Answer it Tuesday

First of all, check out these lovely flowers the Medstud (aka medical student, aka my stud, aka my hubby) brought home! Mind you he came home ten this morning from a 28+ hour shift! He's currently a 4th-year medical school student at UCLA. And he just so happens to be on one of the most craziest rotations, trauma surgery (blood and guts make me squeamish, so we don't go into much detail). Considering the no sleep he's had, this was very sweet of him. I on the other hand...probably would have face-planted into a large arrangement of flowers and called it a day ;)

Alright, let's get back on track here! One of questions that I would like to answer today is:

What do you use to catechize your kids?

And

Why do you catechize? I think this article has an excellent reason:

In Peace or Crisis, Instruct Your Children in the Lord by William Ross

There are a lot of good books on children's catechism but here are the ones we are currently using. We started the 1st two when our oldest arrow was 2 (she is now 4 1/2) and so far that has been a good age for us. 

1. Big Truths for Little Kids: Teaching Your Children to Live for God by Susan Hunt. 

Susan does an excellent job taking catechism questions and applying them to a short story. And has a Let's Pray section after each story. The book contains 36 short stories. I've done it once through, reading a story a day, but we did not memorize the Q&A. I had the kids repeat the question and answer just to engage them. Now we read it here and there to help drive home our regular Q & A of catechism.

For memorization purposes we use:

2. Catechism for Young Children: An Introduction to the Shorter Catechism by G. I Williamson.  This is the short version of catechism. We do about 5 Q & A day and at the end of the week re-cap. 

Lastly,

3.   Everything a Child Should Know About God by Kenneth N. Taylor 

This isn't a catechism book. But it has a lot of essential Bible truths. Stories are very short, about 30 seconds long and has 1 question at the end. The illustrations match the theme of the short story and reinforce whatever is being learned. 

We don't quite have a structured method, we kind of just do it and try to be consistent. We use hand motions, A LOT of hand motions! We reward and praise. And most of all we pray that the Lord will continue to put a desire in our children's heart to learn His truth. 

May Deuteronomy 6:4-9 be your motivation in how you catechize your kid(s).

“Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one! 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as [b]frontals [c]on your forehead. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. 

xo,

M.Y.