I wrote this article for the Concordia Publishing House blog about how we are using their new Luther’s Small Catechism for Kids in our homeschool this year:
We are six weeks into using it, and I have truly loved this resource so far!
One of my catechesis goals for our family is memorizing the Small Catechism. There are so many benefits to having the catechism committed to memory. We have been gently working on familiarity with the whole catechism and memorization of the Ten Commandments and their explanations over the past few years, and I find myself regularly invoking the explanations in parenting. “Was that explaining everything in the kindest way?” “Was that hurting or harming our neighbor in his body?” “Are we helping our sibling to keep and take care of their possessions right now?” I can’t wait to incorporate memory work for the other six chief parts. Our kids have the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostle’s Creed memorized naturally from church and saying them together at home since birth, but I know learning the explanations will help them to develop a fuller understanding of God’s Word. I’m excited to brush up on those myself as I learn alongside them!
One of the resources I have used with my younger kids is the Follow and Do books. This series has one picture book for each of the six chief parts, and is very readable for little ones. When I was targeting our devotions for Kindergarten-age, I would start each day with a hymn, and then read the same Follow and Do book each day for a whole week. This was a gentle way to start familiarizing the kids with the catechism, and I definitely recommend these books for preschoolers!
