The Story of St. Patrick

On Sunday I told my children the story of St. Patrick from Godly Play Volume 7. I do these stories in English as an enrichment for my own children. I don't have time to do the whole book this year, so I am picking and choosing a few of my favorites to do. I realized recently that my children had probably never heard of Patrick. Though he is huge in the English-speaking world, he is not particularly well-known in Germany, nor is the holiday celebrated. Patrick was always one of my favorite saints, so it is fun for all of us to "wonder" about his story.

My homemade materials for this story:

• a wooden boat (made by our kindergarten teacher)
• St. Patrick peg doll 
• a felt shamrock
• a sheep (made from polymer clay)
• a puzzle piece of Ireland (from a puzzle map of Europe)

I made the Patrick peg doll the same way that I made St. Thomas Aquinas in this post. 

Jerome Berryman does a great job of re-telling the most important parts of Patrick's story such as his abduction and later escape, the call to go back to Ireland, and his use of the shamrock to explain the Trinity. Fortunately, he leaves out the parts that are more difficult to believe and that are most likely legend, such as driving the snakes out. 

As with the story of St. Thomas Aquinas, my 8-year-old son was more interested in the story than my daughter. I am not sure if this is an age or personality difference. During the Wondering, when I asked the question about what we could leave out and still have all we needed for the story, he said that we could leave out the part that Patrick was from Ireland. When I asked why, he replied that the part about Patrick being kidnapped as a boy and forced into slavery could have happened in a lot of other places, "like Uganda". 

 

One of the most fun things about doing the saint stories with my kids has been the creative time after the story. I have not pulled out any art materials, but let my kids spontaneously decide what they want to do. This time, they wanted to make a Patrick figure. Since I didn't have any wooden peg dolls to spare, I remembered that we had some toilet paper rolls in the bathroom that would be perfect for such a project. My son ended up making a figure that he referred to as our family's saint. (A great set-up for the story about each person being a saint!) My daughter made a figure that I think is supposed to be Patrick, although she kept referring to him as a king. The bishop's mitre kept throwing her off, because it looks to her mind like a crown. 

As part of my own further "Wondering", I pulled this book off the shelf that I read years ago to read the chapter about Patrick again. I read it years ago and have hung onto it as a reference book about medieval saints and scholars. 

Have any of you been telling the saints' stories? How have your children responded? Please be sure to leave a comment and a link if you have.