You teach them by praying yourself. That’s the first answer and the most important one. Kids learn prayer the way they learn everything else that matters, by watching you do it.
But let’s get practical. You’re probably wondering what prayers to teach, when to pray, and how to make it stick when your six-year-old would rather watch YouTube and your teenager rolls their eyes at everything. Here’s what works.
Start with a prayer corner
Set up a small space in your home with icons, a candle or oil lamp, and maybe a small cross. It doesn’t need to be fancy. A shelf in the living room works fine. This becomes your family’s prayer spot. Light the candle, stand together, and pray. Even toddlers can learn to kiss an icon and make the sign of the cross. They won’t understand it all yet. That’s fine.
The icon corner makes prayer physical and visible. It’s not just something that happens in your head. You stand, you light something, you face the icons. Kids need that. They’re not abstract thinkers yet.
Keep it short at first
Start with the Trisagion prayers and the Lord’s Prayer. That’s it. Morning and evening, five minutes each. Don’t launch into a full prayer rule that takes twenty minutes. Your four-year-old can’t handle that, and honestly, if you’re just starting out, you probably can’t either.
As they get older, add prayers to their guardian angel and the Theotokos. Teach them to pray for family members by name. Let them pick someone to pray for, Grandma, their friend at school, the kid who’s mean to them on the bus. Make it real.
Teach the Jesus Prayer early
“Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me.” Say it together during family prayer. Repeat it in the car. Use it at bedtime. For younger kids, start with just “Lord, have mercy.” It’s simple. It’s true. It’s the prayer the Church has used for centuries.
Don’t make it weird or mystical. You’re not teaching advanced hesychasm to a second-grader. You’re teaching them to call on Christ’s name. That’s something even a three-year-old can do.
Use your body
Orthodoxy isn’t a head religion. We stand, we bow, we make the sign of the cross, we kiss icons. Let your kids do all of that. Little ones especially need to move. If they’re wiggling during prayers, give them something to do, hold the prayer book, light the candle (with supervision), venerate the icons.
Sing when you can. The Lord’s Prayer has a melody. “Lord, have mercy” gets chanted dozens of times in every service. If your family can’t carry a tune, that’s fine. Sing anyway. Kids remember what they sing.
Let them see you pray alone
This matters more than you think. If your kids only see family prayer, they’ll assume prayer is a group activity. They need to catch you praying by yourself. Standing in front of the icons in the morning. Crossing yourself before a meal when you’re eating alone. Saying the Jesus Prayer under your breath when you’re stressed.
You don’t need to announce it. Just let them see it happen. That’s how they learn prayer is a relationship, not a performance.
Don’t force it, but don’t skip it either
Some nights your kids will whine about prayer time. Some mornings they’ll drag their feet. Pray anyway. Keep it short if you need to, but be consistent. This is like brushing teeth. You don’t skip it just because they’re not in the mood.
At the same time, don’t turn prayer into punishment. If it becomes a battle every single time, something’s wrong. Maybe your rule is too long. Maybe you’re praying at the wrong time of day. Talk to your priest. Adjust. The goal is to make prayer a normal part of life, not a source of family conflict.
Get them a prayer book
Ancient Faith Publishing makes A Child’s Guide to Prayer for kids ages five to ten. It’s got the basic prayers with simple explanations and nice illustrations. Give your child their own copy. Let them hold it during family prayer. When they’re old enough, let them read parts out loud.
Older kids and teens can use a regular Orthodox prayer book. The Antiochian Archdiocese has prayer resources on their website. Your parish probably has booklets available too.
Connect home prayer to church prayer
Point out the prayers in the Liturgy that you pray at home. “Hear that? That’s the Lord’s Prayer we say every morning.” “Listen, ‘Lord, have mercy.’ We say that one too.” This helps kids see that what happens at home and what happens at church are part of the same thing.
Bring them to services. Yes, even when they’re squirmy. They’re learning by osmosis. The words, the smell of incense, the rhythm of the liturgy, it all sinks in over time.
Be patient with yourself
You’re going to forget sometimes. You’ll skip morning prayers because you’re running late for work. You’ll be too tired at night. That’s life in Southeast Texas when you’re working shifts at the plant or dealing with hurricane prep or just trying to keep everyone fed and clothed.
Start again the next day. Pray in the car if you have to. Say the Jesus Prayer while you’re doing dishes. Orthodox prayer isn’t about perfection. It’s about showing up.
Your kids are watching. Not to see if you’re perfect, but to see if this faith thing is real to you. If they see you coming back to prayer even when you mess up, they’ll learn that too. And that might be the most important lesson of all.
