Youth Programs
St. Paul’s provides a safe, caring, and educational place for children of all ages. To ensure our children’s safety, our caregivers and teachers are trained and certified through a national program, Safe Church.
Please click on the links below to read about our offerings for children of all ages. If you would like your child to attend our programs, please click the button to register.
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Children up to age three may attend Nursery Care during church services. This program is offered throughout the year. Once children are potty-trained, they may move up to Extended Session.
Children can play with age-appropriate toys, engage in arts and crafts, read books, or have a little dramatic play.
Nursery Care is provided downstairs from 9:45 - 11:30 AM on Sunday mornings.
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Children ages three through five are welcome to attend Extended Session, a preschool-level Sunday School program during church services. Children must be potty-trained to attend Extended Session.
Extended Session is “pre-Sunday School,” a fun and engaging introduction to learning about church. Children partake in a short worship service, learn Bible stories, and engage with the material using crafts and dramatic play.
Extended Session is provided downstairs from 9:45 - 11:30 AM on Sunday mornings.
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Children in grades one through six are welcome to attend Sunday School during church services. This program is offered during the school year, and is not offered over the summer months. Children must be potty-trained to attend Sunday School.
As Episcopalians, we structure our Sunday school year around the church calendar. Whenever possible, we use a curriculum that helps our children develop a foundational understanding of the liturgy and Eucharist while staying in step with the lectionary. We believe this approach will not only deepen their understanding of the Episcopal Church, but also create opportunities for greater participation within the church community.
To build a foundation for understanding the liturgical calendar and the Eucharist, we use the Episcopal Children's Curriculum, developed by Virginia Theological Seminary. We also use Sparkhouse, a theologically sound, multimedia curriculum. By mirroring the lessons of the lectionary, we engage the children in developmentally appropriate discussions and activities.
Children begin the Sunday worship service upstairs with their families, before moving downstairs for Sunday School with their teachers.
Sunday School 2026
9/13/26
In this week's Sunday School lesson, "Offering the Gifts," students explore the meaning of service and sacrifice by identifying how they can offer their time and talents to God both within the church and in their daily lives. Centered on the Gospel of Luke (21:1-4), the session helps children understand the Eucharist as a sacred moment and emphasizes that our offerings are an expression of praise and purpose. As part of our preparation for next week’s Family Sunday, the class will also be baking communion bread together to take home.
9/27/26
This week our lesson, "The Great Thanksgiving," centered on the Eucharistic Prayer of Holy Communion, helping students understand its history and significance as the central act of our sacred meal. By examining readings from 1 Corinthians 11:23-26 and exploring different forms of the prayer in the Book of Common Prayer, the children learned about the essential elements of the Eucharist—including praise, the words of institution, remembrance, and offerings. Through reflection and discussion, the students also explored the meaning of the Eucharist as a "good grace"—a deep expression of thankfulness—and shared their own personal understanding of what receiving communion means to them.
10/4/26
This Sunday, our lesson titled "Going Forth" focused on the connection between Christian liturgy and our everyday lives. We explored the meaning of "mission"—derived from the Latin missio, meaning "sending out"—and discussed how the dismissal at the end of the service sends us into the world to actively live out the good news. Using Philippians 4:4-7, we encouraged students to let God’s love be evident in their actions and speech, emphasizing that our worship at the Lord’s Table is just the beginning of our work in our homes and communities.
10/11/26
This Sunday, our lesson served as a comprehensive review of Unit III ("Eucharist - Shared Life"). Through interactive review games, BCP page-finding challenges, and thoughtful discussion, students reflected on all three steps of our Eucharistic worship: offering our time and talents, entering into the Great Thanksgiving, and being sent forth into the world to love and serve the Lord. The children explored how our time around the Lord's Table directly inspires our daily actions in our homes, schools, and communities.
10/25/26
This week, our students explored the Liturgical Calendar, learning how the Church uses a colorful wheel of five distinct seasons to tell the story of Jesus’ life. Through interactive games and a hands-on calendar wheel craft, the children discovered how Blue teaches us about hopeful waiting in Advent, White celebrates the joy of Christmas and Easter, Green represents daily spiritual growth during Ordinary Time, Purple guides our quiet prayers during Lent, and Red fills us with the fire and courage of the Holy Spirit. Next Sunday, challenge your child to look at the priest's vestments and the altar cloths before Mass to see if they can identify which part of Jesus' story we are celebrating!
11/1/26
On All Saints Sunday, students explore Hebrews 12:1-2 and learned how the “cloud of witnesses”- those who came before us in faith- surrounds and inspires us today. Through memory games, song, and hands-on crafts, the children discovered that each of us is uniquely created by God with the opportunity to live as a saint in our everyday lives.