Preschoolers And The Rosary: How To Start Teaching Them

When starting to teach children how to pray the rosary, especially young preschoolers, you may want to begin with a game plan in mind! I have a special set of rosaries that I use when teaching Catholic ABC’s to preschoolers, and they look something like this…

Today I’m sharing with y’all exactly my process for choosing and altering a “learning rosary” for preschoolers, and how I implement starting the smallest Catholics on the rosary! 🌹 🙏 For years I used this method in my preschool class and they all looked forward to rosary time!I also have the information in video form, so check that out below. 


So to start with an introduction of the rosary with kids, I have a special classroom set of rosaries that I use. I actually did string this set of rosaries myself, and you can see my directions on how to make a rosary here, but you can also easily find and order a set that would work as well if you don’t want to make them, and I will show you how to alter them yourself.

What To Look For In A Starting Rosary For Kids:

  1. All The Hail Mary beads are 1 color
  2. All The Our Father beads are 1 color, but a different color than the Hail Mary beads
  3. Mark the Glory Be Knots (I will explain this further in a moment)

So the basic idea behind the “starter rosary” for Catholic preschoolers is that all 6 “Our Father” beads on the rosary are 1 color, and all 53 “Hail Mary” beads on the rosary are another color. I personally like white to represent the Our Father, and blue to represent Mary, but really any 2 colors could work.

How You Alter The Preschool Rosary

This is where a little bit of customization comes in. Wherever the “Glory Be” prayers are prayed on the knots, take just a little bit of fingernail polish and color the knots for the kids.

Now, each area of the rosary is marked clearly for the kids, almost like a “key” to the rosary prayers.

Purchasing A Classroom Set Of Rosaries

If you don’t want to string your own set of classroom rosaries (and I don’t blame you… it took me a little bit to make my set lol) then you can order a set of plain plastic rosaries like these (which actually are available in blue) and paint the “Our Father” beads also yourself with a different color of nail polish. There are only 6 Our Father beads per rosary, so this is reasonable and affordable to do. Just make sure you get rosaries that are all the same color and not a multi color pack or this method of teaching will not work. Paint the Our Father beads one color and the Glory Be knots a different color.

Post continues after this brief information about the Catholic ABCs Curriculum


Catholic ABCs Curriculum for Preschool and Kindergarten

Catholic ABCs Curriculum

Catholic ABCs is a hand-on curriculum full of crafts, printables, worksheets, saints, learning, and more for preschoolers and kindergartners. There are over 2,000 pages that you can use for multiple school years! (This is also a great supplement for 1st and 2nd graders.)
 
 

How I Start Preschoolers On The Rosary Prayers

In Catholic ABC’s (my Catholic preschool curriculum book) I explain how to use these beginner rosaries during final prayers at the end of class. All the preschoolers gather around the prayer table, set it up themselves, and then each child receives a rosary.

My rule for preschoolers holding a rosary is… no swinging it around like a helicopter! This is because someone might get hurt. That’s it. If they swing the rosary, they lose it and can try again the following day or week when we pray together again. If they want to wear the rosary like a necklace, I let them. I explain to them that it is not a necklace, but as long as they’re not swinging it around I am ok with how they hold it.

After setting up the prayer table with the kids and having them all bless themselves with holy water, I light the candle on the prayer table and call the children up one at a time to get their rosary, then they return to their spot on the circle.

I tell all the children that we will begin by praying the “Our Father” prayer together, and that I want everyone to hold a white bead for that. I wait while they find and hold a white bead, and then we pray together. Then I explain to the children that next we will prayer a “Hail Mary” prayer, and that they need to find and hold a blue bead while we pray that prayer. When we are finished with that, I tell them to find a hold a pink knot, and while we hold that knot we are going to prayer a “Glory Be” prayer together, and then we do.

When we are all finished, I help them to make the sign of the cross, and return the rosaries to my rosary bag. That’s it! Blow out the prayer table candle and class dismissed!

Catholic ABC's Curriculum

Comments

  1. happymomonline says

    We do one decade of the rosary each morning at our prayer time. My children range in age from 10 down to almost 1. I know that the older kids can do a whole rosary, but the one decade has worked for us and that way we're giving some time to our Blessed Mother each day. Some days, we will say a whole rosary and the kids take turns leading the decades – which they love! Any time we get in the car for a long trip, the first thing we do is hand out the rosaries. The whole goal is to instill a love for Mary, however you can do that is up to you!
    God Bless!
    Heather 🙂

  2. Curious how you get your little ones to go along. I have a 2yo and a kindergartener, and i'm just not sure that they have the attention span?

    • If you do it or if you have older children the little ones naturally want to do what the big kids or mommy & Daddy do so they will simply fallow & if they start playing they will still hear you & they learn by playing & listening. I also don’t know a kid that can resist a rosary they look like jewels;)lol

  3. happymomonline says

    Robbie-
    I am a firm believer that children can and need to be trained to sit still and learn to pray. We only do a decade a day which takes about 5 minutes. I made a huge poster board with a rosary on it. We put up a picture that shows the mystery (4×6 inch size) next to the decade we are working on that day so they have a visual to think about. Kids are capable of doing a lot more than we think they can. If they see you doing it and know that it is very important, they'll want to do it too.
    Hope that helps!
    God Bless!
    Heather 🙂

  4. great idea! I ♡ the car trip ,brilliant !