For the week of: Monday, June 18th 2007

"Fun with the Word"

How is the summer going for you and your sweet clan?  No doubt you’re as busy as you normally are during the school year, just in a different way – swimming lessons, soccer camp, church camp, vacation, VBS, family reunions, whew!  This momma business is a never-ending job.

May I make a couple of suggestions for keeping the fun in Bible study at your house for the young ones?  As you know, the more children can be engaged in the learning experience, the greater the probability that they will remember what they have been taught.  And if they have fun, woo-hoo, we have a winner!

As much as we want them to remember how to tell time or tie their shoes, divide and multiply numbers, and distinguish an adverb from an adjective, we desire most of all for them to know God’s Word and the wonderful Truths within.  We want them to be filled with wisdom from Holy Writing that will shape their decisions for life and all eternity.  Please let their impressionable minds and tender hearts know, without a shadow of any doubt that God’s Word is held up as THE standard for living life in your home.

Tear Away Bible Stories

Supplies:            

• Roll of Butcher Paper or free end-of-the-roll newsprint from your local newspaper
• Coloring book with several sequencial pictures of a particular Bible story (i.e. the creation with one page for each day of creation)
• Scotch Tape
• Paper Plate, pencil, scissors
• A wall in your home that tape will not damage

What to do:

• Let the kiddos color the pictures (this can be done in one sitting dependent upon how many pages and how many kiddos you have, or a different page can be colored each day if you have one child)

• As the pictures are being colored, tell the Bible story to your fertile hearts.  If it takes multiple days to get the pix colored, tell the story one day in your own words, read it from a children’s Bible another day and perhaps from an easy-to-read adult version another.  You may be able to find an audio recording of it or a children’s video to show. 
• On the last day, before the children are called to the room, tape the pictures they’ve colored to the wall in random order.
• Tape the long sheet of butcher paper over the pictures
• By feeling the edges of the pictures, take a paper plate and trace around it over each picture with the pencil until you have all of the colored pictures circled. 
• Make a small slit with the scissors, just an inch or so long, in the middle of each circle.
• Let your child come to the wall and choose a circle to begin tearing away.  (They will not be able to tear it in a perfect circle but you can show them how to place their hand on the perimeter of the drawn circle and tear the paper away carefully.) 
• When a picture is exposed, they can tell the part of the story that the picture depicts.
• The next child gets a turn, or if you have one child, they can continue.
• After all of the circles are torn away, let the child/children determine the sequential order of the story, telling it as they go.
• If you are teaching number identification, you can have cut out numerals and let the child tape the appropriate number to the correct scene as they tell the whole story from start to finish.

Hide and Seek Bible Story

Supplies:

• Flannel Board
• Flannel graph pictures of your chosen story

What to do:

• When the kiddos are otherwise occupied, hide the flannel graph pictures all over the house (or yard, or classroom).  Suggestion – make your own list of how many pieces there are and where they’re hidden!
• Give them a small brown bag that they’ve decorated and personalized with whatever crafts supplies you have.
• Set an egg timer and tell them how many pictures have been hidden and how long they have to find them.
• Set ‘em lose and play praise music while the hunt is on!
• When the timer goes off, call them back to the flannel board and make sure all pieces have been found.  If not, you may have to give some hints for the undiscovered ones. (For older children, it’s fun to hide the pictures in hard-to-find spots and give them written clues for finding them.)
• When all pictures are present and accounted for, let the kiddos spread the ones they’ve found out in front of them on the floor and familiarize themselves with what their individual pictures look like.
• Then you start telling the story and as each child hears a detail that they have the picture for, they put it on the board.

May you have a blast finding new and exciting ways to share the Word with young hearts…and share with the rest of us!

Blessings abounding, dear ones

Kay

Comment Here