Mini Revolutions Curriculum Monthly Subscription

As the Director of Children’s Programming at my church, discovering Illustrated Ministry resources has saved me an incredible amount of time in curriculum planning. I’m professionally trained as an educator, and I appreciate how clear and accessible their lessons are—easy to follow, simple to hand off to volunteers, and adaptable across grade levels. I deeply appreciate their progressive theology, inclusive language, and commitment to diversity.

On a personal level, as a deconstructed/reconstructed Bible college graduate, Illustrated Ministry has invited me to explore Scripture through fresh perspectives that have deeply enriched my own spiritual journey and renewed my love for engaging with the Bible.

I love the illustrated ministry's values and creativity. I have used this curriculum for over 3 years and struggle to find a way to make it accessible for leaders that do not have theological training. My teachers are often left wondering what to focus on each week and how to connect each story to the larger picture of God's story. I have found that I have write an additional resource each week for the teachers to find their footing. Part of this is a pit fall of a RCL based Curriculum as the scripture does not always follow a narrative arc. The switching between the first and second testament for the teachers often feels inconsistent. We have a small program and often struggle with the activities as they are for a larger group then we have at the moment. We currently stay because finding a curriculum that alines with our church's values is my highest priority but if it was up to the teachers we would have left years ago.

I really like the theology and the lessons are well thought out. This is best for older children though, and needs to be supplemented heavily for most groups, because while the videos are beautiful, they are too simple for older children to keep their attention, and the curriculum is too abstract for young, concrete thinkers and the questions and activities need adaptations for my youngest pre-k through 1st grade group, and even some of my 2nd and 3rd graders who are not quite there yet on some of the week's "bigger" life questions. I love to encourage kids to think big, but preschool is not ready yet for mini revolutions in its' entirety, so I would still encourage you to purchase, knowing you will just need an extra few moments to adapt your questions or craft.

The story and coloring booklet that goes with it are fantastic but I would love to see more crafty type things that could work with either the daily story or even the season such as one larger take home craft for Advent and Christmas, Lent, Easter, and Pentecost. I wanted to order stickers for our kids and then found that the shipping fee to Canada would be twice the cost of the stickers which was very disappointing.

For our program, it would be better if the coloring pages were designed more for younger children. Fewer words and more picture. Pre-schoolers through K are the ones who typically like to color, and for them the words are pretty meaningless!
We like the 4-panel cartoon stories, which can be used easily with nonreaders and readers.

I am a relatively new subscriber. Came in at the end of the month (May) to download next month's (June) lessons. The email link is expired and there is no download option directly from my account. While I can email customer service to request a new link, I leave on vacation tomorrow and now have no way to distribute the curriculum prior to my holiday. I am in a different time zone so there is now no way I will be able to leave my work at home when I leave tomorrow. The curriculum is great, the convenience/ease of use for a solo pastor is currently lacking.

I love the Mini Revolutions. They have beautiful coloring pages and the quadrant summary page. These lessons make teaching weekly much easier. They make great learning packages to send home with the children, or to save for the children who are absent that week.

I very much preferred the previous four page New Testament's reading summary. They were wonderful. I printed out the colored pages to hang in the Parish Hall and then would print out the black and white as handouts. I found that the explanation of the readings was much more accessible to children K-6 grade which always prompted discussions while they could see the picture along with the summary that I was reading.

I love how easy it is to implement. The additional support.on the FB community is wonderful!

Love this curriculum which gives makes Biblical stories relevance to our current lives.

I would appreciate the lectionary theme focus to be more sensitive to preschool and primary grade children. The one-size coloring might be great for artists and older students in a Sunday school class, but my youngsters are disinterested in this curriculumenrzchment activity. ai like the story books primarily for parents to know what their children were taught that Sunday. Some lessons, such as beatitudes are too difficult a concept for younger children, the ages of my students. they love bible stories, a narrative with repetitious words and counting. I would recommend a lectionary focus that is age appropriated for preschoolers, primary and middle school children as well as youth. I also focus on creation care--finding an animal to showcase , such as locusts for John Baptist and camels for the Magi. I use my laptop to present these creations with age-appropriate you.tube videos; I also like to find a video of the same story lesson to reinforce names, places, and story elements, reinfrcing the first storytelling. I think it is equally important to give parents and/or guardians a memo of what scripture topicstheat were presented, so parents/guardians, too, may help the child overlearn the Bible--helping with the reciprocity exchange and building fellowship based on relationships.

I appreciate the teacher background lessons but the coloring sample are totally ignored, never looked at by my students. Thank you.
Susan Hodgin, St. Mark's Episcopal Church, Moscow, Idaho 83843

As an adult, I find the lessons to be fresh and insightful, and the follow up questions lead to deeper reflection. Other adults at our church have a similar opinion. Where it falls a little is perhaps an area where it was not primarily intended to serve, and that is children in early to mid-elementary school age. The games and crafts are fine, but the primary message often requires interpretation and extra levels of presentation. One could argue that that is the teacher's job, anyway, so my one-star demerit is highly subjective to our situation and needs. Overall, it is the best program we have found to serve our overall Christian education needs.

very helpful

Simply put, it did not meet our needs. I am not the main user of the curriculum, so it was some time before I discovered that we often did not receive the materials.
To be fair, I often find Illustrated Ministry resources to be helpful.
I am surprised to have received this survey as I believe I cancelled the subscription.

I love how easy this curriculum is to adapt to different age groups, and especially that it uses gender-neutral language for God and depicts people in the Bible in historically accurate ways.

Helpful Sunday School material.

We have used for a month. Super organized and simple to follow.

This content has been perfect for our Children's Worship Elementary group. We journal weekly about the stories and the kids each get to read aloud parts of the story.

I will likely end up canceling. The lack of use of the gospel passage is unfortunate. I like what is here,
But I don’t think it will work out for us, as we tend to lean into the gospel, as well as during ordinary time we use Track 2, rather than track 1. I’m going to give it some more time but ultimately it may not be a fit

Engaging, relevant and simple to use.

The curriculum is very easy to use and adaptable for a range of ages. Our students and teachers really enjoy it. Now that Sunday School is after worship, it's a great addition to the Sunday educational experience by giving students the opportunity to dive deeper into texts that they heard in worship.

Good information and good lesson plans

I am using this curriculum with kids aged 3-7 and it is a little advanced for them. There is a lot of vocabulary above them and the videos. Ouls be a lot more engaging.

I appreciate the way the curriculum focuses alternately on readings from the Psalms, lessons, and Gospels. The coloring pages and mini-books are great! However, I work with a group of children from preschool to age 11, and the material is too advanced for most of the children in my group.
Unrelated to the actual content: When I signed up for the one-month trial on July 30 and accessed the August material, it was not clear to me that I would be charged for the September lessons the following day. I received an email stating that I would be charged on August 1 - the charge actually went through on July 31 - but it did not specify that this was the charge for the September lessons. I really didn't have time to review the lessons before this happened; now I have two months worth of lessons that I cannot use. Since I received the trial offer less than a week before the charge, I would have appreciated more clarity in the terms of the agreement.

Love the organized style of the curriculum.

The invitations to play are great! I find the logging into the platform and the format there cumbersome. Would rather have a packet or an email with all the links sent to me. More Christ-centered books on the theme presented or books on the particular Bible story would be helpful -these are hard to find; the ones you list are simple to search and get for ourselves. Thanks for getting creative with the lessons - I appreciate that!

It's fine

Thank you!

Our teachers always find something that'll connect with the kids