Four years ago, my parish priest approached me with an idea for our church school. He wanted to have one overall topic each year for our entire church school and develop the lessons to fit the different age groups.
I so dearly wish I could share with you all the learning moments through photos and videos that I’ve taken over the past four years. Alas, I do not have written permission from the parents to share them online. Therefore, I will attempt to describe some of the highlights to you from our church school years below:
Our first year, we worked together to develop lessons on the Divine Liturgy. In addition to the lessons I was presenting to the teachers for our children, Father Vasile was also putting together a second (shorter) sermon for the entire parish at the end of liturgy each week. (Those sermons can also be found at the link above – titled “Parish Lesson.”) The entire parish learned an enormous amount that year and we decided to continue our “One Curriculum” model the following year as well.
We cannot understand our worship without knowing the Scriptures. Yet the same is true vice versa: The meaning of the Scriptures is disclosed in worship.
Our second year, we started our study of the gospels and began having weekly church school teacher meetings on Zoom for 30-45 minutes, while our classes with the kids were in person. (Not all the teachers live close to the church – Zoom teacher meetings are for practical purposes) We ended up starting with the Gospel of Mark out of practicality for our parish. Our hall was under renovation and we didn’t start our school year until October. Thus, we started with the shortest of all the gospels. I would definitely say there was a little bit of a learning curve that first year studying the gospels. We attempted to cover one entire chapter during each class period – and from that, we learned:
1) Attempting to cover an entire chaper each week proved to be a little bit too lengthy for our typical alotted class period.
2) Some topics were not developmentally appropriate for some of the younger kids and we needed to find a way to handle the natural difference between ages.
3) We wanted to find a way to visually engage the kids that directly supported the gospels.
Our third year, we studied the Gospel of Matthew. This time, we asked the parents to read the designated chapter to their children on Saturday and then we taught about one aspect of that chapter in class. This allowed us to dive deeper into the lesson than the year before.
We had a lot of collaboration behind the scenes too. The teachers were sharing their teaching methodologies and ideas with one another, which helped everyone present the lesson to the kids in a way that kept them engaged week after week. We also incorporated learning to read icons (in relation to the gospels) as part of our lessons. This made a HUGE impact with our kids!
We would show the kids an icon as we read to them from the gospel and St. Matthew would instruct us how to read the icons through the gospel passage. It was so simple and yet enormously effective. Then we would ask the kids age appropriate questions about the icon as review of the gospel lesson. Their reading literacy of icons exploded!
We also tried to include the kids’ senses as much as possible during the lesson – audibly, visually, touch, smell, and taste. The teachers shared photos, let the kids smell different oils & incense, let them see and smell leaven (“sourdough” starter) used for bread, and so much more!
We are currently in our fourth year of our “One Curriculum” model and are finishing up the synoptic gospels with Luke. This year, sometimes we cover one topic in a chapter, while other times we cover multiple topics. It just depends.
We are continuing to focus on teaching our kids how to read icons, as well as, incorporating a timeline (What are some of the significant moments in the life of Christ according to St. Luke?), maps (Where did these events take place?), and learning a hymn in each of our classrooms. We also recently had a huge hands-on project outside as the kids got to thresh and winnow wheat to help them understand the parables, since wheat farms are not commonplace in the DFW area.
In addition to learning to read icons, we are also learning to sequence the major feast days on an age appropriate level. The concept of “next” develops first with kids before the concept of dates. Think about when your kids have asked you, “Who’s birthday is next?” or “When is Christmas?” – and you answer by telling them something along the lines of, “First we have dad’s birthday, then your brother’s, and after that is your birthday.” or “First we have the feast of the Entrance of the Theotokos into the Temple and then the birth of Christ.”
So, for our little ones, we are working on simply sequencing our major feast days according to the ecclesiastical year. We started with only three feast days and gradually added more as the year progressed. The kids can point to Christ, the Theotokos, and Saint John the Baptist in the icons. They can also tell us a very basic summary of each feast day.
For our upper elementary kids, we have focused on not only sequencing them according to the ecclesiastical year, but also knowing which month we celebrate each of the major feast days. (If they know the actual dates – great!) The kids can tell us who each person is in the icon and a summary of each feast day.
For our middle and high school kids, we have focused on knowing the dates of the major feast days and they can also tell us about the icon and feast day in detail.
I know there are many other parishes who have incorporated our curricula into their classrooms. We would love to hear from you! Did you make adaptations? If so, please share! We love gleaning ideas from one another. Do you have questions? Feel free to email me!
