RE Curriculum
Year
1
1: First quarter, October through December
Age range: 5 and up, centered on approximately age 6
Topic: Unitarian Universalist Identity
10 sessions in the topic area; one seasonal session, one session on
Christmas, and one week off.
Sessions in topic area:
Ten sessions based on A Bucketful of Dreams. These stories were
written by a Unitarian Universalist for use in Unitarian Universalist
churches. Use the stories below with the basic
session plan.
- "The Beautiful Tiger"
- "God's Hat"
- "The Truth Crashed Down"
- "The Parting of the Waters"
- "Jericho"
- "Enemies"
- "Two Frogs"
- "The Beauty Contest"
- "Fruits"
- "The Frog Prince"
Seasonal session:
Choose one holiday from CLF's Cycle of Seasons that has special
meaning to your family, and celebrate it together as a family
OR
Celebrate the solstice using a celebration from Starhawk's Circle
Round.
Christmas session:
Celebrate Christmas together as a family. See "Why
Do We Go To Church On Christmas Eve?"
One week off.
______________________________________
1: Second quarter, January through March
Age range: 5-8, centered on approximately age 6
Topic: Our Jewish and Christian heritage
10 sessions in the topic area; plus one seasonal session, one session
on Easter, and one week off.
Sessions in topic area:
Ten sessions from Stories about God, which is designed for groups
of children. However, most of the activities for the above sessions
can be adapted for one or two children. Or use only the story for the
session, and create your own session plan using the basic
session plan.
Many of the sessions present stories from the Bible, or represent views
that Unitarian Universalist Christians might feel comfortable with.
It can be helpful to introduce children to the alternative concepts
of God included in these sessions.
- 24: "The Spirit of God Is There When a Baby Is Born" (Christmas
follow-up)
- 1: "Hide and Seek with God"
- 3: "The One Great Web of Life"
- 5: "God Is Like a Father"
- 6: "Being with God in Prayer"
- 7: "Love Your Neighbor As Yourself"
- 11: "UUs Have Different Ideas about God"
- 18: "Everflowing Forgiveness"
- 27: "God Wants Fairness"
- 30: "Our Stories about God"
Seasonal session:
Choose one holiday from CLF's Cycle of Seasons that has special
meaning to your family, and celebrate it together as a family
OR
Celebrate the solstice using a celebration from Starhawk's Circle
Round.
Easter session: See "REsources for Living",
by Joan Goodwin.
One week off.
______________________________________
1: Third quarter, April through June
Age range: 5-8, centered on approximately age 6
Topic: Wisdom from the world's religions
10 sessions in the topic area; one seasonal session, and two weeks off.
Sessions in the topic area:
Ten sessions from Stories about God:
- 2. God Has Many Names (from Islam)
- 12. Seeing God with an Inner Eye (from mystics of all religions)
- 13. God is in All Beings of the Earth and Sky (from Native Americans)
- 23. Changing Woman, Changing World (from Native American religion)
- 7. God is like a Compassionate Deer (from Buddhism)
- 14. Finding God in Silence (from Buddhism and Hebrew scriptures)
- 15. God is Like Light (from science and all religions)
- 16. God is Like Darkness (from Taoism, psychology)
- 20. Mother Mawu Wants Peace (from an African religion)
- 29. The Spirit Power of God is in Each One of Us (from Hinduism)
Seasonal session:
Choose one holiday from CLF's Cycle of Seasons that has special
meaning to your family, and celebrate it together as a family.
OR
Celebrate the solstice using a celebration from Starhawk's Circle
Round.
Two weeks off.
______________________________________
1: Fourth quarter, July through September
Age range: 5-8, centered on approximately age 6
Topic: Social justice -- environmental awareness
9 sessions in the topic area; one seasonal session, two weeks off,
and one annual session of evaluation (and assessment) in mid-September.
Sessions in the topic area:
Nine sessions from Experiences With The Web of Life, which explores
the ways that living things relate to the rest of life and our spiritual
connection with all living things. The curriculum was written for a
large group with session times of 60 or 75 minutes. However, the activities
can be used for only a few children. You may need to make selections
regarding activities.
- Session 1. Experiences With Introductions (to each other, to living
things, to the course)
- Session 2. Experiences With Our Piece of Earth
- Session 3. Experiences With Moths and Butterflies
- Session 4. Experiences With Insects
- Session 5. Experiences With Trees
- Session 9. Experiences With Bulbs and Seeds
- Session 10. Experiences With Growth and Change
- Session 12. Experiences With the Food We Eat
- Session 14. Experiences With Recycling and Holiday Giving. Written
to be used around Christmas, but can be used any time
Seasonal session:
Choose one holiday from CLF's Cycle of Seasons that has special
meaning to your family, and celebrate it together as a family
OR
Celebrate the equinox using a celebration from Starhawk's Circle
Round.
Evaluation session:
Remembering -- Brainstorm list of memorable sessions from the past
year.
Evaluating: From the children's point of view, what were the best sessions?
Revisiting the covenant: Review Sunday school covenant you created.
Does it need to be revised? When done, sign it again for this year.
See the Introduction for more on assessment
and evaluation sessions.
Two weeks off.
______________________________________
Why
do we go to church on Christmas Eve?
From Special Times by Betty Jo Middleton
& Long Ago and Many Lands by Sophia Fahs
Goal:
To know the traditional Christmas story of the birth of Jesus as a
source of joy and wonder. Also, to gain a UU understanding of Christmas
that “each night a child is born is a holy night.”
Activities:
1. Read: “The Story of the Birth of Jesus”
The Story of the Birth of Jesus
by Aloyse Hume
Once, a long,long time ago--before you were born--another baby was
born. The story is that the baby's mother, Mary, and his father, Joseph,
had to leave their home city of Nazareth and goon business to the town
of Bethlehem. To go from Nazareth to Bethlehem Joseph walked, but Mary,
who was going to have a child soon, rode on a little donkey. They reached
Bethlehem late in the evening and went to the inn to ask for a room
for the night. But the town was crowded with people, and the innkeeper
told them that there was no more room at the inn, and that they would
have to find another place to stay. At last Mary and Joseph found shelter
in a small barn with the animals. When the baby was born that night,
Mary said, "His name will be Jesus," and she wrapped him warmly
and laid him in a manger. There he went to sleep.
That night there were shepherds in a field nearby looking after their
sheep. And suddenly there was a bright light all about them, and an
angel came to them. The shepherds were afraid, but the angel said, "
Fear not, for I bring you good news for all people. On this day, there
is born in Bethlehem a child, and you will find him warmly wrapped and
lying in a manger." And then there were, not one angel, but many
angels saying:
"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward
all people." And the shepherds went to Bethlehem and found Mary
and Joseph and the baby lying in a manger.
There were also in that country three kings, who had seen a new star
rise in the East and had followed it. The star seemed to come to rest
just above the barn where the family was staying, and when the three
kings entered there, they found Mary and Joseph and the baby Jesus.
The kings remembered this very first birthday of Jesus by bringing him
gifts. This story is a story of long, long ago, but this year, and every
year, we still remember Jesus' birthday by giving gifts and by singing,
like the angels:
"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward
all people."
2. Family albums: Get out family albums that show pictures of
when your children were born, and when you were born, if you have them.
Talk about your feelings on “the night” your child was born.
______________________________________
Easter
Joan Goodwin
A column from the Quest archives, REsources for Living, reissued
in New Connections, March 2003, under "For Parents"
A CLFer newly settled in New Zealand recently wrote to remind me that
October is not autumn "down under," but spring. A springtime
Thanksgiving is bad enough, she said, but what will I do about Easter
in the autumn?
Robbed of the religious liberals' classic fall-back position of celebrating
burgeoning life in nature rather than the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
we might all have to dig a little deeper into the theology and the personal
meaning of this most problematic of religious holidays.
As adults, most of us have come to terms with Easter, ignoring or reinterpreting
its various aspects according to our personal preferences. As parents,
though, we come smack up against the Christian belief system, like it
or not. Our children see to that as soon as they are of an age to be
out and about in the neighborhood, conversing with playmates.
What are we to say to children still young enough to think in concrete,
literal terms, yet old enough to realize the horror of crucifixion or
the puzzlement of resurrection?
Did these things really, really happen? Why? Who was Jesus, anyway?
What is it all about, and does it affect us? Even when we adults are
full of confusion and uncertainty about such questions, we owe it to
our children to share our thinking and feeling in ways they can understand.
Faced with a young peer certain that he or she has "the answer,"
our girls and boys feel inadequate unless they have equal certainty,
and they expect parents to provide that certainty! Feelings as well
as facts must be considered with sensitivity.
First, we can share the Bible stories with our children. If they have
heard the Bible stories about Easter, our children are at least on an
equal footing with their friends from traditional Christian families.
However, as religious liberals, we can also tell our children that the
Bible was written a long-long time ago about things that may have happened
and even longer time ago, and that there was nothing like TV news in
Bible times. Stories were told, retold, and changed many times before
they got into the Bible.
Well, then, is it just a story, or did it really happen? We have to
answer that based on what we know about history and about life. We know
that such a person as Jesus existed, and we know that there was a Pontius
Pilate who ordered criminals put to death. Even today, some criminals
are still put to death in parts of the world, including the United States.
Our own experience bears out this part of the Easter story.
What did Jesus do that was so bad? He spoke up for his own beliefs,
even when they were different from what the religious and political
leaders wanted people to believe. the leaders, whose business it was
to keep order, were afraid that he would cause trouble. Sadly, our own
experience in today's world makes this part of the Easter story seem
believable and even familiar.
But what about Easter morning, the part about the stone being rolled
away and the angel saying Jesus was risen? In our experience, people
do not come back to life after they have died. This is where myth and
symbolism enter the picture. There are many stories of gods and heroes
who are supposed to have risen from the dead. And we do know that in
nature life and death form a continuous cycle. The idea that life goes
on in spite of death is an ancient and important one.
We also know that when a person dies, the memories of that person live
on with the people who loved that person. If a person has been very
important to many people, the story of that person's life may be handed
down and written into books so that, in a sense, the person never dies.
Jesus must have been a person like that. what he said and did, and
what he believed were very important to many people. He was so special
that people couldn't believe he was really dead. They kept thinking
about him and telling his story -- and perhaps adding details here and
there to make it an even better story, more fitting for such a special
person.
What did Jesus say that was so important? Jesus believed in love and
in respecting people and being kind to them no matter whether they were
men or women, young or old, rich or poor, Jewish or Gentile, no matter
what the color of their skin. He believed in peace and justice for everyone
in the world.
But "So-and-so" said that Jesus is God! Unitarian Universalists
believe that Jesus was as human as everyone else. He seemed God-like
in many ways, and we believe that it is possible for each of us to be
fair and kind and loving as Jesus was. UUs also believe that it's important
to stand up for what we believe, just as Jesus did. That's not always
easy, but we can try.
Happy Easter, wherever you are!
 RE
Curriculum Home
Last updated June 12, 2005
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