Praying the Rosary is such a beautiful Catholic tradition, but teaching and praying it with children (especially young children) can be overwhelming. I've rounded up a variety of resources for teaching children to pray the Rosary. Hopefully they can help you with your own children or the students in your classroom.
Create a Rosary Lapbook
I've found that the hardest part of praying the rosary is a) knowing all the prayers and b) knowing what order to say them in. As an adult who didn't pray the Rosary regularly growing up, I still have these problems. That was why I designed my Rosary Lapbook. It helps children (and adults too) to have the words to all the prayers and the order of the prayers all in one organized place.
This is a tool that can be used at a variety of ages and the feedback I regularly get is that the parents loved and used the resource just as much. Designed for kids, but benefits everyone!!!
You can find my Rosary Lapbook in my store as a digital download that you can print out and create.
Listen to the Rosary
This is how I started praying the Rosary with my girls. I knew it could be long for little ones and we'd never really prayed it as a family, so we started by using their Rosary Lapbooks and listening/praying it in the car on our half hour drive to church. Our church recorded an audio CD that we use but those same recordings are available now as podcast episodes. We would just pick the correct mysteries for the day and listen and pray along. It helped us to stay on track and also learn the correct order of the prayers.
Have a variety of rosaries accessible
Have a variety of rosaries available for children to use as they learn to hold the beads and keep track of what prayers they've said already. Mine still have trouble remembering what bead we are on even when it is in their hands, but it is still important for them to have access and get used to using the beads as reminders of the prayers. There are so many places to get rosaries and I would look at the age of your children to determine which ones you want them to have access to.
We put all of ours into a box which means my little ones had access to a rosary I bought in Italy and had blessed by Pope Benedict. Now, I bought it from a little cart outside the Vatican so it probably wasn't the best quality, but the kids indeed broke it and my husband did his best to repair it. If you have super special rosaries, let your children see them, explain the significance of it, where you got it, etc. but keep it in a safe spot.
Order young children some inexpensive rosaries so they can use them without worrying about breaking them.
Here are some options from Amazon:
This Colorful Polymer Bead Rosary is so fun to look at and was a hit with my 6 year old. The only problem we found was that the Our Father beads were a similar size with only a slightly bigger space. So to a little learner like that it wasn't as obvious when we switched to a new decade. This would be better for an older child who has more experience with praying the rosary.
We love this Purple Rose Rosary and actually have a few of them including another purple one and a pink one. The beads are really smooth and I like the rose beads as something different.
We started with a wooden rosary similar to this one that would go in our church bag when my oldest was a baby. It made it through 2 kids before it broke. But this is a great option for young kids as it has nice big beads and you don't have to worry about any choking hazards.
For baby number three we upgraded to a Chewable Silicone Rosary that would be quieter in Mass than the wood one and better for a teething baby. I can't remember the exact brand we got, but lots of
companies sell a version of this.
Another good option is plastic rosaries, especially if you are providing them for an entire class. This would be your most affordable option and you don't need to stress if they get broken by little hands.
Books to Use
I love having kid friendly books about the Rosary around the house.
I love any book by Kimberly Fries for young children and The Rosary for Little Ones is no exception. Her books do such a great job of explaining difficult concepts in kid friendly language. And the pictures are always beautiful.
This set of A Little Catholic's First Rosary Books were so unique and kid friend that I bought them as soon as I saw them. Each book is a bead by bead picture prayer book. So each page has a bead, the start of the prayer to say, and a picture and short sentence about part of the mystery to reflect on. I love that it gives kids a visual to look at while they are praying to help keep them focused.
Coloring Books to Use
Another way to engage younger children with the Rosary and the mysteries of the Rosary would be to allow them to color while they are praying and reflecting on the mysteries.
Make it fun
Get children up and moving while they pray the Rosary with a walkable rosary option. I have full instructions and printables to make your own walkable rosary that I wrote for Today's Catholic Teacher.
Edible
Another fun idea that we tried this year was to make an edible rosary. I gave my girls chocolate chips and some raspberries and they pulled out their Rosary Lapbooks and from there created a rosary on their own. Once they had them finished we prayed the Rosary together and they ate a chocolate chip after we said the prayer.
There are so many other ideas for making edible rosaries depending on if each child is making one or if you are making a big one for many to share. You could use fruit, M&Ms, veggies, marshmallows, raisins, cookies, cupcakes, etc.