Vacation Bible School at our congregation is different from the mainstream VBS. First of all, we create our own curriculum. We’ve found that the packaged curriculum has degraded into twaddle over the past several years. If you’re interested in learning about pandas, race cars, cowboys or beaches, then they are just the thing but if you’re interested in learning/teaching about God, they just don’t do the job.

When choosing a theme for our VBS, we take into account what the children have been studying in our regular Bible classes. If they are studying in the Old Testament, we try to have a theme from the New Testament and vice versa. When we’re studying the life of Christ, there isn’t enough time to study most of the parables, so one year we did a VBS on the parables. We try to pick a theme that will complement and complete the Bible study the children are already doing.

We have limited facilities and teachers so we try to keep our numbers under control. It may sound selfish to not open a VBS up to the whole community but past experience has shown that if there are too many children in a class, no one learns anything. Of course, we would never turn anyone down that wanted to attend but we don’t advertise it in the paper or even with a sign out front. Most of the children that come are friends/family of those in our congregation.

I have tried to put my lesson plans for the classes I teach online. I include pictures and files if appropriate. Sometimes I can’t include files due to copyright issues but I share what I have when I can. There has only been one year that I didn’t post lesson plans. I don’t know what I was thinking or how I survived the week but I regret not writing it all down now. Having a lesson plan in hand when I’m in the classroom helps keep me focused. Putting these lesson plans online insures that I won’t lose them amongst all the other projects going on around the house and hopefully the lesson plans will inspire someone to do a little more for their VBS than what is currently provided in packaged curriculum.

Below are the links to the lesson plans I have online. If a link is broken it just means that I don’t have it online yet. I will work on getting it there as soon as possible.

2006 — The Plan of Salvation (ages 5-6)
2007 — Parables of Jesus (ages 8-9)
2008 — That You May Believe (ages 5-6)
2009 — Remember Your Creator (ages 5-7)
2010 — The Beginnings (ages 5-7)
2011 — Worship in Spirit and Truth (ages 5-7)