Nashville, Tenn. ? It’s meant to help children learn about their faith, but the Southern Baptists’ curriculum for next year’s summer Bible school is drawing fire from some church officials and Asian-Americans who say its images and title — “Rickshaw Rally” — promote stereotypes.

The teaching tool is built around a race through Japan, with children running through Tokyo streets, climbing Mount Fuji and diving for pearls.

But the curriculum’s central image, the rickshaw, along with photos on its Web site featuring young people dressed in kimonos and eating out of takeout boxes with chopsticks have been called “grossly misguided and inappropriate” by critics.

At least one group of Southern Baptists in New England voted last month not to use the curriculum from the LifeWay Christian Resources publishing house in Nashville.

“We just determined that it was insensitive to Asian culture, and we didn’t feel we could stay sensitive to our culture and context in New England and promote this material,” said Jim Wideman, executive director of the Boston-based regional convention, which includes 240 Southern Baptist churches in Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut and Rhode Island.

“We felt that this material, however unintentionally offensive, could prove to be a huge stumbling block for us as we attempted to reach and minister to Asian-Americans.”

Wideman said the New England convention will use alternate material from LifeWay, the publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Vacation Bible Schools vary from church to church, but they are typically three-hour, five-day courses in the summer for children in first through sixth grades.

More than 1 million children are expected to attend Vacation Bible Schools next summer in churches that belong to the SBC, the nation’s largest Protestant denomination.