Questions about teaching Bible to kids

[robbyjo]

How often do you teach Bible to your kids? Once a week? Twice a week? Or more?

 

How long is each session? 45 min? 60 min? 90 min?

 

What curriculum do you use?

 

Thanks.

[Kelly1730]

We use My Father's World for our bible, so it depends on the year you are doing what the bible curriculum is. We do it Mon-Thurs. Friday is usually only a verse review. It takes us about 15-20 minutes. 

[homeschoolkitty]

I have 4 little ones 6 and under. I don't have a curriculum for BIble per se, I have a few books I like to read them everyonece in a while. I am not very good at being consistent. If you are looking for a catechism like thing, I don't have that... the book is:

 Leading LIttle ONes to God by Marian  M Schoollnad. it is a book of bible teachings

ISBN: 0802851207

 

I would like to do BIble everyday, sometimes it takes the form or a nightime story, For the day time I found that 5 to 10 min of bible reading/listening while eating breakfast (the quiettest time in my home-busy chewing not talking) Yes I even read through Leviticus that way... and you know, they do get it sometimes... one child commented, no mom you read that already, how they had to sacrifice this or that....  it has built in repetition! =o) Then there are their questions, sometimes easy sometimes not so easy, so I buy time saying I don't know and when I ask daddy we will come back and answer the question.

 

Now if you have older students, and you want to do Bible as a subject, First they have to be familiar with the content regardless of what book/curriculum you use. So I suggest to read the Bible by itself first, If they are not familiar with the BIble start in the New Testament. Every day.

 

[Blessed Mommy]

We read a chapter a day from one of the books from the Millers series:  Wisdom and the Millers, Prudence and the Millers, Proverbs and the Millers, School Days with the Millers, and Growing with the Millers.  Each chapter has a verse and applicable story to show how to apply the verse to your life.  We discuss the verse and I ask questions to make sure they understand.  My children also copy bible verses from their bibles as their handwriting each day.  They also spend 10-15 minutes a day working on their memory verses for AWANA during the school year.  This summer we're also going through "Boy Have I Got Problems" by Kay Arthur.  It's a study through the book of James.  We love it! 

[SilverMoon]

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Edited September 6 by SilverMoon

[Heidi]

We do scripture reading as a family from KJV Bible, about 15 min./day. We take turns reading a verse from a chapter. With the kids that can't read, they repeat after me when it is their turn. We also include scriptures in our memory work and learn church songs as a family.

 

I read scripture stories from Golden Children's Bible to my three youngest 4Xs a week.

 

And starting this next school year I will be studying by topic with my older two kids about 30 min./day from an LDS book (Gospel Principles).

[Heartsjoy]

What mine like best is RKWLA, read, know, what, learn, apply. They choose a book of the Bible read a verse or several ch, write down 1-2 things they already know like background or related verses, Write down a question. Sometimes I help here,learn I help the find an answer, then they write how it applies.

 

I don't always know the answer. We enjoy learning. We do this once a week along with some other things. My 2 that do this are 12 and 14.

[HS Mom in NC]

When we start the Ancients we read through a 1 year Chronological Bible. We've also used Korfker's Bible Story Book in the preschool years. Sometimes we do a word study reading passages related to a particular topic, but I don'tdo that until we've been through the first two I listed. Sometimes we focus on a particular book and go through it verse by verse.  We read aloud from the Bible about 20 minutes per day.  Later we add in another reading right after of a great work like Mere Christianity by Lewis or some character based readings like the Bob Schultz books. That's another 10-15 minutes in the mornings each day.

[BrandieRose]

I teach Bible every school day. I spend about a 1/2 hour for my olders and 15-20 minutes for my littles. We use Veritas Press mixed in with my own stuff. We usually start by playing "sword drills" where the kids compete to look up passages the fastest. They love this. Then we chant/sing through memory work and the Bible time line, and I ask a few random review questions, usually as a game. I keep the actual story somewhat short. Sometimes they'll act the story out or draw a picture. My younger kids leave early and I spend a few minutes talking about types and figures, comparing with other worldviews, application,etc... with my older kids. Any really little ones (6 and under) do Bible separately with me, similar method, but much shorter and with a slower pace.

 

Books we really enjoy reading together: The Child's Story Bible, The Golden Children's Bible, Big Truth for Little Kids

 

Oh, and also, my kids all have personal Bible reading included in their daily school reading.

[boscopup]

Every day, probably about 20ish minutes? Plus they have Bible class at church twice a week, and my oldest has to prepare his lesson beforehand.

 

Your DD is 2? I'd just get very basic Bible story book and tell her a story for a few minutes. You may not be able to go very long with a 2 year old. ;) Our Bible classes at church start at 18 months, and the kids are in there for 40 minutes, but that's probably about 10 minutes of singing songs about the Bible/Jesus (they have a series of songs they often use while holding their little "Bibles", which is really a pocket NT :D ), about 5 minutes of telling the story for the day with some kind of visuals, then doing a coloring page for a few minutes, then singing a song, then retelling the story a different way, doing a craft related to the story, and maybe retelling the story another way or singing some songs. Basically, they change things up about every 5 minutes. They'll move from the table (where they sit in chairs) to a "story circle" to hear the story again, then move back to the table to sit in chairs. Their attention span at that age is VERY short, so you have to change things up often, but it works, and the kids learn. :) At home, I think some simple talking about basic stories would be good. No need to spend 40 minutes at that age!

 

[Down_the_Rabbit_Hole]

For little ones (1st grade and younger) I would just read from a Bible story book.

2nd I teach how to use the Bible, look up scripture, and memory verse work.

For 3rd through 6th I would use Discover 4 yourself series. We are using this and have found it to be a very good in depth study of scripture. Typical book takes about 6 weeks to go through if you follow their schedule. I find it takes 8- 9 weeks because we move through it slowly.

[Mom2TheTeam]

I also use My Father's World.  It's incorporated into the curriculum.  We do it daily with some days just being verse review, but most days having something else.  This year, in Adventures in U.S. History, we are studying the names of Jesus. 

 

For a 2 year old, oldest child, I would just read daily from a children's Bible.  I like the Rhyme Bible Story book, but there are many good ones. 
 

Plus, we live our faith out in our lives.  So, we talk about it throughout the day as things come up.  :)

 

ETA - We do AWANA for our kids who are 4 and over too.  Plus, church.

[ByGrace3]

5 days a week. 30 minutes/day. Bible Study Guide for all Ages. We add additional Scripture memory as well.

[Tanikit]

My DD(5) is doing the Bible section of www.abcjesuslovesme.com (the 5 year old section) and DD(2) does the 2 year old curriculum - maybe 15 min two to three times a week. I also read them Bible stories - the 2 year old about twice a week and the 5 year old does a devotional with me daily. We do not do scripture memorisation as often as I would prefer, but it does get done sometimes. We do also talk about our faith as it comes up in daily life and both girls are in Sunday school and a Christian Moms and Tots group where they do another Bible story once a week.

 

My DD(2s) Sunday school class has a very strict routine which is mostly singing songs with actions or musical instruments, a very short story (like 3-4 spoken sentences), a short craft (5min) and then more songs, a prayer and a biscuit before play time. The youngest class is 18m til just before 3 years old.

[mamamindy]

Similarly to others, so far we have just read a children's bible together before nap.  We love, love, love The Jesus Storybook Bible.  We've read it over and over and never tire of it.  I just recently purchased the Vos Storybook Bible just to have something different for DD1 (entering 2nd) to read.  I like it.  We just read and discuss.  Here and there we've attempted to use Telling God's Story curriculum, but I just don't have time for crafts right now, so we just read, color and talk.  Honestly, I find that we get more from just reading our Bible and discussing.  Since my big girls are getting older, I have considered doing more.  (But not mommy-dependent crafting.)  Anyone have any experience with Stick-figuring through the Bible?

[Hunter]

When I was raising my boys, Morning Worship time was about 1 to 1 1/2 hours. It incorporated just about every school subject. We sang, we prayed, we read the bible and Christian books, we talked. Afterwards my youngest often had a writing or research assignment based on something covered in Family Worship.

 

My oldest was the one who fought me, but now tells me that just about everything he needs to know in his adult life, he learned during family worship. My son was not, and is not a Christian, but he still thinks family worship was critical to his education.

 

I don't think it matters what religion a family is, but a day started out together in spiritual pursuit is important.

[faiths13]

We try to do the Bible every day, M-F. We just take as much time as needed. With my two little ones I use Leading Little Ones to God. We read the chapter, read the short passage from the Bible, answer questions and pray. With my two oldest we read straight from the Bible. I have a study Bible. I read a chapter and then read from the study notes. We discuss and I answer any questions. We dont do it for school though. For school my little ones will be doing Heart of Dakota and they will have their own Bibles, so we will go through what they say to do every week. Im not sure what the older ones are doing yet.

[robbyjo]

Thank you so much for your replies! They're very helpful.

 

I was thinking of getting my kid to go through the Bible once every year on select stories, with age-appropriate narrative and lesson plans. So far, I haven't found any. I'm thinking that I'd start for 15-20 mins each, either once or twice a day. I will try to gradually increase the session to maybe 60-90 mins each as she gets older.

 

However, so far I've found none of the curriculums covering the entire Bible in one year (summer included). Or maybe I'm not searching carefully enough? Do you think such curriculum would be great for our kids if it's available? Or perhaps I'm too ambitious?

 

If there's no such curriculum, I'm thinking of getting a few materials together and make do with it. Thanks.