I guess it’s depends on the ages of the kids.
When we are very young, we try to keep it simple. I know people teach things so differently now than years ago.
I learned from praying it with my family. We used to all kneel down, as a family. My mother, or one of my brothers or sisters, would lead. We would follow. When my mother wanted another to learn, she had us lead…or at least part. When we were young, we prayed, answered, but we didn’t lead.
When we made mistakes, she would correct us.
I resisted leading. I was afraid of making a mistake, but eventually she insisted I was old enough and needed to also learn how to lead it.
She also explained to us the history of our family. She explained that our family had been praying like this for generations. My mother spoke French as her native language. She explained that there was a point when some would begin the rosary in English and the others would finish in French. She said they prayed like that, daily.
Then, even in advanced age, and pain, see my parents get on their kneels together, nightly, to pray the rosary. When I visited as an adult, I would pray with them. My parents would pray with others of my brothers and sisters who were Catholic when they visited.
I got to see that this was normal, or should be.
My mother also had us watch movies (before there were videos) on the saints, the 10 commandments. She had a bunch of movies she made sure we saw…The Robe, Barrabas, Ben Hur, Joan of Arc, and I think there surely must have been one about St. Bernadette. We would sometimes stay up till the wee hours of the morning to finish a movie.
My mother would talk about St. Bernadette and explain it all to us.
My mother got books for us on the lives of the saints. My parents tried to lead by example…go to church, confession, etc. My mother taught us our prayers simple ones and later got more complex. We would pray, individually, nightly, before bed. We would get on our knees, and my mother would tell us what prayers, and we would say them. If we had questions, she answered them.
Now, one could get a book, or video, on Fatima, say…or Lourdes. I think there are adult versions and children’s versions now, I think, on both.
Today, young kids could go online to the religious coloring pages online and learn more.
My mother always had crucifixes up …one in each room. She had statues…one in her room of the Blessed Virgin Mary. She had pictureds. One was very old…of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and Sacred Heart.
I would teach children that
EACH prayer is a rose. When you finish the rosary, it’s a **CROWN **of roses, to present to Our Lady. We need to pray our very best, because we want the flowers to be very nice.
I would teach them you could pray for people…mother, father…brother, sister…sick people…whoever. …ourselves. Then, we get better at it with practice
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