Dear Brothers and Sisters,
By the time you read this newsletter, our Sunday school classes will most likely be taking place in the new classrooms at the Edwards Interfaith Chapel and Community Center! Our little ones and our Sunday School teachers and helpers have been such troopers during this moving transition as they learned and taught in the hallways of the center for the last 6 months. And now, we will reap the fruits of Father Brook’s and Deacon Steve’s labor and all those who have put forth the donations and effort to help bring this dream to its fruition. How blessed we are as members of this congregation to be able to give our children a high quality, age appropriate environment where they can learn to know Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and make Him known!
Since the last quarterly newsletter went out, much has happened! In the fall, the Sunday school children learned about the Old Testament. This study culminated in the “Shield’s of Faith” wax museum. Over a 12 week period, children learned about some of the Old Testament prophets and servants of God who were true to their faith during the good times and bad. After each lesson, the children would add a drawing or quote to their personal Shield of Faith. On November 7
th, each child chose one of the servants of God or Prophets to portray. As the parishioners exited church and entered the lobby area, they were encountered by the stationary “wax” prophets and servants bearing shields. When the parishioners pressed a start button on the prophet or servant, the prophet or servant “came to life” and told their story or prophecy. It was a great opportunity for the children to share all that they have learned with the adults of our parish.
Soon after the wax museum, we began practicing the songs for the 2010 Christmas Pageant. Over 25 adults and 45 children had a hand in helping out with the pageant. Attendance during these weeks was sky high peaking at 49 and the pageant itself was magnificent! Every child who wanted to participate was able to. This year, we included child and adult musicians in the pageant. It was truly a collaborative event and a feeling of church community and joyous celebration was pervasive as the children dramatized and sang about the birth of Jesus!
On January 9th, the Magi visited our Sunday school classes. King Casper, Melchoir and Balthazar played by Tom Tasillo, David Barbour and Brent Davis shared their story of how they traveled from their respective countries to Bethlehem. It was a wonderful way to bring the Magi story to life! As with everything that is involved in the children’s ministries, we couldn’t have carried out this event without our volunteers. To all who volunteer your time helping out with Sunday school or our myriad of children’s events, thank you for valuing our children!
For the remainder of January and February, our Sunday school teachers got back to regular Sunday school instruction. The Winter curriculum generally focuses on the New Testament and the church. The Pre-K and Kindergarten children have learned that Jesus was a great teacher who taught us how to love and live. They have also been learning about cross and the beautiful things that are found in churches here and around the world.
The Primary and Intermediate children have been learning about the Sermon on the Mount with a focus on the Beatitudes, otherwise know as the Beautiful Attitudes. The children have learned that to live out these attitudes can be challenging for they often conflict with worldly attitudes. Our teaching objectives are to explain the attitudes that Jesus wants us to have, identify them as “Christian values”, and apply them to everyday situations such as when someone cuts in line at school or when someone is offensive. During our instruction hour, the teachers will go through the choices that we have for various situations and then decide what Jesus would want us to do based on the Beatitudes that he taught. The hope is that our children will begin identifying themselves as Christians who are equip with the knowledge of the Beatitudes and that they will be confident in putting these attitudes into action as they go into the world.
Looking forward to March, our biggest change will be the move into the classrooms. Mary Ball, one of my predecessors, had a dream of creating and setting aside a Godly Play space where children and teachers could come to tell the stories of the bible to our children. After researching and talking with people who are currently using Godly play from other parishes, I have chosen to try and make the designated Godly Play space a reality. Godly play is an age-appropriate story based religious education curriculum that honors a child’s natural sense of the sacred. It seeks to provide a richly structured environment in which the religious potential of a child may freely develop. Each lesson is presented in a story form based on Holy Scripture and provides sensorial materials that children can work with in a safe, stimulating environment. The stories are appropriate for children of all ages.
The optimal presentation of the Godly play curriculum is to house the materials in a specific room where the story sets are accessible for the children to visit as often as they would like. This is what we hope to create in one area of our classroom. Already a part-time Edward's resident from Salida, Kansas, Jeffrey Denton, has volunteered to get our Godly play storage shelving underway. We’ll be needing carpentry helpers to help him assemble them after he makes all of the cuts which is tentatively scheduled for June 2nd, 2011.
Along with the Godly play shelving, we are also seeking out large amounts of solid colored fabric that correspond with the colors of the church calendar: red, white, green and purple. The material will be used as a room divider to set aside the Godly play area in one of our classrooms and will change with the church calendar seasons. If you or anyone you know has some gently used bay curtains or has access to large pieces of fabric, please let us know. Having the room dividers would truly be the icing on the cake!
Once again, after writing this quarterly newsletter, I am struck by awe for we continue to move ahead, full throttle, as our children continue to grow in their knowledge of Jesus and all that he offered us. And to whom shall we be thankful? As we have learned in our Beatitude study, “To be poor in spirit is to recognize that all we have is God’s gift: our very existence, our families, our health, our talents, our situations in life. And Christ goes even further - even our successes” (from Blessed are the poor in spirit; the kingdom of heaven is theirs (Mt 5:3) - Holy Cross Family Ministry.
Thank you, Lord, for all that you have given us. We are truly grateful.
Faithfully,
Barbara Jean Houck
Director of Children’s Ministries