Challenge Junior Program

Program Description

K-4^th grade girls’ catholic faith and virtue program with 3 series of twenty weeks of curriculum each. The Junior program is made to match the developmental needs of early elementary age. Each meeting is built around a virtue and giving the girls ways to live it out with God, at home, at school or with their friends. The program is made to be led by middle school mentors with the support of Mom’s to fosters the mother/daughter relationship. The meeting structure is made up of fun, crafts, activities, saints, prayers, and games to help the virtue become something real and accessible to their age.

Junior Curriculum

Virtue Centered

Our curriculum is virtue-centered. A virtue is “an interior disposition, a positive habit, a passion that has been placed at the service of the good. That means that we must change on our way to God” (Youcat 299) Most of the our spiritual life and living of faith is God’s action, what we can do from our side is respond by good actions, actions that repeated enough times become a habit. This creates a positive inner space in our hearts for us to develop our friendship with God. This good habit or good inner disposition is what we call virtue. Then there are “superpower” virtues that God gives as gifts too. Kids today need to see virtue modeled and who better to set an example than the saints! Each year and week of curriculum is built around helping virtues become alive through the saints so as to foster this lived faith and friendship with God from an early age. Virtue is the beauty of a girl.

The Challenge Junior youth ministry curriculum focuses on five virtues each year. Each virtue has four weeks of curriculum, which focuses on living that virtue with God, with family, with friends, and at school in the corresponding week. Each virtue has a saint role model that the girls can learn about. The story of that saint will be carried throughout the 4 weeks of meetings by showing a video or telling a story about their life. There are 3 years of Challenge Junior Curriculum. Each virtue campaign also includes virtue stickers that the girls can add to their member cards. There are also coloring pages that you can print and send home.

Download a Sample Junior Meeting

The Challenge Junior Series 1 curriculum features 20 weeks of content through 5 four week virtue campaigns: Honesty, Hard work, Responsibility, Courage, and Friendship.

The Challenge Junior Series 2 curriculum features 20 weeks of content through 5 four week virtue campaigns: Obedience, Kindness, Generosity, Self-control, and Compassion.

The Challenge Junior Series 3 curriculum features 20 weeks of content through 5 four week virtue campaigns: Charity, Faith, Joy, Hope, and Perseverance.

Weekly Meeting Description

It is suggested for the weekly meeting to be 1 ½ or 2 hours.

Challenge JR Products:

Getting Started?

These are the products you will need to successfully get your program started. As K-4^th grade girls are in the developmental stage where hands-on is important for their learning and they aren’t yet able to think abstractly; there are different tools offered to help the virtue curriculum be attractive, accessible and tangible for their age.

Leader

Guidebook &

Curriculum

It can help to have a couple of copies to use between your directive team and middle school mentors.

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Prayer

Coloring Book

Not only does it have Catholic Prayers in coloring book format, but it also has corresponding virtue pages for each virtue. This can be used during the prayer chat moment of the weekly meeting.

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Member

Card

The Member card has five sections highlighting each virtue and giving space for the girls to put their virtue sticker there. There is a corresponding card per series.

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Virtue

Poster

Help the virtues and saints come alive by posters that go with the corresponding virtue and have spaces for the girls to color. They can be used for coloring during the virtue activity lesson during the meeting.

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Virtue Charms,

Bracelets &

Saint Cards

Give the girls a daily reminder of the virtues and saints who exemplify them via the Charms, Bracelets and Saint Cards. You can use the charms as a “reward” for when the girls complete the virtue sessions.

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