Sunday School

Action # 4

      I may as well continue in my church-orientated vein while I'm at it.  

      I started teaching Sunday School when I was 7 years old.  Yes, I know that is very hard to believe, but you have to keep in mind that my parents had just started  this church in our Bolivian neighborhood and all the members were new Christians.  Having grown up in a Christian household, I was probably more spiritually mature than many of the adults, or at least a lot more Biblically literate.  I quickly became my daddy's "little helper" Sunday mornings - when the smaller children became restless during the church service, I would take them outside and read them stories from one of our many Bible picture books.  My mom has a pretty humorous picture of me reading to a group of kids probably a year younger than me that I wish I had with me so I could post it on this blog, but alas...

      As the years went by, more people my age began to express interest in helping with teaching Sunday school, and after we moved our church services into our newly constructed building, we were able to split Sunday school into more appropriate age groups.  I took turns teaching the 9-12 year olds -one month I would teach, the next month another person would.  Though at times I got frustrated with the rather sporadic attendance of children - one week there would be 12 kids, the next, only 5 - I genuinely enjoyed being able to teach and help these kids better understand God's Word.  

      Teaching Sunday school let me teach me teach in a non-traditional classroom setting (there are no tests, homework, etc.) and taught me to be flexible in my teaching plans.  It was also good for me to teach in a language that is not my first language - Spanish.  Though this could be frustrating at times when I couldn't think of the exact word I would have used in English, I realize that it has helped better empathize with people who struggle with English as their second language.  I recognize that it was easy to fall in a teaching routine, however (teach the lesson, do an activity, learn a verse, play games...).  Were I to teach Sunday school again, I would try to add more variety in the lesson!  In any case, I miss teaching Sunday school.