For most churches, June is the month for their annual vacation Bible school. I’d like to hear your best tips for VBS. Leave your best Bible school ideas in the comment section below.
- What does your church do that really seems to work?
- How do you save time or money?
- What do you do to make VBS an event to remember?
- What are some fresh ideas for Bible school?
Need More Help? You can find even more practical ideas on my Vacation Bible School resource page and my Vacation Bible School crafts page.
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{ 20 comments… read them below or add one }
We using the book and film Facing Your / The Giant as our theme. The workbook was a major resource. Additionally, we our young adult and adult classes viewed the film and held a discussion. Finally, the last day, we held a balloon release with message inside — the giants in our lives! Weeks later we recieved letters of response from persons that found our messages worldwide!
Robin,
I would be interested in to know some more about what you did. We are starting an after school program at our church for the children in the community. It will have kid from preschool to 5th. The ballon release sounds wonderful… Anything you can tell me will be helpful.. I really I new at all this.
We had difficulty finding skit actors this year, so our youth group is taking on the project of creating and videotaping the skits that will be shown each night. This gives the high-school age kids an opportunity to get involved and serve, as well as meeting a need and solving a problem.
Amity Aliceas last blog post..VBS 2008
When I began a new job this year as a Director of Religious Education in a Catholic parish, I felt that my situation was different from many churches. VBS in general was not really designed with our denomination in mind, and in fact many local churches using the canned programs are deliberately “targeting” our children because they consider them “unsaved.” Even a lot of packages sold as “Catholic” are really modified versions of something that was designed from a Protestant perspective.
For us, the Bible is of course very important, but is understood within the context of Tradition as a whole. The program at my parish also is not intended primarily as outreach to unchurched families, but as an enrichment for children already being raised in the Catholic faith. I wasn’t sure that a commercial curriculum designed from a “sola scriptura” point of view for the purposes of outreach could be made appropriate for our kids.
I decided to re-define our summer children’s program, and I designed one from scratch. I gave it a different name with the word “Catholic” in the title, and broadened the focus from Bible stories alone to a specific aspect of Catholic life, with Bible passages used as illustrations. This year, the focus was on the seasons of the liturgical year, with a different season every day. Each Bible story was one that they would hear at Catholic liturgy during that season.
The kids had fun, and I came away feeling it was much more consistent than the canned programs with what we try to teach our children all year. It sure was a lot of work, but I intend to keep doing homegrown programs for the foreseeable future. I recommend to any VBS director, whatever your denomination, to take seriously the option of a “do it yourself” program. If you feel for whatever reason that the available packages do not quite meet your needs, see if you can do better!
I am a Catholic director for VBS at my parish, and we use Cat. Chat VBS and another great program is the Kids for JEsus series. Both very biblical and very Catholic… Just some ideas..
I have helped with VBS for several years in different churches in different capacities. I was disappointed with the way things were done the last couple years at our current church, and have become much more involved as a result.
I wrote our whole VBS program this year. I am a former Elementary school teacher who has also taught HS English, and am now a stay-at-home mom. I felt like the Lord was prompting me to do this, and it was definitely a challenge! We saved well over $300 and were able to ear mark that money for our first Friday night carnival.
We tried a new concept this year. Each class had crafts for two days and games for two days for longer periods of time. The fifth day was our carnival – complete with carnival food, bounce house, carnival games, prizes, candy, and a dunk tank (modified).
Our craft this year was a CD Clock. I found a site that sells clock works for about $2 each if you buy 50 or more. We used old CDs and painted and decorated them. The children were amazed that they were taking home a craft that was so “cool”; it actually worked!, and I was happy my son brought home a craft that wasn’t going to end up in the trash. I used a small supplemental craft I found at Oriental Trading for the smaller children when they finished decorating their clocks.
I planned out great games this year, as opposed to getting out a box of balls and other sports equipment and letting the kids run wild.
We simplified the snacks and the kids loved them just as much as the elaborate ones in the past. Any leftovers were saved for the carnival.
We used some kids’ music that I collected from different sources.
My husband took pictures all week and we had our slide show Sunday night for the closing program. We pulled out the cotton candy machine and popcorn machine and made more goodies after church for everyone.
I was able to go off on vacation afterwards with the knowledge that we had 6 children who made professions of faith as a result of all our hard work. I have a couple months to convince my husband that I can do it again!
Thank you for your information. I am looking for more details on what Day 5′s Carnival Theme include. How was it set up? What was the Bible Lesson for that day, Memory Verse, Craft, etc.? What did the children do? Did they travel around as they choose or was there a specific order in which they were to go?
How did the movie as the VBS Theme work? What movie(s) were used?
Any information you can share will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
Eliza
On the fifth day of VBS, our opening time (skits, songs, offering) was the same. Then we had our regular classtime with the story/verses etc. After that, we had a brief assembly to let everyone get an idea of what was going to happen and to announce the points winners.
We had a loose rotation schedule with 5 groups. I started the littlest kids out eating first. The next older class got to do the bounce house. There was a craft/face painting/tattoo station near the bounce house. And there were games. This year we added a fifth station – an actual dunk tank. Each group had a couple adults to assist them as they went to their station. I watched the groups to see when there was a lull, or when kids were getting bored to have them rotate to the next station.
We drew lines on the ground in our parking area with spray chalk to separate the games. At each game was a metal folding chair. On that chair we posted the name of the game along with the directions on how to play. We did have people stationed at almost all the games, but our church is small. So some of the games were run by the adults helping with the rotations. Each child was given a plastic bag to take around to the games/stations. The children were given candy at each station, and were able to win small prizes, too, if they “mastered” the game. The smallest children were given a bag with toys in it already, to ensure that they got something. We considered just making gift bags of the toys next year so that all kids get something to take home.
The points winners were given the first chance to dunk the pastor in the dunk tank. After that, we had teens who were willing targets.
This past year we went with a 3-day VBS on Jonah. We added a half an hour to our schedule. The actual Bible story was a puppet show in the opening assembly. Classtime was used to review the story and learn the verse. As the person in charge, I loved it. But I think we all agreed that 4 days would be a better compromise, especially with the last night being the carnival. The kids had crafts and games each day. Instead of a small snack, we provided a light supper since it was only a 3 day VBS. First night was chicken nuggets, fruit, chips, cookie, and a drink. Second night was pizza, chips, fruit, cookie and a drink. (We asked all the pizza places to donate, and one place gave us a great deal for the remainder.) Carnival night – hotdogs, chips, popcorn, cotton candy, slushies, cookies, fruit, kool-aid, etc. (all the leftovers)
I’d be happy to answer any other questions. :0)
@Robin Jefferson: Using the movie as the VBS theme sounds like a very creative idea. I’m surprised I haven’t hear of more churches trying that direction.
@Amity Alicea: I love to hear about getting the youth involved in VBS. I can still remember helping with VBS when I was a teenage. Looking back, it was one experience that God use to eventually get me serving in children’s minister as an adult.
@ Trish O.: I’m glad you came by and shared your experience. It sounds like you’ve made the best of the situation and created something that was very meaningful for your church.
@Tammy W.: Thanks for sharing your awesome comments. I really like the way you got involved to help make VBS better for the kids. It sounds like you tried some creative changes to the schedule and saw some great results. Thanks for the tips.
Dear Brother,
I am Fahim Qaiser from Pakistan. I have studied your web site, and I found it the most wonderful site to get right to the True Word of God. My suggestion for you is to create your material in my language of Urdu and Punjabi also. It will bring lots of blessings of the Word of God for the Pakistani and Indian Urdu and Punjabi speaking people. For that purpose I as a translator will bring your material into Urdu languages and into Punjabi language as well. Although it will take your low expenses as well, as fund for the Word of God to reach out to the deserving people. I my self, work on a local radio station also. Many times it becomes difficult for us to keep doing this because of being minorities and because of the lack of the financial resources. I will wait for your response.
Sincerely,
Fahim Qaiser ( Pakistan ).
Using the internet, you can find many resources to supplement solid Bible teaching for VBS.
We use Children Desiring God curriculum that only has the Bible stories and applications for only $80 (http://www.childrendesiringgod.org/vbs.php). We choose a theme to go along with the one provided by Children Desiring God. For example: for “Things Hidden: An Evangelistic Study for Children on Kingdom Parables” ( http://www.childrendesiringgod.org/curricula.php?id=18&grouping=Backyard_Bible_Club_VBS) we chose to do a jungle/treasure hunt/safari theme. It works great! Then, we create our own simple crafts by looking online at different craft websites, we create our own decorations according to the theme and using the different artistic talents in our church, we choose songs from different Children’s CDs or songs from other VBS publishers, we create our own games thanks to a gifted tennis teacher at our church, and we have the congregation donate cookies for our snacks. Very simple, very easy… just involves a lot of delegating.
This year our church has created a VBS Core Team, putting different parents in charge of the different areas of VBS (crafts, games, decorations, teaching, publicity, etc). They will all work together to organize and plan VBS. This brings so many ideas to the table and the church won’t have to pay a full-time director to lead it.
Heather,
Great suggestions and thanks for sharing the links to Children’s Desiring God!
Also check out this VBS planning time line:
http://www.iheartchildren.com/2009/04/time-line-for-vbs.html
Our decorations for our VBS are made by using a transparancy and an overhead Projector. We called a local printing company and asked if they would save us their end of rolls of printing paper. They don’t use the roll to the end. Most will give it to you free, while some might charge a nominal fee. You can make any picture a transparancy using a copy maching. The decorations can be as big or as small as you like. During the months before our VBS we would outline pictures (using overhead) and then one Saturday we would call on the congregation to come and help us paint or color in the pictures. Great day of fellowship and a chance for everybody to have a hand in helping to get ready. Great Fun.
I need some ideas on food for VBS this year
you might find some good snack ideas on one of the VBS forums
We set up a photo booth last year (first time) in the crafts room.
first i will explain the set up:
Place a large, solid colored sheet on a wall and pushpin it so that it is not wrinkled and will not fall down. Place a card board sign above the sheet that reads “_____ Photo booth” our theme was polar express so i would have put “Polar Photobooth”, this years theme is a rain forest theme so i will probably have a sign that says “Froggy Photobooth” or “forested photobooth” or something similar. use a test subject to see how far from the wall they need to stand so that they don’t cast too much of a shadow (try to avoid using a flash camera, if your camera blurs the photo when you don’t use flash then you may want to get a tripod.) and mark the floor with masking tape so you can show the kids where to stand.
If you have windows in the room where you are setting up the photo booth then try to position it near the window so that it is off to the side. natural light looks really nice and is good for people who will be using a typical digital camera and works even better for people with a dslr (but that do not own or can not set up off camera flashes).
did i mention: avoid flashes at all costs! Flashes both on and off camera seem to scare children more than the cameras themselves.
I was in charge of crafts and had no problem getting pictures of all the children in all of the groups. everyday i took pics of the new children that were not there the first day and i kept telling the children that on the second to last day we were doing a photo frame and then on the last day after they had dried they would get to take it home with the photo from the photo booth in it. oddly enough we saw more kids come back for the final day than in previous years (though it may have been coincidence).
Another thing you could do is assign someone the job of photographer. if you know of someone who can take pretty good pictures and whom knows how to use a camera this may be the perfect job for them! especially if they are normally are a floater and haven’t found “their place” yet in the churches vbs. This is a great job for anyone, the only requirement really is taking good pictures and knowing how to use windows movie maker and owning some christian cds. It doesn’t matter if the person is an introvert or extrovert.
All this person has to do is roam around taking pictures of the kids: eating snack, praying, reading, listening, playing games, singing, ect. the hard part is trying to make sure they get all the groups and at least one picture of each kid (its ok if its only on pic and the kid is in a group of other kids, it looks a lot better to the parent when they see only one photo of their kid in a group rather than one photo of thier kid all by themselves. ) they can start working on thier “project” as soon as they want to, but i usually start around tuesday and try to have everything done by wednesday so all that i have to do is make a few adjustments on thursday and save the movie to a flashdrive.
the project part is pretty basic: add all the pictures you took to the wmm import media folder. weed out the really aweful ones (blurry, ooops i used flash and now that kid has a twin ghost, he blinked (though i have seen a few cute blinky photos from some kids), ect.), then set your project to when dropping photos in they automatically (under tools –> options) are set to only show up for about 2 seconds. i know it sounds really short but it will keep the kids and their parents attention. next highlight all the photos you kept and drag/drop them into the time line. if you know have 20 minutes of video you may want to go back a weed out some more until you have no more than 10 minutes but no less than 3-5 minutes. they find a song, or two, that is up beat and peppy (doesn’t have to be a children song, for example i usually use charlie hall’s music (similar to casting crowns) and add it to the timeline. and then publish movie once you’ve tweaked it and have it the way you want it. yep. easiest thing i’ve ever done… well… maybe not. but the reward is worth the frustration.
I love the photo booth becuase it gives me a chance to get at least one good picture of all the kids that they can take home for their parents. and not only do i man the photo booth and am leader of the crafts (only usually have one helper) but i am also that “floater” that takes the pictures for the end of the week movie. yeah. now THATS a tough job! on occasion some of the other leaders and teachers will remember to bring their camera and take pics for me of their groups, which i very appreciatively use (as long as said pictures don’t get weeded out).
I was stunned at how the church people reacted the first time i did the end of the week movie. I had adults in tears! seriously! church members were thanking me for weeks and telling me that the kids were counting how many of the pictures they were in and all sorts of stuff. Every time i come home from college for breaks i have kids from the church run up to me asking if i’m going to make another movie (I started doing them for the awanas end of the year awards night as well as for vbs).
If none of this convinces you that one or both of these things are an awesome activity to try at your church to make you vbs (or awanas) more memorable then try this one: a few weeks ago we had a parent call the church and say that they remember getting a photo from vbs and wanted to know if we had a digital version of it that they could have. the secretary said she would check with her daughter (me) and then asked why, they said thier daughter had passed away from meningitis a few weeks prior. she was a kindergartner. I did not know the family very well and the only comfort i could bring them was in finding a dozen pictures that their daughter was in outside of the one from the photo booth. Thank the Lord I had not accidentally deleted any of the photos! I would have felt terrible!
so I’d like other people to learn from that and i strongly encourage you to try to incorporate photography somewhere in your Vbs or even awanas.
Ashley the hobbyist photographer.
Looking for input from anyone that has had a “night” time VBS. Many of our working parents have commented that if we held VBS at night – it would be feasible for their children to attend. We usually have it from 9:00 am to noon. Any thoughts?
Here’s a recent post that might help
night or day vbs?
After several years of very expensive, and most unfulfilling VBS sessions, I proposed that we “get back to the basics” of VBS by discontinuing the purchase of the VBS packets (which are very expensive). Last year, we (me, my two co-leaders and our pastor) wrote our own cirricuilium. We had adult members of our church become characters out of the bible. We built a huge 10 ft. bible and the characters stepped out of the pages of the bible each night to tell their bible story. Our theme was “Living Waters of the World” and our bible stories were centered around “water” in the bible, i.e Peter casting his net out and drawing in huge quantites of fish, Moses being saved from death as an infant by being placed in a basket in the river, etc. We accepted monetary donations each night and ear-marked the funds for building clean water systems in 3rd world countries. This year, our theme was “Feed My People”. Our bible stories were centered around “food” in the bible, i.e. Jesus feeding the 5000, Manna from heaven, etc. We accepted donations of non-perishable food items to present to our food pantry. We exceeded our initial goal and reached our 2nd goal. We have always prepared a meal each night to make it easier on the parents to get their kids to VBS. This year our meals consisted mostly of foods that were eaten back in biblical days. For instance, our meal for the night that the bible story was about manna (a pancake like item), we served pancakes and sausage.
Getting back to the basics has surely worked for my small church.