SAN ANTONIO • “Fun foam,” felt, pre-cut paper strips and squirt paints, with plenty of donated shoe boxes and more than a few candy treats (plus the help of your handy-dandy computer printer and an eye for clearance tables) can keep your religious ed students “happy campers,” as Camp ACC’s workshop on “Creatively Rapp-ing Up Your Faith,” ably demonstrated.
     Presented by two generations of the Rappmund family, this fun workshop featured hands-on, creative projects for students age four years to confirmation and was part of the Archdiocesan Catechetical Center’s summer Catechetical Leadership Development training program, held at the chancery.

    Mom Rosemary Rappmund is director of religious education at Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Parish in St. Hedwig, as well as an instructional aide at Green Valley Elementary School. Daughter Shelley is assistant DRE there and an office manager.
    Daughter Deanna, a recent graduate of Our Lady of the Lake University (OLLU), is a second grade teacher at Paschal Elementary and daughter Raelyn is a student at OLLU. Deanna and Raelyn both teach second grade religious education/First Communion classes.
    By the time the half-day workshop was done, participants had constructed paper hats illustrating stories of the Ten Commandments and Noah’s Ark, made palm-print palm trees on dish cloths, created fish out of river rocks, feathers and paint, and prepared and consumed an “Easter Sundae.”
    Mini-Hershey bars were decked out in striped paper, pipe stem cleaners and tiny eyes to become edible “bees” for a lesson on the beatitudes; little cards with mints attached proclaimed “You were ‘mint’ to be a teacher” (easily changeable to “You were ‘mint’ to be one of God’s children”); and a Tootsie Pop was popped through squares of red and yellow tissue paper representing the fire of the Holy Spirit for confirmation.

    The Rappmunds call these treats rewards for the children coming to class and aids to fighting off the inevitable boredom that comes with sitting still too long.
    Shelley is the official family poet and comes up with the original little poems that accompany the various sweet treats.
    She points out this is easier than dealing with copyrighted material and graciously offered the use of any of her religious rhymes to the attendees to use as they saw fit.
    The Dollar Store, Target, Wal-Mart, gardening stores and even the bargain table at Office Max have all provided the Rappmunds with great bargains for their creative classroom projects and they keep a sharp eye out for items that can be transformed into something as unique as paper cups becoming whales to swallow wooden clothes pin (or popsicle stick or ice cream spoon) Jonahs.
    Inexpensive lengths of bamboo are cut down to become picture frames, and paper plates can become Jesus’ tomb (a small crumpled brown bag makes a nice “rock”) — or a learning tool for the Grace Before Meals blessing, with magazine cut-outs of food framing the words to the prayer pasted onto the plate. (The reverse side can hold the Grace After Meals prayer.)
    The shoe boxes? They provide projects the students can take home to do with family, with each student assigned one of the stations of the cross or mysteries of the rosary to present in a little diorama.
    Paper bag puppets of the Blessed Virgin (for the Assumption, add cotton clouds), plastic coat hanger mobiles illustrating the seven sacraments, and multi-colored beach balls with an icebreaker question or Bible verse on each panel for a physical game activity were also demonstrated.

    The class wrapped up with a unique spiritual and culinary “tour de force,” the “Easter Sundae.”     Symbolizing the palms spread on the ground before Jesus on Palm Sunday, the workshop students unrolled green and yellow fruit roll-ups into the bowls set before them. As the Last Supper was described, vanilla wafers were handed out to symbolize the body of Christ, and strawberry syrup, representing the blood of Christ, was poured atop a mound of chocolate ice cream (Mt. Calvary).
    Graham cracker crosses, put together with sugar and water, were then placed atop the “mountain,” which was sprinkled with chocolate chip “rocks” to bring to mind Jesus’ tomb. Spray whip was then added as clouds, with a cherry placed atop the concoction to represent Jesus himself, rising above the clouds at the Resurrection. Throughout, the students listened to a recounting of the various events of Holy Week.
    Having admirably resisted temptation up to this point, the students concluded by consuming their final project!