Children's story Bibles in Sunday School

Day 2: 31 day challenge

Remember this picture?  I need a new picture (that can be another day this month!) and maybe a third shelf! 

My idea to share today is:   Use story Bibles & Bible picture books to help children of all ages comprehend the story during a teaching time. 

Educational reasons:

• Pictures build connections, a skill essential to comprehending a story. 
• Giving kids picture Bibles/books also engages the visual learners to your 'talk' in a new way. 
• using 10-15 different picture storybooks in a lesson, can also inspire kids to read their own picture Bible or Bible storybooks at home, or to ask for a Bible at their reading level. 

HOW: when you teach a Bible story in Sunday School, AWANA, kids group or with your children at home,  bookmark (post it type book tabs are my new favorite) the story or a page/image from the story and give EACH child or pair of kids, a picture Bible to look at/read while you all explore the story or concept. 

Grade 1/2 example
I've been teaching Faithful to All His Promises in our 1st/2nd grade classroom.  For a variety of reasons- we are using a curriculum geared for grades 2-6 with non readers. They say right in the curriculum, you can adapt it and use it with any age, so we are.  But with non-readers- it is different than the written directions. 

Lesson one focused on: what a promise is, and the example of a covenant/agreement/promise.  We said we had a "magic" word for the year- promise!

The lesson suggested you read the passage in Genesis about the rainbow after the flood.  With so many non-readers, I decided to search for images and the 'magic' word of the day PROMISE, in my story Bibles.

I marked the page, and had all 10-12 kids come and get a picture Bible from me, open to the marked page, find the 'magic' word, and then listen while my helper read the assigned passage from the ICB Bible (written at a 2nd grade reading level).  They loved it!   It was appropriate for early readers- to find a word and see the image of a rainbow, and connect them!

They listened attentively, they argued that they needed more time to 'read' their copy of the story, and they found an example of a promise in a Bible and READ at a developmentally appropriate level.  They also got to move in the middle of the 'sitting' part of the hour. They walked a circle around the room, to pick up their 'Bible' and return to their seat at our tables.

Toddler example
I taught lessons on prayer with 18 month-30 month old kids.  I brought in a stack of picture Bibles and even picture books.  Our lesson was on how Hannah prayed for a child and waited. 

So I marked the picture in about 10 Bibles/storybooks of Hannah praying, and when it was time to start the lesson, handed one to each child.

While I asked questions, they had an image and concept in their hands, and we talked about prayer, this lady praying, and how sad she was that she had no children.  The kids enjoyed it and it gave them a CONNECTION to build their own comprehension of the oral story.  It was fast and simple part of the lesson, but I could tell they felt very grown up 'reading' their own Bible during the story.