Children’s Ministry Curriculum, Ideas Anyone?
Hi Ladies,
Melissa has a question about children’s curriculum. Any suggestions?
Hello Church Planting Wives! Greeting from sunny (and hot) South Florida! My husband (Jon) and I are preparing to plant/launch our new church in January 2010! We are very excited and are working hard to prepare to serve our community and bring the Gospel to those who are in spiritual darkness. I would love to get some feedback from other church planting wives on what type of Children’s Ministry curriculum your churches are using (or used in the beginning stages of your church plants). We have a few in mind that might meet our needs in the beginning but just thought I would ask around! Thanks for taking the time to respond…I would be grateful to hear your thoughts! Captured by the Cross, Melissa *Elswick
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Hi Melissa,
One of the easiest curriculum’s to use is the Kidmo kids curriculum. It is a really great program for volunteers who may not have a lot of experience yet. Unfortunately, it is often way too expensive for church planters to purchase. (depending on their budget)
You may be able to borrow the Kidmo series from another church. Because of the DVD nature of the program, churches may wait a year or so to cycle through it again with a new group of elementary kids. If you could partner with another more established church that might allow you to borrow the videos, that could definitely keep them from being cost prohibitive.
Any other ideas ladies?
-Anne
We are fortunate enough to be part of a network and are able to use other churches in the network’s curriculum. Kidmo is very expensive. Actually writing some of it yourself is a good option too. I do that when we can’t find something to go along with our series we are doing at church. Try partnering with another church.
We use ELEVATE (www.elevatekids.com). It, like KidMo, is very user-friendly. It’s interactive, FUN!, and chock full of kid-friendly/biblical messages that the kids take home with them. It runs $159 per series. If you use the Jr. program for preschool age kiddos, it’s another $159. The series are 8 weeks, but we always stretch it out to 9 with a review celebration at the end of the series. We have purchased several of the series and would love to share it with you to try it out. You can email me through my blog and we’ll make the arrangements.
Hey ladies… We love Children Desiring God curriculum and we also just started using Praise Factory. The Desiring God curriculum is AWESOME, but it a little hard to use in planting and through transitions from two kids to five, then twenty… but Praise Factory is what we are incorporating now with a few older kids and tons of toddlers… Hope that helps…
Hello ladies,
I am the children’s coordinator for Lifegate church in Lexington, Ky. We launched last February and I have spent countless time searching for a cheap curriculum. (We do not yet have a large budget for the curriclum.) We began downloading videos from other churches that were entertaining, but I felt they lacked the spiritual emphasis that was needed in these years. Especially at that age. For our toddler class, we used the Boz the bear series, but again, it was more of a “let’s share” program than something to teach our kids about Jesus. At this point, the best thing I have found is creating my own lessons. It can be time consuming. For the prek-5th grade class, I use the format from this website (http://www.kidssundayschool.com/Gradeschool/Lessons/lessonindex.php) if you sign up, some are free. I take the bible verse and find a craft or fun game online to go with it. I have seem much improvement in the kids in terms of retaining the stories or bible verses ex. 10 Commandments.
In the toddler class, I have been starting off in circle time, singing songs (Jesus loves me, B-I-B-L-E) and going into a lesson. I use a children’s bible to read a bible story and then explain what it means in our lives and who those people are. Again, then I find a fun age-approriate game or craft for the kids and then play time.
I only have a bit of experience with this, but feel free to contact me with any questions you have. tembrej.watkins@uky.edu
Blessings!
We are planting a church in February, 2010. We found a great option for children’s curriculum at lifechurch.tv — all of their resources are totally free and we have found them to be at the caliber of expensive curriculum. The only downside is you have to download and print - which takes time and a little $ in printing costs (but nothing compared to purchasing a curriculum). :):)
Thanks Kara! I checked out their children’s programs and they look great. We may use them when we finish up the program we are currently on.