months in advance of the first week listed in the magazines.
- 80.3% wanted the publishing schedule to stay as it is now
- 13.2% didn’t really mind
- 6.2% wanted the magazines closer to the start-date: 1 month ahead or even less (0.3% 2 weeks ahead).
A number of you commented to say that you would like to know what readings we'll be focusing on further in advance – four months was specifically mentioned by a few. There are already two ways to find this information:
Year planner
Focus readings for the whole lectionary year, published every autumn
|
|
Month by month planners
An overview of the weekly resources, published roughly 6 months ahead
|
 |
|
 |
Although traditionally we’ve published our annual Year Planner in November (i.e. accompanying our Jan-Feb magazines), a number of you thought it would be more appropriate to send them with the Nov-Dec magazines. We're aiming to bring the timescale forward this year, so do watch this space.
Colouring sheets
Some of you said that you like the Activity sheet, but you were sad that we'd stopped creating Colouring sheets.
|
This is feedback that we also heard in last year's survey, and in response we did re-introduce Colouring sheets towards the end of last year. However, with lots of changes happening at the same time, it appears that the message about Colouring sheets didn't reach everyone. We're really sorry about that, and we're delighted to confirm that you can download Colouring sheets every week, in English and Welsh.
|
 |
|
Tip
You can download a whole issue's worth of Colouring sheets in one go, if that's easier for you. Simply go to Month by month and look for the Quick links menu.
|
 |
Under 5s resources
Another point we'd noticed is that not all Adult & All Age subscribers know that they can access our Under 5s resources online.
When you log in and navigate to the week you want, simply click on the Very young children circle and you'll be able to see the Under 5 resources for that week. You can use these for a Sunday creche or for a midweek toddler group.
Bible studies
Another tip for Adult & All Age subscribers: most of you didn't seem to know about the Bible study resource - a ready-made collection of every week's resources for use in a small-group Bible study.
You might not be the Bible study group leader, but - if you have a sharing subscription - could you share this resource with the Bible study leaders in your church?
Other points
- We were really struck by how many of you have already recommended us to others. Thank you!
- We found it a great encouragement to see what kind of things you value about Roots - and which areas you'd identify for improvement.
- Some resources (e.g. Check-in) are currently under-used; is that because you don't need them, or you don't know that they exist? Or maybe we need to produce them in a slightly different way? We want to help you get the very best from the resources, and we also need to make sure that we're producing the resources that you really need. We'll need to keep looking into these areas as the year goes on.
 |
Thank you again to everyone who responded to the survey – your responses are helping us to plan the future of Roots! We value your feedback all through the year; please do get in touch at rootsforchurches.com/contact-us. |