You are here: Home > Children and teens
Children and teens at First Unitarian
Welcome
Meet our Director of Religious Education
Child Care
How To Register Children for Sunday School
The Sunday School Program
Our Volunteer Teachers
Teens at First Unitarian
Link to Sunday school registration form
Link to permission forms for overnight trips
Welcome!
Welcome to religious education programs for children and youth at the First Unitarian Church in New Bedford! Our congregation began providing liberal religious education over a century and a half ago, and today we continue our tradition of excellence in liberal religious education for all ages.
When it comes to young people, our primary goal is to teach children and youth how to lead religious lives: to become sensitive, moral, and joyful people, people with intellectual integrity and spiritual insight. Young people learn about religion best not by learning facts, but by living their religion. They learn how to be warm, caring human beings not through lectures, but through spending time with adult role models. Curriculum books are far less important than lived religion.
Because we believe in learning by doing, this year all children and youth will attend the first part of the Sunday morning worship service. In those fifteen or twenty minutes of worship, young people learn our religious tradition through participation and doing: singing and hearing liberal religious music, being in community with adults, sitting quietly for a time. Ideally, young people will learn that a worship service is a time when you reconnect with the best part of your self.
Unitarian Universalist religious educator Margaret Gooding has written: "Growing up Unitarian Universalist does not mean growing up in a system that places high priority on learning about religion. It means growing up in a climate that fosters becoming a religious person." In that spirit, I hope you will encourage the young people in your life to participate regularly in religious growth and learning here at First Unitarian.
Meet Our Director of Religious Education
Marybeth Truran is our Director of Religious Education. She comes to us after years of experience as a volunteer Sunday school teacher, youth advisor, and trained sexuality education leader with the Unitarian Unversalist church in Middleboro, Mass. She is a Unitarian Universalist lay minister licensed in Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Marybeth has done graduate work at Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, and has experience in youth ministry, pastoral counseling, and religious education. She is also a principal of Bristol Building Redevelopment, New Bedford.
Child Care
Child care is available for infants and toddlers up through age 2 Sunday mornings mid-September through mid-June. In a loving and safe environment, our very youngest children explore and play together under the supervision of Serena Andre, our Child Care Provider. Our child care space is in the Green Room, and is easily accessible from the sanctuary.
How To Register Children for Sunday School
If our religious education programs suit your needs and you want your children to participate, please fill out a registration form. You can obtain a registration form at church, by calling the church office at 508-994-9686, or by sending an email request to the church office at NBU718-at-aol-dot-com. You can also find a registration form online.
On the form you can indicate what kind of volunteer support your family will be able to give. Our cooperative program is staffed by volunteers, and it won’t succeed without a time-and-talent donation from every family. Sunday school teachers are especially needed. If you are new to the church, check the appropriate place and wait to make your volunteer commitment -- we want you to have time to feel comfortable at First Unitarian before you volunteer.
Thanks to those who gave strong financial support through their annual pledges, we have no registration fee for the Sunday school. Let’s continue this tradition of strong voluntary financial support. Please give as generously as you are able when you make your pledge to First Unitarian this year.
The Sunday School Program
We have divided the year into four, eight-week quarters, and children participate in programs with a similar theme at each age level during each quarter, as follows: autumn, Unitarian Universalist identity; winter, our Jewish and Christian heritage; spring, religions of the world, late spring, special project. Often, the first part of the worship services will relate to that quarter’s theme. During each quarter, sessions will be led by a team of adult teachers using standard Unitarian Universalist curriculum books.
We use established curriculum guides published by the Unitarian Universalist Association and other professional religious educators. Volunteer teachers are allowed flexibility in choosing material to present, based on the needs of their group. Feel free to ask teachers what they did this week! If you would like to review any of the curriculum books we are using, please call the church office to arrange to do so.
Our Volunteer Teachers
One of the main goals for lifespan religious education at FUNB is to create meaningful intergenerational connections. People who offer teach in the Sunday school are the heart and soul of religious education at FUNB. Their teaching ministry is one of deed more than word, of setting an example more than wordy instruction. Their caring presence encourages new learning and new growth for all generations.
Each year, parents, grandparents, non-parents, and others volunteer to be church school teachers. The Director of Religious Education (DRE) and experienced volunteers provide training opportunities during the year. Training topics include classroom management, ideas for teaching meditation and prayer in Sunday school, discussions on our unique Unitarian Universalist heritage, etc. Adult-to-adult mentoring also contributes to excellence in teaching. Teaching and advising teams typically include one or more experienced teachers or advisors who can act as mentors.
The DRE is available to Sunday school teachers for consultation. Since training and guidance are easily available, newcomers to teaching, and newcomers to Unitarian Universalism, find they too can succeed at leading programs at FUNB. People who have never taught or led a program before are surprised at how satisfying this ministry can be, and they are pleased at how well they can meet its challenges. (However, we do ask that you attend church for at least six months before you teach Sunday school.)
Link to a volunteer job description for Sunday school teachers.
Consider furthering your own spiritual growth by leading a church school or adult program. And don’t forget to express your thanks and appreciation to those who lead our programs for children, youth, and adults. Tell them how much you appreciate their dedication to FUNB, and to liberal religion.
Teens at First Unitarian
Teenagers (or youth, as we like to call people in the 14-18 age range) at First Unitarian are invited to participate in the congregation in a number of ways. We have a small youth group that meets for dinner on Sunday evenings -- please ask Dan Harper, our minister, about the youth group. Youth may also serve on committees, be lay readers in worship services, participate in social justice activities, teach younger children in Sunday school, etc.
Youth in smaller congregations often find that while they don't have a large peer group, they get more support and more attention than youth in larger congregations do. If you are a youth yourself, or a parent/guardian of a youth, feel free to call Dan Harper to talk about ways for youth to get involved -- 508-994-9686.