This article is a part of a series about using Play Kits in Worship. Read part one of the series here.
What are Story Boxes?
Story Boxes are one creative way to engage pre-reading children during a sermon time. Story Boxes are plastic shoeboxes that include play pieces related to the story and a story card or small book for the kids to look at or read to familiarize themselves with the story.
When Kelli Dunn was exploring how to incorporate play into her church’s worship life, she decided to create Liturgical Toolkits, or bags of items that helped children engage with and learn about the different parts of the worship service. When it came to the sermon, though, Kelli wanted to help pre-readers engage with scripture in a meaningful way, not just zone out until the talking was finished. Storyboxes were her answer.
Below, Kelli shares how she came up with the idea, gives a peek into several of her boxes, and tells some stories of how these get used in her church.
Coming up with the idea
For the sermon portion of our liturgical tools, I wanted to engage stories from the Bible in playful ways. So, I developed story boxes for as many Bible stories as I could think of. When considering the role of sermons in our worship, we are meant to be drawn into the story, to engage with it in new ways, and to consider where we are in the story. And I wanted our story boxes to do just that, especially for pre-readers.
Creating the Boxes
Below are some of the story boxes we have and the pieces they include – but use your own playful imagination to come up with boxes that work in your space! You could even make special themed boxes for a season of the year, like Advent, or a sermon series your church is exploring.
- Psalm 23: sheep, felt, fence pieces
- Wall of Jericho: peg people and gem stacking blocks
- Pentecost: flame-shaped stacking toy and peg people
- Feeding the 5000: felt bread and fish, peg people, felt hillside
- Ten Commandments: wooden heart puzzle with 10 commandments written on the pieces
- Queen Esther: crown cut-outs with colorful buttons or other objects to decorate the crown
Story Box Examples
Tips for creating your own
Having a wide variety of stories and materials within the boxes helps engage kids in different ways. One week, they might be using playdough to sculpt something for each day of creation while the next they are stacking up wooden stones to retell the story of the Walls of Jericho. These can be added to over time, and inviting volunteers to compile materials for a story would be a great way to build a library of stories.