Several years ago, when my baby was nearly 3, I was told that it was my turn to teach the pre-school class. I had not taught this age in quite a while. I had been in the baby class for years and spent some time with the older kids. We had some great teachers that were always willing to teach the pre-school class but apparently they were ready for a break.

I’ll never forget the day I was handed the reins for this class. I had just been to a Singing School in Silsbee, TX (the driving force of that singing school was and is Wayne Wise). Glenda Schales attends the singing school every year and teaches the ladies to sight sing and she teaches new children’s songs she had written. That year she had taught some really cute songs — I don’t even remember what they were but they were cute. I was so excited to go home and share them with the pre-school teacher. This pre-school teacher had been teaching the pre-schoolers for years. When she saw my excitement to teach new songs she very clearly told me that it was “my turn” to teach that class.

I was a little taken back. I was happy teaching the older kids and even the babies but the pre-schoolers are a little different. First of all, I had never really found a curriculum that I was totally happy with. Second, they need a lot of visual stimulation but are ready to move away from the cutesy stuff the baby class uses. Third, well there wasn’t really a third and the first two were not really very strong reasons to avoid the class so I took the challenge.

The congregation was following a 3 year cycle (studying the Bible chronologically through in 3 years). It works great for the older kids and I was supposed to try and do it with the pre-schoolers. This same teacher that handed me the reins had told me previously that the 3 year cycle just wasn’t working with the pre-schoolers but I had other things on my mind and just left her to do the best she could — which by the way was excellent. Once I got in the class and began thinking how to go about teaching them, I immediately saw what her complaints were all about. After thinking about it a while, I came up with a 2 year cycle for the pre-schoolers that was sort of a mix between Palma Smiley’s To Toddlers With Love and The Amplified Bible Curriculum that the rest of the congregation was using. We would study key figures in the Bible spending 1 month on each one. This plan worked great. Kids are happy and teachers are happy.

We have a box for each lesson (that’s right, 24 boxes).  In each box are lesson plans and activities that were used the last time.  This should make teaching the lesson a lot easier over the years.  There are things like puzzles that were made from pictures of the story.  Flip Charts that were used to tell the story.  Attendance Chart ideas and the masters to reproduce them.  Where a pop-up book was used, a sample book and masters to reproduce these as well.

The lesson plans I have listed below are what I taught while going through this 2 year cycle. Since I started teaching when the rest of the congregation was teaching the Judges, that’s where my lesson plans start. I was able to teach a little over a year in this class before I moved on to a different class. That explains why there are no lesson plans for Creation through Joshua.

One other thing that teaching the pre-schoolers triggered was the children’s songs I have written. Remember that it was one of Glenda Schales class with her children’s songs that got the whole ball rolling of me teaching the pre-schoolers. I planned on teaching the class at least one new children’s song that coincided with the lesson plan each month. My first class was on Gideon. I looked through all of Glenda’s books and handouts that I had and discovered, to my dismay, that there was not a song for Gideon — so I wrote one. It was a lot of fun and the kids loved the song so after that, I wrote a new song every month for these precious pre-schoolers.

Below is the 2 year cycle that we used.  The lessons that I have lesson plans for are linked to the lesson plan on this website.  I will add more as I have time.  I hope you either find something you can use in these lesson plans or get motivated/inspired to write your own.

Pre-school Bible Class Schedule

The Beginning

• January — Creation
• February — Adam & Eve
• March — Noah

The Promise

• April — Abraham
• May — Jacob
• June — Joseph

The New Nation

• July — Moses
• August — Wanderings
• September — Joshua

The Judges

• October — Gideon
• November — Samson
• December — Samuel

The Kings

• January — Saul
• February — David
• March — Solomon

The Prophets

• April — Elijah
• May — Daniel
• June — Jonah

Life of Christ

• July — Life of Christ
• August — Parables of Jesus
• September — Miracles of Jesus

The Church

• October — Peter
• November — Paul
• December — The Church