Can a six-year-old understand what Jesus meant when he described himself as “the Bread of Life”?
How about a nine-year-old?
That's the intriguing and important question addressed by Rotation.org's Lead Lesson Writer in our teacher training PDF: How to Unpack Bible Metaphors with Children.
The full, free PDF is available to Registered (free) and Supporting Members of Rotation.org in our collection of "Paste in My Hair" Teacher Training Handouts. 
Excerpts from the PDF:
Can a six-year-old understand what Jesus meant when he described himself as “the Bread of Life”?
How about a nine-year-old?
For most of the 19th and 20th centuries, the answer was “no.” It was widely believed that children were mostly incapable of understanding metaphorical abstractions such as “Bread of Life.” This belief was enshrined in the early 20th century by Piaget’s theory of childhood development which classified children ages 7 to 11 in the “concrete” stage with the ability to think “abstractly” appearing sometime after age 10. The historical inclination to treat children as empty vessels which can only be filled with information – is a legacy that still plagues some Sunday school curriculums and teaching styles to this day.
And yet... our brains are hard-wired for metaphorical (abstract) thinking. Thus, much like any other innate ability (music, coordination, language, etc.), understanding and interpreting metaphors is a skill that needs to be taught and nurtured. And it’s an especially critical task given that our “textbook” is full of life-giving metaphors that our children need to begin to understand for their faith formation.
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The following chart shows four simple steps for unpacking the Bible metaphor, “I am the Bread of Life.” This is something you would typically do as part of your Bible study, and the results of the unpacking should find their way into your follow-up activities. You may already be following these steps without thinking about it, or this way of working through a verse might be news to you!
See the rest of the PDF: How to Unpack Bible Metaphors with Children
