8-11s: Lord’s Prayer Session

May 30, 2015May 30, 2015Leave a comment

Here are some ideas for helping children to connect with the Lord’s Prayer.

Lord’s prayer ordering game– How well do you know the prayer?

Prayer printed out and cut into strips, mixed up so they can be put in the correct order. We made this a race!

‘Hallowed be your name’: Play names of God dominoes, exploring the different names and characteristics of God. Click here to print out the dominoes.

‘Your will be done on Earth as it is in heaven’: Talk about road signs in this country- triangle signs are warnings and circle signs are orders. If God made some order signs to show how He wanted people to live, what would be on them? Let children draw them in the circles.

‘Forgive us our sins’: Forgiveness prayers such as ‘washing away sins’

‘As we forgive others’: Forgiveness fizz prayers

Reflect on the prayer with this reflective colouring sheet:

Pentecost: Fork Flame Paintings

May 30, 2015May 30, 2015Leave a comment

This is a really great idea for all ages. We ended up working on the kitchen floor and even the adults decided to join in. Some of the children got incredibly creative…

You will need: yellow, red and orange paint, foil (for easy clean-up afterwards!), plastic forks, card or paper (we used black for a great effect).

Use a fork to blob some paint onto the paper and then swirl and pull or brush with the fork!

Encourage colour mixing as the flames flicker together…

Advent Playdough Mat

May 30, 2015May 30, 2015Leave a comment

Advent is a time of waiting and preparation. To fit with this, here is a play dough mat based around the idea of ‘journeying’ (reflecting the journey that Mary and Joseph went on to Bethlehem). Print out the mat, laminate it for repeated use and get creative!

Click here to print out the mat.

Fuzzy Felt Story Telling

May 29, 2015May 29, 2015Leave a comment

Visual ways of telling stories are great for all ages. Fuzzy Felt is especially good as the children can play with the pieces after you have told the story and recreate the events for themselves. The great thing is that the felt figures will stick to the felt background so you will be able to hold your felt board upright as you tell the story, making it easy for everyone to see.

You will need: A board or piece of cardboard, felt sheets, scissors, glue

Cover a board with a large felt sheet (use glue or staples) to make a ‘background’ board.

Cut simple figures out of felt to help you to tell the story. Here are some examples to give you an idea…

Nativity

Baptism of Jesus

Joseph

Jesus calms the storm

You can also make mini fuzzy felt boxes by sticking some felt to the inside of a sandwich box lid and then keeping small fuzzy felt pieces inside the box. See here for more on this.

Abraham Assembly (Changes)

May 29, 2015May 29, 2015Leave a comment

This assembly is based on the story of Abraham being called by God to leave his homeland and journey to a distant land (Genesis 12) and fits with the SEALS theme of ‘changes’.

5 mins	Game-get 10 yellow ball pool balls, 5 red and 5 blue and share them out as follows into 3 baskets spaced out across the front of the hall: Left basket: 5 yellow balls, middle basket 5 red and 5 blue balls, right basket 5 yellow balls. Get two volunteers to stand by the left hand and right hand baskets. Shout ‘go’ and get the volunteers to run backwards and forwards between their basket and the middle basket, changing their balls one by one until the left basket has 5 red balls and the right basket has 5 blue balls and all the yellow balls are in the middle basket. The first to change all of the balls in their basket is the winner. This introduces the idea of ‘change.’
5 mins	Talk about God calling Abraham to leave everything behind to journey to an unknown place (mirroring what would happen after the summer when Y6 move to secondary school). Invite a child up to the front to become ‘Abraham’ and give them a rucksack and a map as if they are going on a journey. Then take the map away and gave them a blindfold to wear and lead them around following only the direction of your voice. This is hard because they really have to trust! Then talk about Abraham having to trust God when everything he knew was changing and how we have people we can trust to help us when things around us are changing. Share with the children who some of your trusted people are
5 mins	Object lesson- check out the original idea here on this blog of object lessons using natural laws. Stand about 10 feet away from ‘Abraham’ and aim an inflated but untied balloon at him. Let go and the balloon will go a little bit crazy in the air as it deflates. This is like us when we get stressed about things and don’t let others help us. Next, blow up another balloon (still without tying the end) and sellotape it to a piece of straw with a long string running through it (see picture). Get ‘Abraham’ to hold on to one end of the string and you hold the untied balloon/ straw at the other end. Let go and the balloon will fly straight to its destination at the end of the string (Abraham)! This shows us how, if we trust God or those around us to help when things are changing and we are worried then, like the string, they will help to keep us on track!
2 mins	Light a candle and ask the children to think of all those people in their lives who they can trust to help them when changes are happening- the people who will keep them going in a straight line. Say a brief thank you prayer for those people.

Easter Story Play Dough Mats

May 29, 2015May 29, 2015Leave a comment

Play dough mats are a great way to help children to connect with a story. Print off the sheets, laminate them so that they can be used multiple times and it is easy to clean off any stray play dough and let the children get creating!

Here are some play dough mats to use with the Easter story…