Catholic Bulletin Board All About Teaching Prayer

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Bulletin board are one of those things you either love or hate as a teacher. It can be so much work to put up and then the pressure to change them throughout the year. I wanted to take away that stress for Catholic school teachers and come up with an easy to assemble bulletin board that could be used all year long.

My Catholic Prayers Bulletin Board is designed to be used throughout the whole school year, but it is also designed to be interactive. That means students can use the board, manipulate parts of it to encourage them to pray in different ways.

This bulletin board could be used in so many different ways. You could use it as a whole class and spend time praying in one of the six different ways - scripture, thanksgiving, vocal/memorized prayer, intercession, petition and the Rosary.

You could also have students use it independently (depending on their age and if you've taught them each type of prayer) during the day as a center/station or a prayer corner.

In making this board, I wanted to make it as simple as possible for you to just print, cut and hang. I designed everything with minimal cutting. So while it will take some prep work from you, you aren't cutting around individual letters.

Supplies Needed for the Prayer Bulletin Board

The beauty of this bulletin board is that there is a lot of flexibility built in. You can decide what color scheme to use to match your space. I went with bright colors to really make it pop, but you can easily print on pastel or muted tones or something that matches your classroom.

For most of my pieces I printed on colored paper. You could also use cardstock or even laminate pieces if you want to for durability.

This bulletin board set does not include paper, borders, etc. Most of my extra decor was purchased from Amazon. You can find the accessories I used here on my Amazon store front in the section for bulletin boards.

Supplies Needed:

• Printable Prayer Bulletin Board
• Paper or Cardstock
• Printer
• Stapler or glue
• Book rings
• Pushpins/Thumbtacks
• Dry Erase Pouch
• Dry Erase Markers
• Pencil
• String
• Rosaries

You can find the items I used in my Amazon storefront under bulletin boards.

Buy Catholic Prayer Bulletin Board HERE

Setting Up Your Catholic Prayer Bulletin Board

The first step to setting up your bulletin board is to decide what size you need it to be. I have included full page letters and multiple letters to a page. I also include printing tips on how to print smaller or bigger depending on your needs. It is so frustrating that bulletin boards aren't a standard size, but you should be able to adjust your printing to fit in any space.

Once you've decided the size, start printing! Pick out the color scheme you want to use. I've tried to keep this as simple as possible as far as cutting so that you aren't cutting around each letter. You are cutting squares or circles around each letter.  

The Title

Start with the title "How Can I Pray Today?" in the middle of your board. Play around with the placement until it fits, but still gives you space around it for the other six sections. I would recommend waiting to glue or staple pieces onto your board until you are sure everything will fit.

Prayer Type 1 - Thanksgiving

For the thanksgiving section, students are going to focus on gratitude and thanking God for what they've been given in life. To do this, they will use these list pages to work on keeping a list of what they want to thank God for. They can store these in a prayer journal, or keep them stapled together or hole punched with a book ring.

To assemble this, you will use the pocket printable, and glue or staple 3 sides, leaving the top open. Then copy and print the thank you lists and store them in the pocket.

Buy Catholic Prayer Bulletin Board on TpT Here 

Prayer Type 2 - Vocal Prayer

In this section of the interactive bulletin board, students will focus on vocal prayer - the memorized prayers of our Faith that can be said outloud or in the silence of their hearts. There is a poster for each prayer as well as a mini set for students to hold.

Included prayers:

• Hail Mary
• The Sign of the Cross
• Glory Be
• Angel of God
• Blessing Before Meals
• Our Father
• The Apostles' Creed
• Act of Contrition (5 versions)
• Nicene Creed
• Hail Holy Queen
• St. Michael Prayer
• Fatima Prayer
• Grace After Meals (2 versions)
• Confiteor

There is also an editable page with directions to type out other prayers you want your students to learn.

Decide how often you want to change out the prayer. Depending on the age of your students, some prayers may be refreshers and some may be new learning for them. You could mount the prayer on colored paper. You could also use a dry erase pouch to more easily trade out the prayers.

In addition to the prayer posters, you can also create mini books of the prayers for students to use and take to their desk or a prayer corner. To make these, print the small version in the file (4 to a page) and hole punch the top corner and insert a book ring. Then you can use a thumbtack on the board to hang the book rings. When making these mini books you can include all of the prayers at one time, or add them as your students learn them. 

Prayer Type 3 - Petition

This section of the interactive bulletin board is all about asking God for the things we need. Generally, children have no problem with this. But we also want them to see that this isn't just a Christmas list of all of their wants. We want them to really be thinking about the different areas of their life and what they need help with.

Set this up like a matching activity where students will need to match the pictures and the words. These are designed to be very general ideas. The goal is to have students match the idea and then think of a more specific petition for their life. 

For example, they might match "friends" and  the picture of two girls. But instead of generally praying for their friends (though there is nothing wrong with that), guide them to a more specfic prayer such as, "God, please help Bella and I to get along better on the playground and become friends."

To make this a matching activity, use velcro or thin magnetic tape (linked in my Amazon store) on the back of each piece. Then create a horizontal strip at the bottom to store all the pieces. Create two vertical strips - one for words and one for pictures when they find matches. Once they've matched them together and said their specific prayer or two, have them put the pieces back at the bottom so the next student can match them.

Buy Catholic Prayer Bulletin Board on TpT Here 

Prayer Type 4 - Scripture

This section of the prayer bulletin board is all about praying with scripture. There are lots of ways you can use this section. I've included posters about lectio divina if this is something your students are familiar with or something you want to teach them about. This will help guide them in how to read the passage, mediate on the passage, pray with the passage and connect it to their own life. 

If you do not want to use lectio divina with your students, you could have them do some of the following instead:

• find the passage
• read the passage
• draw what the passage is about
• use a prayer journal and write about the passage
• copy the passage as a handwriting and/or memorization activity 
• read with a partner
• explain the passage to someone else
• think about how the passage relates to your life

I've included 52 scripture passages. This gives you one a week and since most school years are shorter, you have flexibility and can pick the verses that you think will work the best for your students. They are generally short passages - just one or two sentences in each. 

I've included the book, chapter and verse if you want your students to look up the passage on their own. I've also included text if you want your students to just be able to read it without looking it up in a Bible. Print and use whatever works best for your students.

The translation that I've used for all of these is The Catholic Children's Bible by St. Mary's Press. I've also included an editable page with directions that is blank and you can type in the words if you would prefer to use a different translation. 

Prayer Type 5 - The Rosary

Helping students learn to pray The Rosary is the whole point of this section of the prayer bulletin board. We use this prayer to honor Mary and to ask her to intercede for us. This section could be used by individual students, but could also be used as a whole class activity if you want to practice praying a decade or the whole Rosary.

There are several parts to include in this section. First, make flipbooks with all of the prayers in it. Just print and stack these with the shortest page going on top. Staple at the top and then students can flip to the correct page for the prayer they are working on. You will also make a pocket (similar to the thanksgiving section above) to hold these flip books. 

Then you will add a diagram of a rosary. There is a color version or a black and white version. I like to use the black and white one and then with the class color code the picture and the prayers flip book. For example, color the words "Hail Mary" blue on the flipbook and then color the beads where you say the Hail Mary blue. This will help students to learn what they say when.

For the mysteries of the Rosary, there are mini books that you can make and hang similar to the vocal prayer section. Just print, cut, hole punch the corner and then put a book ring on it. Then you can hang the mini books from a thumbtack and students could flip through them as needed.

Underneath all of the Rosary prayers and diagrams, use some thumbtacks to hold some student friendly rosaries that they could grab and pray with if they do not have their own rosary.

Buy Catholic Prayer Bulletin Board on TpT Here 

Prayer Type 6 - Intercession

In the intercession section of the prayer bulletin board, students will learn about praying for the needs of others. This is a spot where they can add names when someone is sick or hurt in their family or at school.

Decide how you want to use the intercession pages. There are ones with and without lines included. If you want to save these and just add to them, you could just print new ones and staple on top of the old ones. If you want to add new ones each day or each week, you could laminate the pages or slide them into a dry erase pouch and have students add names using a dry erase marker. Then they could be reused week after week. 

However you decide to write on there, have a pencil, pen or dry erase marker hanging nearby so new names could easily be added.

When students come to use this section, they could add a name and then read through the list praying for each person by name and using the same terminology we use in Mass - Let us pray to the Lord, Lord, hear our prayer.

And there you have it! A bulletin board you can keep up all year long to teach prayer in your Catholic classroom. Introduce different ways to pray and then spend time praying as a class or as individuals. This is the perfect addition to your prayer corner! Something practical and tactile for your students.

Buy Catholic Prayer Bulletin Board on TpT Here