Summer Ruche

Friday, May 17, 2013

A Tale of Two Prayers

This week's lesson is the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. I was surprised to find quite a few resources on this subject.

Presentation
The presentation for this parable is like many, very simple. Two figures, some cynlinder-shaped blocks and a background. I tweaked my simple figures to have chenille stem (aka pipe cleaner) arms, so that the Pharisee has arms raised, as noted in the parable, and the publican has hands folded or near to his heart, also as noted by Jesus.

Song
I taught them Humble Yourselves in the Sight of the Lord and used simple hand motions. They were willing, quick learners and have enjoyed this new element to our class time.

Object Lesson
It's been months since I used a good object lesson, but a good one is always memorable. This uses only a balloon, or maybe two, if you want to really expand on it. The concept is to re-tell the parable (either exactly or using examples of thinking relevant to children in your class age group. Blow each balloon only part way up, like a normal "head". You can also draw a simple face if you have a Sharpie marker, but it's not necesssary.

As the pharisee or proud character develops add increasing breaths of air to the balloon so it is puffed up and huge, but keep the second ballon as-is (if you use it). Talk about what's inside the big ballon (alot of air, nothing) and what will eventually happen to it (burst, self-destruct). Ask about the second ballon (less likely to pop at all, even with a pin, since it is not "puffed up with pride"). Then make the application.

There is a fabulous example of this ready for you to use from Christianity Cove here.





Craft
I chose paper bag puppets, because they are utilitarian, the children can retell the parable to each other in class and possibly at home, and it is a visual reminder of the lesson, if the presentation is handled well (esp. in drawing out the questions at the end).

I found this example that I will modify. (The monk will have a full hat and be the tax collector and the "mother Theresa" will have a dark blue or black body and be the Pharisee.) Supplies are bags, construction paper, glue, scissors and bobble eyes.

Coloring/Activity Sheet
You have probably noticed that I make a point to include at least one sheet per week. Some people think of coloring/activity sheets as "busy work", in a negative sense. They are more than just time-fillers, though they do fulfill that role; however, I believe it is secondary to re-enforcing the message of the lesson, especially if the sheets are well-produced.

The coloring sheet I chose for this week is below. It so clearly depicts the postures of pride and humility.

There are many activity sheets for older children such as crosswords, word scrambles, word searches, etc. at Sermons4Kids.com.

Snack
For our snack, I had a few ideas. "Resurrection rolls" from the Easter lesson would serve as a nice object lesson, since they are empty though they are all puffed up, like the pride of the Pharisee. In the "Little House" books, Ma bakes vanity cakes; same idea.

I also found a nice, seemingly child-friendly recipe for humble pie at Cooks.com, but the weather is on the warm side and I chose not to heat up our house any extra. So, I settled for jello, a very tummy friendly option. The idea is to have jello cups, lids on. Then, while they start to eat, you ask:

What's on the inside of your snack?
How do you know it's there?
Why doesn't what is on the outside hide it?

Then talk about how sometimes we try to hide what is going on in our hearts by showing something different on the outside. When we do that with God and pretend that there is nothing wrong, it doesn't fool God because He sees our hearts and knows what is there.

You can use commercially prepared Jell-O, which I don't think is the best for anyone, especially young children, or prepare your own. There is a fabulous recipe (including flavor variations) at Out of the Box Food which works very well and takes less than 10 minutes to get into the refrigerator. I made some strawberry gelatin last summer using the same principle, but from this recipe.

Extra Materials
If I ever have a permanent classroom and get to teach through these again as a full curriculum, I want to have other materials also on the shelves that deal with each parable and further the point. This book, Fool Moon Rising, is definitely one that interests me on this topic.

Friday, May 10, 2013

Parable of the Persistent Widow

This week had even fewer selections than last week for my class, but I am very happy with how it's going nonetheless.

The parable of the persistent widow, from Luke 18, is something that may seem to exceed a young child's capacity to understand, but Jesus taught in parables and never disallowed children to be in His presence, so even though they may not grasp it, I think it's important to introduce it, and I think I will revisit the parables curriculum I'm developing now when the children I am teaching are several years older. The key to learning is repetition, and I don't believe these presentations get "old" for children any more than they do for us. Jesus told timeless stories, and they really are the best (which is understandable, since He is communication itself, as the Word of God).

That being said, here's what I've got for this week:

We will be having a simple presentation on a gray felt underlay with two figures.

I didn't find any good coloring sheets. One showed up on a search that is the same style as some others I have, but to me it didn't depict the parable or its message. However, there were several other sketches that were in the image search and I ended up combining them into this coloring page (see below). I don't know who the artist is, but I like the work (if anyone knows, I will happily give credit where it is due).



For a snack, I saw only one idea, but I really like it. It is a "gavel" snack made from a pretzel stick inserted into the side of a small rectangular candy bar, but I will use a lower sugar, more natural food bar of some kind. It doesn't fit the message of the parable, but it is staying within the theme, and a gavel can serve as a reminder that judgment was given (and request granted) in the end.



Crafts on the theme of prayer are obviously in order. Use what you like. I'm just scrapbooking my ideas here. I liked the prayer pail best. It is something to "do", i.e. pray - which is the point of the lesson - so I think it will be motivational for the children to use after they create, much like the Compassion Rolls from a previous parable. It is a simple craft, and I have all the supplies, so that is also a plus. I will use small metal pails from the dollar store (they were with the wedding favors) and small craft sticks. The children will tell me names or needs and I will send a few blank ones for their parents to add to (or correct my misspellings of names) at home. Then I'll let them decorate the pails with ribbons and stickers, most likely.


This picture is what inspired me (I later found it posted here), but there are many queries for it search engines. A prayer pail like the one here could also be used in the classroom on a regular basis.

Monday, May 6, 2013

Parable of the Insistent Friend

So I had the hardest time getting components and inspiration for this parable. Pickings are rather slim for the less than famous stories of Jesus, and even artwork is lacking compared to, say, last week's. I managed to find a few things, but I had to make up some of my own parts, which, I guess is not terrible.

Story
I used the dark blue felt underlay from last week's parable, since this also takes place at night. I had several wooden figures: a man, woman and three or four children who were all laying in the bed from our doll house. These were set up inside their "house" along the path that was spread over the underlay. Then I had another man figure who was the friend, standing just outside the door. The whole "house and door were just our parable box because I couldn't come up with anything else.

I told the parable using the basic text from Luke 11, then asked lots of questions at the end. You can get the script here:


Song
After the lesson presentation, we sang "Ask, Seek and Knock" by WonderKids, using simple hand motions. One hand was the door and we knocked with the other hand. I sang it with them and it was very quickly learned.

Craft
For our craft we made a moving coloring picture that I ended up creating myself from various components I found online. The friend's hand knocks by the action of a brad attached at his shoulder, and the door is openable as well. The template is available through the link below.

 



Coloring
Here is another coloring page that I cleaned up and made available, but they were more interested in the craft, so we did it and I sent the other one home with them.


Video
A nice little animation of this parable was on YouTube, but it was in Spanish, and it was made to go along with the song that was written just for the animation. So I spliced it with "Ask, Seek and Knock" and it was perfect.



Snack
Since preparing went slowly and I ended up spending a while on designing and assembling the craft, I didn't have a snack. However, I probably would serve biscuits or rolls, since the parable ties it in, and I would serve it in a small bread basket.


Monday, January 21, 2013

Lost and Found: The Parable of the Lost Sheep

This week I had an abundance of resources to sift through to prepare for the parable. My only trouble was to find what was best.

So...I looked, and I looked, and I looked, much like the shepherd searching for his little lost sheep. I ended up stumbling upon this batch of ideas, and I am so glad I did!

Story
The method of telling a parable with simple words and objects is ingenius. Preschoolers really benefit from 3-D visuals/manipulatives. This is sort of what I did for the parable of the net and the hidden treasure, so I guess I was onto something.

I already have most of the supplies. I found some plastic sheep at a local thrift store (which was a miracle), and put everything together. The story script is one I found from a British Anglican church (though I can't get for the life of me find how I got to it now, so the link is for a copy off the resource I had saved). I love this presentation.


But I need to back up. Before I told the parable from the box, I used this preparation object lesson:

Object Lesson
  • Have 99 pennies in a large jar. Ask the children to guess how many there are. Tell the children you have 100, and then let them help to count them, say that one is missing. Ask them if it really matters that one is missing when you have so many? Then ask them to find it for you.
It took a bit of prep work time to count them all out, but it worked great. Little children love looking for little things, especially coins. :)

Coloring
After the story, I used this activity sheet , and this coloring page (which was a hit). I like how the coloring page captures the other sheep left safely and the joy of the reunion.


Craft
We did a cute craft that I think the children enjoyed. They are clothespin sheep. (I found the idea here.) The body is cardboard and the legs are two wooden clothespins painted black (or not) and they are wound with yarn. This is an excellent preschool fine/gross motor skill craft, and it is so cute



I was happy to find a ball of curly white/gray yarn at our dollar store, so my lesson overall was very inexpensive. 

Snack
For the snack we had shepherd's staffs. I just took the end of the bread sticks and turned them over so they weren't straight. Yummy and well-received. The recipe is from here and it was super easy.



Video Extra
Then we watched this short video clip. I liked it so much, I just couldn't resist showing it. It does have a bit of peril, but of course the happy ending, and it is true to the parable without being too lengthy.

I hope you can enjoy something from this post in the plethora of "lost sheep" findings out there!




Monday, January 14, 2013

Parable of the Unforgiving Servant

This week's parable was a bit tricky for me to prepare. I didn't find a satisfactory idea for telling the story itself in a sensory, but I did try.

The first thing we did was a "sin" bean bag toss. I didn't tell the children what they were doing had a meaning at first; we just took turns tossing a bean bag at a mark, giving a certain number of attempts per child, moving farther and farther back each time. If they missed we just let them finish their tosses. At the end, I explained the connection between "missing" (the mark) and sin.

Next, I had a clear jar with a lid. I talked about our hearts and how when we do something that is unloving or wrong, how our heart changes. I got ideas from the children, and with each idea we added a dark bit of fabric to the jar. Eventually it was full. I talked about how we could get rid of the darkness and sin, and explained about God's offer of forgiveness and we exchanged a white cross for all the darkness.

Then we told the story. I used some summary pages to keep myself to the point and not get into explaining, only telling. At this point, the preparatory activities were worth it, because it made more sense to the children. We moved into craft time.




I gave them a coloring sheet (not this one, but this one is good), and then this activity page pictured just above. (Note as of 2015: I cannot find either the coloring or activity page I used in any online search. They are copyrighted to Sadlier's Coming to Faith, which is a curriculum for purchase, but you may wish to make something similar for yourself.)

There was no tie-in for snack. :(

I was truly unimpressed with what is available online for this very important parable of Jesus. I will need to research further for better resources the next time I plan to go through the parables.


Monday, January 7, 2013

Parable of the Net

Okay, this week I had a flash of inspiration. I really liked last week, and how things seemed to really click with the figures and simple retelling, so I thought I'd try to repeat the same method with this week's parable: the parable of the net (or dragnet, as it is specifically mentioned in some Bible translation/versions).

I used our same dollhouse doll man from last week. He was the central figure. Then I had some batik-style fabric in a sea green motif that I spread out for the water. I also had a tan felt strip and a packet of beads I had purchased at a discount store a while back that have fish and shells and seahorses, so I poured them over the fabric underlay. Lastly, we had a small mesh net bag that came from the dollar store which held some purchased item that the girls were using in their play kitchen as a produce bag, and I borrowed it for the net.

Now, I have to say that since this parable is super short, I just ended up repeating the parable to them slowly as I took the net and dragged it through the scene to collect as many beads as I could easily. Then set the man on the "shore" and separated out the fish-shaped pieces and tossed the rest back. I did this quite methodically, carefully noting the "good" fish and laying them in their own pile.

It went across really well, and after the lesson was over they each worked with it on their own.

Because the parable is pretty short, I had lots of coloring and a craft. We had this great coloring sheet from The ClipArt Wizard that depicted the parable with this page (below) on the back (sorry it's huge, but I can't find the original file in a search). I also printed this simple activity from the flip side of the children's bulletin that I posted in the parable of the treasure in the field here.

For our craft, I chose to do a "tissue fish" because it is simple and I had all the supplies on hand. It requires a paper for each child with a fish outline, tissue paper cut in small squares, glue and an unsharpened pencil or dowel rod or equivalent. I liked this also because it uses fine motor skills as the children fold the tissue and hold the pencil/dowel to press it onto the paper. However, I will say that in retrospect, even though it was very bright and colorful, I would do it next time with paper plates or heavier paper, since once the tissue paper is glued on the paper becomes quite heavy, so when the child takes it home it cannot be displayed.

There is another craft, a CD fish with glued on jewels, fins and  mouth ,which was also a great idea, but I would probably choose to use that with older children or if I had supplies for it.

As for a snack, I loved the idea presented by this blogger's picture of little nets with fish. They are pretzel squares with a dollop of frosting (I would use peanut butter, unless we had a nut allergy present) and a fish-shaped cracker. I'm not a purist, so technically goldfish crackers would be okay with me, but I have a child who can't eat wheat, so until I can acquire this cookbook and make my own with a flour that does not offend, I won't be able to make these for our situation, and I wouldn't use colored fish unless I colored them with non-petroleum-based food dyes, just for the record.