PRAYER

Messy Prayer

(Jane Leadbetter, BRF)

2016 conference recommendation by Jane Leadbetter

Equipping your Messy team to pray and encourage others to do so, both within and outside the Messy Church context. Including:

• Communicating prayer as a concept
• Praying as a team in advance and on the day
• Prayer ideas for the activity time, celebration time, and at home as a family
• Ways of praying the Lord’s Prayer
• Ways to reimagine other traditional prayers
• Creating a prayer space
• A Messy Quiet Day outline

My big prayer book

(Maggie Barfield, Scripture Union)

2012 conference recommendation by Lianne Smith

2011 conference recommendation by Jane Leadbetter and Maggie Barfield

Full of age-appropriate prayers about situations that under-5s experience and understand, about concepts of God that are within their comprehension and using language that they themselves will use day by day.

Sue says: Simple prayers and engaging photos that will give confidence and encourage young children to develop their own prayers.

Top tips on prompting prayer 

(Sarah Bingham and Vicki Blyth, Scripture Union)

2012 conference recommendation by Lianne Smith

2011 conference recommendation by Maggie Barfield and Jane Leadbetter

This short guide is accessible, practical and written by practitioners.

Massive prayer adventure 

(Sarah Mayers, Scripture Union)

2011 conference recommendation by Jane Leadbetter and Nick Jackson

This is a prayer scrapbook to help 8- to 11-year olds get started on the adventure of talking and listening to God. Children will personalise this scrapbook, discovering their personal prayer style with quizzes and puzzles and recording their discoveries.

My God book 

(Victoria Beech, Scripture Union)

2011 conference recommendation by Jane Leadbetter

An interactive prayer book for 5-8s. It includes Bible teaching on prayer, prayer activities to be done in the book, ideas to go off and do and ‘My Choice’ pages where the child chooses an activity from the back of the books, cuts it out and pastes it onto the page.

Sue says: Children may need help and encouragement not to just rush through the book doing the activities and missing out on the opportunity to talk with God.

Ultimate creative prayer 

(Judith Merrell, Scripture Union)

2011 conference recommendation by Jane Leadbetter

The prayer ideas range from little preparation needed (such as response prayers) to praying through craft! There is guidance on choosing which prayer activities would be suitable for your group and how best to get your group praying.

500 prayer ideas for all occasions

500 more prayer ideas for all occasions

(David Clowes, David C Cook)

A variety of ready-to-use or easy to adapt prayers for anyone responsible for leading public prayer.

Barnabas children’s prayers

(Bethan James, Barnabas)

A collection of nearly 40 different themes covering a wide variety of topics, such as God’s love for us; our concerns for ourselves, other people and the world; celebrations and holidays across the year; our family, friends and pets; and many other aspects of everyday life. Designed to dip into day-by-day as children learn to share the everyday details of their lives with God. Included with the prayers is a useful index of themes that places each of the 365 prayers in to a category and helps the child find prayers for many different occasions.

Creative ideas for quiet corners

(Lynn Chambers, Barnabas)

Space for prayer can be difficult to find, especially for children. This book will help create physical prayer space at home, in a hall or a church. Each idea uses simple, easy found materials and minimal space to create a quiet, reflective corner. It also offers practical support to enable children to move at their own pace and level to a sense of quietness and prayer.

Multi-sensory: prayer

(Sue Wallace, Scripture Union)

Over 60 hands-on, step-by-step tips on everything from innovative new techniques to meditations and rituals borrowed from across Christian traditions. Includes a section on labyrinths.

Tiddlywinks pray and play

(Scripture Union)

101 creative prayer ideas to use with under 5s.

You & God

(Elaine Carr, Scripture Union)

A prayer book for 11-14s written in a journal style. Young people are encouraged to pray in different ways, thinking about all the different parts of their life – you, friends, family, school, money, fun, belonging, the world and love.

Sue says: I like the way that there is regular encouragement to ‘backtrack’ and review earlier journal entries, seeing how God responds to our prayers.

The Spy Kit

(Olly Goldenberg, Children Can)

2015 conference recommendation by Olly & Helen Goldenberg

The kit contains:

• The Spy Track – CD with information from top agents on the field and four songs.
• The Spy Guide – spy puzzles and space for children to make their own notes.
• The Spy Pen – Write in invisible ink then shine a light on your writing and see your hidden message appear (actually it’s not really a pen it s more of a pen-cil!)

Prayer spaces in schools

Although this site is aimed at encouraging groups to take prayer into schools, it has a range of creative ideas for prayer spaces and activities that can also be used for church groups.

Flame creative kids

This is a great blog site with lots of ideas for creative prayer activities for children.

Hands On ways to stop prayer being boring

(Victoria Beech & Naomi Swift, 2015 conference)

Delegate rating 9/10

An introduction to The Bible and Prayer

A Core Skills taster session

(Martyn Payne, 2014 conference)

Explore ways of handling Bible stories and encouraging prayer, including an opportunity to reflect on how this can apply to your ministry to and with children.

Delegate rating 9/10

10 HANDS ON ways to pray creatively

(Victoria Beech and Phil Moore, 2014 conference)

Delegate rating 9/10