Here are two great ideas for helping students and families get back into the learning habit.

Prayer Partners for Beginning a New Year of Learning

In order to support our students, foster intergenerational connections in the church community, and remind adults of the baptism commitment that they make to support and nurture children in the faith, we created a Prayer Partner program.

Adults were encouraged to sign up to pray for a child at the start of the public school year and Sunday School year.  And our students (or the parents of younger children) were given cards to fill out that gave the partner a bit of information to enable them to pray more specifically during the first few weeks of the school year.

The start of a new school year is an anxious and exciting time for both kids and parents, and the Prayer Partner program let them know we were there for them.

This is how we worded the request to the adults in the bulletin and on signup sheets in the gathering area:

Many of our students return to school the first week in August (Wednesday, August 6 for Ascension Parish schools). We are asking members of our congregation to commit to praying for a student the first few weeks of the school year. If you would like to be a prayer partner, please sign up here. You will receive information about the student(s) you will be praying for soon. Thank you!

The student's card said:

Students (and parents): we would like to pray for you as you start the school year. Please take a moment to fill out this student prayer request form and leave it in the basket in the gathering area. It will be given to someone who has committed to pray for you for the first few weeks of the school year.

Information requested on the student's cards (doc attached if you would like to adapt it):

• Name
• School
• Grade
• Date of first day of school (we had multiple schools and districts in our area)
• Parents' names
• Any special concerns or prayer requests
• Contact information (optional)

If some of your parents are skittish about sharing their children's personal information with people they do not know or connecting their kids to unknown adults, adapt the prayer requests to be first name (or initials) and grade only and do not give the prayer partner the school name or any other identifying details. God will know who is being prayed for.

If you are in a small community or if people are comfortable sharing home addresses, encourage the prayer partners to mail the child a card or letter the first week of school to encourage them and to let them know that they are being prayed for. Kids love getting mail!
(If your budget allows, provide postage stamps and cards to the prayer partners so that more children get mail. )

This was a gratifying program, as I was able to introduce some of the adults in the congregation to children that they really did not know. We had prayer requests for specific subjects in school as well as for no bullying in a new school. One mom wrote, "Recently diagnosed with dyslexia – pray for her frustration level and endurance! (and for Mom, too!)" And we even had a college student fill out a card asking for prayer.

And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.
With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.
- Ephesians 6:18 (NIV)

Related Idea:

"Prayers Answered" Partners: helping students with supply needs

In some congregations and their surrounding community, there are children who need school supplies and basic articles of clothing (like underwear and shoes) to start the school year.

Acts of kindness and gifts of much-needed supplies are prayers-answered!

• Who in your Sunday School might need some "Sunday School clothes"?
• Who in your Sunday School might need a car seat or new Bible?
• Who in your Sunday School needs school supplies?
• Who in your Sunday School has an after-school supervision issue?
• You could create an anonymous donor program that matches needs to donors.
• You could also talk to your local school nurse or principal and collect new clothing items, like socks and underwear and supplies like toothpaste, soap, and deodorant for students in need.