Teaching Middle School Kids How to Study the Bible

5th and 6th graders are a special group to teach. They are in the process of learning how to study the Bible themselves and take on a faith of their own. Many people are always asking how to teach them and things they can do with this age group. One of our ministers' wife taught this age group and developed this system that other teachers have continued. It has been a big hit with the teachers, students and parents. Each child was given a 3-ring binder. Before class, each child was given a copy of the text for the next class. You can find different versions of the Bible that you can print off on the internet. The teacher would print off and copy the text for each child to have. This way everyone had the same version of the Bible to study from. Before the class meeting, the students were to study this text by following this formula in the picture. 1. Pray - before you read

2. Circle and define words you do not understand

3. Highlight the verses you like

4. Ask yourself these questions:

a. What is this about?

b. What don't I understand?

c. What's one thing I know now but didn't know before?

d. What does this have to do with me?

5. Pick a verse to memorize.

All of these questions were done before class so when the students came to class they were able to discuss questions, words and ideas that came up in their individual study time. Of course, with anything, you can take this and make it your own. I hope this helps your middlers learn more about God and His word

How to Use Old Bible School Visuals

I found these old visual pictures while going through some Bible school materials. They were smaller in size but the color was still good. I decided to make a copy of each picture on the copy machine. I laminated each picture - the color and the black and white copy. Then I took the black and white laminated copies and cut parts I wanted to highlight or review. I put these pieces in a ziploc bag along with the color pictures.
When I used it in class, I gave each child a couple of the black and white pieces. I laid out the color pictures in front of them. Each child took a turn finding their item in the color pictures. When it was found, they placed the black and white picture over the color part. We talked about that part of the story to review.

This was a very quick and easy activity to make and a great quick way to review any lesson.

Jobs in the Classroom

I could never remember who did what job from week to week. So, I made this chart (the one on our right) to help me remember. I made a list of all the jobs I had my students do. I took clothespins and wrote each student's name on one of the pins. Their pin would be clipped to their job of the day. Some of the jobs were as follows:

1. Leading the Prayer
2. Song Assistant - choosing the songs we sing at the beginning and helping me with them
3. Center Checker - makes sure centers are picked up and helping friends clean them up
4. Attendance - counts how many are here and helps me put it out on the door
5. Cleans tables - helps pick up crayons and supplies we used at the end of class
6. Visitor's friend - sits with and helps any visitors we have for that day
7. Pick up Carpet Squares - helps pick up the carpets at the end of the class

When Making Games . . .

A wonderful Bible school teacher, Rhonda Thompson, taught me a great deal about centers and review games when I was beginning. I remember one thing she taught me that I want to pass on to you as well. Many times in education classes, you are taught to make your games self-checking. However, in the Bible classroom, do not!!! I try to always place a scripture reference for each question or answer. This way, if the child does not remember the answer or missed that story, he/she can look up the answer in the Bible. This helps them to read for theirselves the answer, but also works on building skills in using the Bible. After a child has finished a game, they are to get a teacher to check their work. This allows some one on one time between you and that students to review the story together. When I check the work, I remove the answers that are wrong, and have them look up in the Bible to find the right answer.
Now, different kids having differen versions of the Bible can cause some difficulties were this is concerned. So, if you have Bibles in your classroom, use one of those to make the games and then put a copy at the game so the students can use those to look up the answers.
I hope that this helps you develop your games and develop your students into ones who dig into the Word.