| A great way to share the world’s religions with kids is through the holydays. These faith-based occasions frequently make use of stories, festive foods, group activities, visits to sacred spaces, and other meaningful rituals. For that reason, they can serve as a great entry point for both families and classrooms. They can also serve as an easy starting point for curriculum planning. Pair the book with a craft or activity, and you’ve got yourself a head start on a lesson plan!
One caveat is that many published kids’ books have the goal of establishing and maintaining a specific faith path. In other words, they are devotional in nature. There isn’t anything wrong with that, unless you are looking for non-devotional options. To save you time and effort, I’m sharing my favorite non-devotional, holyday-related books from each religious tradition. These books were chosen out of the hundreds I have read and are great for both public school classrooms as well as multifaith or no-faith families. Another option is to use one of my freely-available resources. My stories, articles, lesson plans, crafts, and PowerPoint presentations teach kids about holydays in a fun, engaging way while avoiding cultural appropriation. And I’m happy to share them with you! Also, I love feedback! So stay in touch and let me know what worked, what didn’t work, what additional resources you would like, and what we might do better. Drop an e-mail (worldreligions4kids [at] gmail [dot] com) or fill out the contact form on our Contact page. Indigenous/Neo-PaganHinduismJudaismBuddhismIslamSikhismInternational Days |
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