We have a Little Flowers group in our area. Little Flowers is a girls club that meets once a month and learns about a Saint, a virtue, a flower and a color that represents the virtue or Saint. The Patron Saint of Little Flowers is St. Therese the Little Flower.
Monday night we had a Little Flowers gathering and we did our lesson. Played some fun games that centered on the virtue and then settled in to do our large craft project for the evening.
The girls made prayer books. It is something that my great Aunties (the Nuns) had done one year at Vacation Bible School when they would come to our church to teach. I was older and was a helper. I always remembered making the prayer books.
I had made them in my faith formation classes with my students on occasion and a girl that is seventeen now, told me on Sunday that she still has her prayer book. That meant a lot to me to hear that. It makes me feel like I actually touch the children in a way that they will remember, just like I remembered making them with the Nuns.
We took paper and made a booklet and tied the ends with yarn. We took holy cards and used the picture side for pictures in the booklets and some stickers too. I always feel leery about using prayer cards because the beautiful prayer on the other side is covered. (The Nuns did it, so I am relinquished of my anxiety!) We then put the cut out prayers on with the holy card image. It was beautiful to watch these girls so lovingly put together their booklets. They were so happy with them. I walked around the room and listened to the girls talking about how they wanted them to be special.
Teaching is a wonderful thing for me. It is something that I can give to the church and something that brings me great joy.
It is very easy and the learning process is immense. The teachers manuals tell you everything you need to know. Use your favorite things from the past and you will do just fine.
Think about taking on teaching at your Parish. It will be very rewarding for you.
