Praying with Grade Schoolers

A way that will help move our children progressively toward praying on their own is ping pong prayers: we pray a prayer; our child prays a prayer, we pray a prayer, and so on. We should of course still discuss ahead of time the special things that we want to pray about or for: Our children can then cover those things in their prauers, and we can pray for other things we didn't discuss to give them examples of the kinds of things that they can pray about that are new to them. This is a great way to start introducing our children to the different things they can and should be praying about.

When our children are ready, the next step is to move them on to praying their entire prayers on their own. Depending on the child, we could alternate nights; one night ping-pong prayers and the next night saying their own prayers.

We should be careful at this point that, for the sake of a little extra time to ourselves in the evenings, we don't race off and leave our children praying on their own too soon. We need to stay with them for a while and listen to their prayers, continually encouraging them in the training process.

There are ways in which we can continue the training even after our children are praying on their own. Nights when it's late or when the kids are particularly tired, we can offer to say their prayers for them. This gives us the opportunity to lead them forward again by example. As our children get older, they'll begin to understand more and more how to talk to God about their feelings and intimate thoughts. They may feel hindered from praying this way when we're listening. We should respect their privacy and allow them to say their prayers, or part of their prayers, quietly to themselves while we sit and wait. We should also take the time to answer and/or discuss any questions that our children may have.