Tell Me a Story

Over the last few months I have been taking short online course through Ausburg Press. So far, one of my favorite has been one on Building Biblical literacy. The last 10 or 15 minutes of the course the instructor gave us tangible ways to encourage and promote Biblical Literacy. Some of the tasks can be done at church both during the worship service and during Sunday School. Others activities are intended to be modeled in out everyday lives, such as reading the bible in public, which I mentioned last week. But one that I think is really important is encouraging children to retell bible stories in their own words. In order to retell a story, we must truly know the story, we must internalize the meaning and the important elements. The Christmas Story is one of the best known Bible stories, so I encourage you to ask your child to tell you the story. There are so many ways for them to retell this story! They could:

• draw pictures of different scenes to hold up while they tell you the story
• make a book with their own written text of what happened
• act out the story
• record themselves telling the story and then listen back to it
• write a song that tells the story
• create a dance that highlights the important pieces of the story
• simply tell the story, before they go to bed, after dinner or in the car

The options are endless! So I encourage you to ask your child to tell you a story. Start with the Christmas Story, since they likely have internalized it already. Then next month ask them to tell you a story. If they don't remember all of the details, get the bible out and read through it so they can have another interaction with the text. This simple act can make a huge impact on how your child understands the way God works through stories. And don't forget, it's OK if they use their own vocabulary. This is a sure sign that they get it. Think of it as your child's personal translation of the bible :)