Preschool: David Protects his Sheep
September 6th
This was our first Sunday in our new classrooms and we had a blast! So much fun in fact, that I forgot to take pictures of all the things we did. But here’s a recap for all our moms and dads!
This month we are learning- Who will help me? God will help me! And God helped David too. He had a big job to do! David was a shepherd and had to protect his sheep from a lion and a bear. David was able to do such a hard job because God helped him.
During our class time, we made lion and bear puppets, played a matching game with animals, and had a fun snack!
Parents, Kids love playing pretend!Play out this week’s story. Set out a bunch of pillows in the living room.These will be your child’s sheep. Have one parent (I suggest dad) be a hungry lion. Dad’s make great growling sounds. Tell your child that it ishis/her jobto be David. He needs to collect all of his sheep and put them in their pen (the couch) before the hungry lion gets them. Dad, make sure you let your child win at the game! But have some fun too. Ending the game in a tickle fight or letting your little “David” wrestle you to the ground will make for a wonderful memory.
This week’s memory verse is: “I (point to self) can do all things (spread arms out above and slowly bring them to your side) through Christ (point up).” Philippians 4:13 (make a Bible with your hands)
For moms and dads who are new to our preschool area (yellow ducks, green frogs, blue birds and red foxes), our Sunday morning schedule looks like this:
- First 15 minutes: We spend this time in our classroom doing activities, crafts or games that help us to prepare for what we will learn during GreenHouse. It’s very play oriented, but with a purpose. This week some of the activities that the kids were involved in were: making a lionor bear puppet,playing a matching game with animals. Our group leaders can choose whichever activities they like best, so not every cchild or every class will have participated in the same activities.
- Next 20 minutes: All the kids in the preschool area group together at GreenHouse (in the chapel). We start with an intro video produced by our curriculum starring “Mr. Justin.” This 3-4 minutevideo introduces the application question and answer. This month it is, Who will help me? God will help me! Next comes the Bible story. The Bible story directly ties to the concept we are teaching and allows kids to learn about all different characters from the Bible. Next, we worship God through lively music and dance. Kids are encouraged to express their love of God by singing and doing actions to the music. It’s a lot of fun, and a little rowdy. After that, we learn our memory verse, which again ties to the concept we are teaching.
- Next 5 minutes: When we return to the room, we sit in a circle for our talk time. This time gives kids an opportunity to share with each other and directly apply the concept to our lives. This week the question that each child answered was, “Can you tell me something that is hard for you to do, that God can help you with.” Kids named things like: brushing my teeth, obeying my mom and dad, and sharing. After each child had an opportunity to share, we prayed for God to help us with those things.
- Next 5 minutes: After talk time, we have a snack. Many times our snack reinforces what we are learning. This week we used Ritz crackers, EZ spread cheese, and raisins to make lion faces. Yum!
- Last 10+ minutes: We finish up our time together with more activites, games or crafts that reinforce what we learned. For example, this week one of the games a group played involved looking for sheep (cottonballs) that were hidden around the room.
We always seek to make the learning very interactive and fun for the kids.
Each week, we will post one idea that parents can use at home to reinforce what their child has learned. We want your child to know God is not confined to our church building, so make sure that you talk about Him and to Him at home many times each week.
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