"For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them." -- Jesus
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SSTN # 59 - August 4, 2006
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IN THIS ISSUE OF THE SSTN e-NEWSLETTER:
1) Creative Teaching 2) T&T Ideas? 3) Large Class 4) Summer Outreach 5) Jewels for Jesus?
Fall Sessions...Ready, Set, Go!
6) Large Classes 7) Small - Multi-age Class? 8) Stories for Children? 9) Names of God? 10) Teacher Appreciation?
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1) Creative Teaching
In response to the request for ideas for working with large groups of kids:
Our 1-5th graders are combined into 1 class. We have over 120 kids in this age range but they are divided between 4 services. I generally have 30-50 kids in my class so this is the only thing I am used to. We have 3 adult or teen helpers during our busiest service. These people serve as shepherds. We break our classtime into 2 main sessions. A large group teaching time (This is also when we do worship songs. Worship can be awesome in a larger group esp. if you incorporate fun motions.). The second park is a small group time. During this time we do life application, story review, maybe a craft, and get to know the kids more personally. As far as doing games that engage everyone, you can do it in a small group or large group. There are so many great games you can play with a large group. I recommend buying a good group games book and adapting the ideas for your class. We do alot of relays, freeze dance (play music and then they freeze), ice breaker/get to know you games, fruit basket upset. Alot of games can be adapted to go along with your lesson. For example, this past weekend we were learning about Daniel and his resolve not to eat the food of the Babylonian king. We did a relay for this. 4 boys came to the front and put on a XL white t-shirt. They represented Daniel and his friends taken into exile. The relay part was this. Since they were prisoners everyone had to hop down to them with their hands behind their back. Then they picked up a card which had a food listed on it. If the food was a vegetable (something Daniel and his friends would eat) then they stuffed a balloon in their teammates XL shirt. If it wasn't (say a milkshake) then they took a squirt gun and squirted it in their teammates mouth. Your team continued the relay, and the first team with all 10 balloons in their captain's shirt, won. At the end the 4 boys ended up looking like big muscleman so it was a great visual representation of how Daniel and his friends got strong when they obeyed the Lord. That's just one idea. As far as incorporating creative teaching methods, everyone knows kids love to participate. Sometimes it can be as easy as having them shout our something every time you say something. For the story of Moses and the burning bush we had 2 posters. One said "I'm not good enough" and one said "I am" When I would point to a poster the kids would shout it out. So for instance. God tells Moses he's sending him to the Israelites to free them from slavery but Moses says "I'm not good enough" but God says "I am" Moses says "Who shall I say sent me" God said tell them "I am" sent you. on and on. Another way is to let participate as part of a drama. For the story of the parable of the weeds I divided the kids into 4 groups. One of the groups were the seeds that feel on the path, the rocky soil, the thorns, and the good soil. Each group had to figure out how to act it out. Some kids were birds that carried off the seed. Some were weeds that choked out the good plants. I walked around like the gardener planting the seeds and then each group acted out their part. Another teaching method that seems to keep their attention is to have someone besides you come in dressed as a character and tell the Bible story. Praise the Lord for the kids He's given you to plant seeds in! May God bless you efforts! Dawn
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2) T&T Ideas?
Hello All, My husband and I have been asked to be the T&T directors for the Awana club at our church. Does anyone have experience with this club? I would be interested in ideas for games and incentive ideas. Thanks in advance. Connie , Tenuhcmama@wmconnect.com
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3) Large Class
How blessed to have a growing class of young kids!!! I have found that the key to managing any age group is ORGANIZATION! It's OK to keep detailed lesson plans of your lesson up front where you will see them while teaching. Also, for this age group (and most any other) try changing the activity every 7-10 minutes.
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4) Summer Outreach
>Besides VBS, what other outreach activities does your church provide >during the summer?
My church has youth nights twice a month on every other Friday DURING SCHOOL MONTHS. However, we don't have ''regular'' sunday school in the summer. All the teachers get a break. We rotate Sundays to take the kids down. Therefore, we only have to do it about twice during the summer months. It is a nice break. THe drawback is we have to prepare for all of the kids and find helpers as well. To take place of youth nights, we have a couple get togethers at the beginning, middle, and end of summer. We rent out the local pool for the night so just the kids from church can come. We also our doing small group activities. Teachers plus other adults take about 5 kids around the same age and gender and have to do an activity with them at least once a month. For example all the girls around the junior high age in three different groups got together and we had a sleepover for our monthly activity. We stayed up late, did the limbo, twister, and hide-and-seek in the dark. We have games and watched movies. Afterwards, we had a small devotional time for the kids. Also, We have fundraisers every month to help with the cost of the activities we do. We stay VERY busy but it is a lot of fun.
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Fall Sessions...Ready, Set, Go!
Bible-4-Life Curriculum from SundaySchoolNetwork.com is a non-denominational publisher and is designed to systematically help your children learn about Bible-times and God's plan for their lives today, tomorrow and for all eternity!
You will find our products distributed to a wide variety of church congregations and denominations throughout the world.
Are you ready for Fall sessions? Get set and go to:
I am preparing a special Investiture service for the kids in our Adventurer Club (aged 4-9yrs), with the theme being "Jewels for Jesus." I wonder if anyone could help me with where I might be able to find, or how I might be able to make large "jewels" for some of the kids to carry down the aisle in a procession, perhaps on white satin cushions. These "jewels" will need to be large enough for the congregation to see, so about 5" x 7" perhaps? Thank you in anticipation!! Sharon Australia
--from SSTN: cover small boxes in brightly colored
iridescent paper. You can also glue fake jewels and sequins onto them.
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6) Large Classes
Hi, I teach 25-30 3 year old to 5 year olds and you are right it can be very difficult to teach this many in the younger age group. Here are some keys - you are right the children will do better when they are involved but this doesn't have to be all the time or everyone some of the things that i have found that work are
- give the children all props that they can use in the story - it might be cut outs of the characters and at the right time they can 'act out' what is happening.
- When you are presenting stories make sure you make it entertaining - if you are doing the story of Jesus calms the storm have the chidren imagine they are in the boat (mark out a boat on the floor if you can) have them make the noises of a storm, and move and rock like a boat in a storm.
- Another piece of advice is break everything up - do something active and then something that requires the children to sit, and then do something active again. By structuring this way children don't get over excited but they also will sit with less wriggles and concentrate better.
Hope this is a help
Rachel
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7) Small - Multi-age Class?
Hi, I am teaching a class that is rather small but has different ages in it. Does anyone have any ideal on what I could do to get the kids more involved, but yet have a fun time doing it. Thanks Kali in New Jersey
Could anyone recommend a book of short stories for children with moral themes? I'm looking for something to have on hand to read aloud to my class occasionally when the worship service runs a little long or while they are eating a snack. I'd rather not use a Bible story book for this purpose, since I'll be teaching a bible lesson and don't want to confuse the children with two bible stories a week. Thanks
--from SSTN: You didn't say the age group, but if you need them for younger kids, try these, they are excellent: "Big Thoughts for Little People", "Big Thoughts for Little Thinkers" and "Character Billders" (it's spelled correctly). Type the titles into the search box to locate them at: http://www.sundayschoolnetwork.com/bookstore.html
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9) Names of God?
Hello,
I'm a missionary working in the Philippines, and am currently teaching a Sunday school class at our church. I'm about to begin a new series on the Names of God, focusing mainly on the "I AMS" in both the Old and New Testaments, showing the continuity of the Old Testament Yahweh with Jesus' "I Am" claims in the book of John. [Ex. Yahweh Jireh (God is my protector), Yahweh Nissi (God is my banner), Yahweh Rohi (God is my Shepherd), etc.] The kids' ages range from 7-12; there about 20 in the class. Any ideas for lessons, crafts, games, object lessons, that go along with this theme, etc?
Thanks! I've enjoyed reading the great ideas from this site, but this is the first time I've asked for help. Barbara W.
Good Morning: Sunday School Appreciation Sunday is coming up the 2nd Sunday in October and I have run out of ideas for our program. Can someone please give me some suggestions for showing our Sunday School Teachers how much we love and appreciate for the hardwork they do.
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