Flannel Graphs

Our pastor's wife and I have finally gotten around to organizing Sunday School lessons for our kids. Yes, I know it's strange we're starting this project two weeks before my due date, but it just seemed to be the right time. We were given a great curriculum by a friend and I'm enjoying learning how to use it. The lessons are based on a children's adaptation of the Westminster confession.

For those not familiar with a catechism format, basically there are questions and answers for each lesson that the children learn. The first question is, "Who created you?" The answer, "God". The memory verse for the week was "God created man in His image." Or, in transliteration, "khalaq allah il'insaan 3ala suuritu." I was so proud of Oliver who shared the verse with the congregation, from memory, in Arabic! He is a typical fickle five-year-old. Sometimes he participates, other times he gets shy and won't get involved in an activity. As he's often shy to speak Arabic in front of adults, this was an especially proud mama and baba moment.


The fun thing about the lessons is they use a flannel graph. We were able to find flannel down in the balad, at 2.5 JD a meter. The kids and I had fun cutting and gluing and above are samples of our project. Many of you remember using flannel graphs in Sunday School as children. Basically when you place two pieces of flannel together (one side is a bit coarser than the other) they stick, sort of like velcro, but not as strong. By gluing flannel to each cut-out and hanging a large piece of flannel over the whiteboard, I can put images up on the board for the kids and they can also manipulate them as desired.

Sort of a retro version of the power point presentation, I guess, but more hands-on. It is fun, the kids are amazed by the flannel, and easy. The curriculum provides all sorts of ideas for various ages. Considering the ages of our kids, the lesson is short and we then have a lot of fun coloring and singing.

~ Um Tulip