Do you ever wonder what to do with all your children’s mounting Sunday school papers or your old magazines? Why not use them to create flannel graph stories? It’s a simple and entertaining project sure to diminish your piles of paper and engage your children in a creative form of storytelling.

Instructions:

Step 1 – Gather all materials and allow child to cut pictures out of old Sunday school papers and magazines.

Step 2 – Glue a few small pieces of felt or flannel material (recycled fleece pj’s or sheets will do) to the back of each picture.

Step 3 – Wrap and secure a fleece/flannel blanket, sheet or a large piece of felt material around a child’s art easel or any portable black board, white board or any flat stable surface placed at the child’s reaching level.

Step 4 –Engage your children in a story (Bible story or any other child-appropriate story) using their handmade flannel graph magazine characters. Once they see how to use the pieces, encourage them to make up their own stories.

Step 5 –Store the flannel graph characters in a large envelope, manila folder, shoe box or plastic container for future storytelling fun.

Flannel graph stories are an excellent literary exercise for young or emerging readers. They allow for physical manipulation, tactile experiences,  a creative language and comprehension lesson as children use their imaginations and physical world to create either original stories or retell a familiar story.

The possibilities are endless. You can create countless flanngel graph/felt pieces for various lessons (alphabet, memory verses, calendars, science lessons (fruit, senses, etc). The skies the limit! No magazines or old Sunday school papers hanging around? Use coloring book pages or free down-loadable coloring book pages from DIY sites like DLTK  http://dltk-bible.com .