When I was a kid in Sunday School, we had felt pictures to go with our
lessons. Anyone else remember those?? My first few years teaching
preschool, we also used felt pictures, but I was looking for something a
little more up-to-date that we could use over and over. That's when I
started writing
Bible Story Booklets
to go with our lessons.
Each
Bible Story Booklet
closely matches the Bible Story script in the lesson plans, but is written in
a little more kid-friendly language depending on what age it is for.
The kids love listening to the books being read and they pay attention more
too!
But you may be surprised to learn that reading aloud the Bible story isn't the
only way we use the Bible Story Booklets in the classroom! Let's talk
about 3 ways to use
Bible Story Booklets
in your Sunday School classroom.
Read Aloud the Bible Story
The first one is obvious: We use the
Bible Story Booklets
to read aloud the Bible story.
But first, you need to know that I'm a stickler for using the actual Bible
with my preschoolers. I always have a real Bible with us when we sit down to
read a story. You can see in the photo below, that I literally keep a
real Bible right there in our carpet space.
I have a Bible story script that comes almost word-for-word from scripture
included in our
lesson plans, but the booklet is a more kid-friendly version of that script. The
booklets are written to whichever age group the unit is for (anywhere from
Preschool to 2nd).
When I am reading the booklet, I do add in other details from the script that
I think are important so they are hearing a detailed Bible story.
Retell the Bible Story
At the end of our Sunday School hour, we retell the Bible story if we have
time.
To do this, we reuse the
Bible Story booklets. But, we use separate pages so that we can order them.
No, I don't staple and unstaple and restaple the booklets. We either
make a separate copy of the booklets (sometimes half the size to save
paper).
Or, you can hole punch the books and add rings so that it's easy to take apart
and put back together.
Once we have the separate pages, we are ready to order the story and retell.
With my preschoolers, I show them the page and tell them what is happening in
the pictures since they cannot read yet. Then, we lay it out in order
together. It is definitely more teacher-led for younger
preschoolers! But just remember, they are getting another chance to hear
a story from Scripture. :)
For older kids, they may be able to read their page on their own and work to
order it and retell.
Classroom Library Exploration Station
Just like in my first grade classroom, our Sunday School room has a classroom
library. It's one of the exploration stations I have no matter what unit
we are learning!
There are tubs of books--both Bible stories and fiction trade books. On
the top shelf, I usually place the
booklets from our unit
or any trade books that go with our unit. I add a new booklet to the shelf
after each lesson, so that there are only books out that we have read the Bible
story for.
The kids love to grab our unit
Bible Story booklets, get a stuffie and "read" or orally retell the story in our cozy corner to
their stuffed animal friend. :)