Lessons for Sunday School - Engaging Visual and Interactive Learners

When teaching children's Sunday school, it is important to remember that everyone learns in a different way. By engaging children on more than one sensory level, teachers can ensure that they are presenting the optimal learning environment for everyone. Children remember experiences more than they remember lessons. If a teacher can make a Sunday school class an interactive or visual experience, then children will retain the stories for the rest of their lives!

These Sunday school lessons get the children involved, teach them through multiple senses, and can be adapted for various age levels:

Puppet Show

Children love puppets, and making puppets to act out stories is a great way to incorporate a craft element in a Bible lesson. For this class, you will need at least two paper bags for each child; craft items to decorate the bags, like googly eyes, yarn for hair, and construction paper or felt for clothes; and a Bible story that mainly features two people.

Begin the class by reading the Bible lesson. Once the story is finished, tell the children that they will be making puppets to represent the people in the story. Ideally you could show puppets that you've already made to show how to use the flap in the bag as a mouth, but make sure to encourage the kids to get creative and make their puppets however they want.

While the children start making their puppets, talk about the Bible lesson. Ask questions to see what they understood and what you might need to discuss further. Try to relate the story to something they might understand in their own lives. Once the puppets are finished, have the kids take turns acting out the story as they remember it.

Felt Board

This Sunday school idea can involve various age groups and can be as big or little as you want it to be. The felt board is a large piece of felt that works as a background and has smaller pieces of felt that stick to the board that can be used to create scenes and act out stories. Felt board kits can be bought at various craft stores and online, but making it can be a fun project in itself.

Start by deciding how big you want the board to be. If you're thinking the felt board might be used over a long period of time, then one fun idea is to devote one wall of the Sunday school classroom to the board. Kids love the idea of a big space that they can interact with, and it allows for more than one scene to be represented at a time.

Once you have bought the felt you need for the background and to make the smaller pieces, you can start getting creative. Ask the youth group or crafty members of the congregation if they would like to help create felt items, like houses, trees, people, and clothing.

Now the children can use the board to visually create the Bible lessons they learned about in Sunday school!