I started adding up how much paper we are sending home with a family who has 3 children in the elementary area and 1 in the preschool. It made me feel bad that I am contributing to paper overload for this family, so am wondering how to best go about changing that.
Three children in our elementary area in both 9:15 and 11:00 hours of Sunday School means that we are sending home 3 copies of a 9:15 monthly newsletter and 3 copies of an 11:00 monthly newsletter and 3 weekly copies of the Bible lesson for parents to read with their children before the lesson is taught on Sunday. The preschool child brings home a paper each week. That is 24 pieces of paper per month! This family really only needs (1) 9:15 monthly newsletter and (1) 11:00 monthly newsletter and 4 weekly papers that give the Bible lesson to read with their elementary children before Sunday and 4 weekly preschool papers. That is still 10 pieces of paper per month - but it's much more manageable than 24.
This all sounded so good last summer but it's not working out as well as we had hoped. We want to encourage all our parents to read the Sunday School Bible lesson with their children at home before the lesson on Sunday. This gives parents a chance to have first crack at discussing the lesson with their children BEFORE the Sunday School teacher teaches the lesson to the children. It is one way to give parents an opportunity to spiritually impact their children at home by reading and talking about the Bible lessons together.
Kari, Connie and I have been talking about this paper overload and wondering if this is working for you parents. If not, we are open to any suggestions. One thought was to put 1 set of these monthly papers in your mailbox at church or you can go online and print them out for yourself. Or, we can just leave them on the counter in the LIFE Center Lobby and at the Welcome Center by Sandy's office for parents only to pick up these papers and not pass them out in class. What would work best for your family? I would love to hear from you. Have these papers been useful to you at all? Do you read them? Or are we just contributing to your paper overload?
I prefer email and email attachments, or even a link to a webpage. I have no problem printing something out. I can set an alarm to remind me to preview the lesson w/ them, and everything is right there. Another alternative is give each child a Sunday School notebook (such as a binder or 3 prong folder) and keep all papers in the folder each week. Families with multiple young children that do not need duplicate newsletters, assign all the newsletters to go to just the oldest or youngest child's folder.
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