It’s that time of year again. School’s almost over. Summer’s almost here. And your preteens are moving up to middle school. In this bittersweet time of goodbyes and well wishes, use these three graduation and promotion ideas for children’s ministry to celebrate new beginnings and remember special memories.

Idea #1: Make Graduation Keepsakes

These personalized gifts will make great keepsakes for all your graduating preteens.

Find a Scripture that says something about a graduating preteen’s personality or one that will offer personal encouragement or challenge. Use a nice font, create a page with the kid’s name at the top, followed by the selected verse, then your church’s name and date at the bottom.

Kids love to have something personalized, and younger elementary children will look forward to seeing which verses you’ll pick for them when they graduate.

Idea #2: Create a Graduation Scrapbook

Create a memorable memento for each of your graduates with this “scrappy” idea.

Leave plenty of time to prepare this meaningful graduation gift for the graduating preteens in your children’s ministry. Look through photos from the years your preteen was in your children’s ministry. Some photo storage apps like Google Photos have a facial recognition feature that automatically compiles all the pictures taken of each person. Then, as graduation nears, compile an individual scrapbook for each graduate.

This can be a time-consuming process, but it’s one graduation gift that won’t be forgotten.

Idea #3: Give Graduates a Faith-Filled Survival Bag

Give your preteens a tool that will help them through difficult times.

For every graduating preteen, put together a “Christian survival bag”—a sandwich bag that has in it a heart, a cross, a marker, a rock, a penny, and a battery-operated tealight or glow stick (optional). Add to each bag a sheet of paper that explains what each item means:

• Heart—Jesus loves you so much that he gave up his life so you can be a forgiven and forever friend of God (Romans 5:8).
• Cross—When in doubt, take the “cross road” and follow the way of Jesus—even when it’s hard (Mark 8:34).
• Permanent marker—Nothing can erase God’s love for you (Romans 8:38-39).
• Rock—Friendship with Jesus gives your life a firm foundation (Matthew 7:34-37).
• Penny—You have the “cents” to know that Jesus loves you (1 John 4:19).
• Battery-operated tealight or glow stick—Jesus is the light of the world (John 8:12).

Hand out the bags, and tell kids that when they are frustrated, overwhelmed or stress, they can reach for their survival bags. Even in this next season of life, God will always be with them!

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These graduation ideas are adapted from Group’s Best of Try This One book. 

Need more tips on how to make your graduation or promotion day go smoothly? Check out this article.