Each month I like to choose a few saints from the liturgical calendar to celebrate. Sometimes I have my act together and plan the whole month ahead of time, and sometimes I find out that it’s a feast day when I’m reading morning prayer from my Magnificat and scramble to find an appropriate coloring page/craft/book/baking project to complete.
But either way, the first step I always, always take when planning to teach my children’ about a saint (or a feast day or an important bible passage for that matter) is to think about the key point, or in other words, what I want them to remember from the lesson. Keeping this in mind helps me to choose the right activity.
Think about this example: A parish I know was teaching their children the story of Jesus and Zacchaeus (See Luke 19). After reading the story, the kids completed a cute little craft by which they could pull a string and make a little Zacchaeus climb a paper tree. Adorable right? Yes, but what the program leaders realized was that all the kids remembered about the story was that Zacchaeus climbed a tree to see Jesus. What they wanted the kids to come away with was that Jesus call him by name, loved him, and spent time with Zacchaeus, and that Zacchaeus had a change of heart as a result. So even though the kids had fun making the craft, the program leaders cut it from the lesson and replaced it with a game that would help the kids glean the right key point.
Working backwards from the key points makes it easier for me to plan out not only which activities we’ll do, but how I’ll guide conversation while we do them.
For example, last week was the Feast of Corpus Christi. For the Feast Day. I knew I wanted to focus on the great gift of the Eucharist, impressing on G the incredible, awe-inspiring love of God coming down in the form of bread. So as I was explaining the feast day to her, I made sure that I talked about reverence in the Church, about the moment of Consecration, about the miracle in plain sight.
The craft we made was a monstrance, cut out of paper and with little glued-on paper jewels. We’ve spoken about monstrances before, and she’s gotten to see one up close during our Church tour, so we talked again about how monstrances are made of gold and jewels because they hold the King of Heaven and Earth as she made hers.
Taking the time spent making a craft or coloring a picture to talk about important topics has been a hugely effective part of teaching our children about the Faith. Planning what key points I want to hit ahead of time has made me better prepared to make those conversations deeper and richer.
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