A Lesson On Being Prepared

This is a lesson for me.  Last Sunday AM, I was not prepared to teach my Bible class.  I could go on and on about the reasons (excuses) but the reasons aren’t really important.  What is important is to be reminded (and believe  me, I was reminded) how important it is to be prepared when teaching a Bible class.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I’m now teaching the baby class.  I teach the same subject for 1 month.  Since last was the first Sunday in August, it was time to change lessons.  I had all the materials I needed because they have been stored in boxes from times that this lesson was previously taught.  What I hadn’t done was re-familiarized myself with the material.  I hadn’t become comfortable enough with it to go in and teach with the enthusiasm and confidence I needed.

Tonight, I get another chance.  Am I prepared — yes!  At least much better prepared than I was Sunday.   So, bring on the sweet little kids and lets have a good class.

Teaching The Little Ones

I’ve been teaching the “baby” class again for the past month. I haven’t been in this class for several years. I have really missed teaching them. We are in a baby slump at our congregation so we just have a couple in this age range. I have 2 in class on a regular basis. We are blessed with frequent visitors in this class due to young families coming back home for a visit.

I started teaching a baby class before I ever had children. My oldest is now 25. At the time, we had 3 little boys all nearly the same age in our congregation. Their parents thought I was crazy when I said I wanted to start a class for their age. We had a great time but those poor little boys got a very novice teacher. I got to see one of them for the first time in probably 20 years this summer. It was good to hug his neck.

Not long after starting that first class, I had a baby of my own. While visiting family at Bellaire, I took him to their baby class. Kelia Ballou was the teacher. I was amazed at how she taught that class. She had 10-15 babies in that class. Each baby sat on the floor in a semi-circle with a mom or dad right behind him/her. Those babies were captivated by her teaching the entire time. I went home that day with a new enthusiasm for teaching.

Kelia was using To Toddlers With Love by Palma Smiley. I soon began using it as well. This curriculum, while not perfect, is wonderful for this age group. If you’re not familiar with it, check out their website: Early Childhood Curriculum.  This curriculum teaches one lesson for a month and has plenty of activities/songs to keep teacher and students learning the entire class time.  The lessons are independent of each other so you can use them in any order.

This last month we studied David.  I chose this lesson first mainly because I had such a nice full box of activities all ready to go.  Palma Smiley recommends that you (and anyone else you can get to help you) make the activities and store them in boxes so they are ready to use whenever they are needed.  I have my personal set of boxes that I have used over the years and at each of the congregations we’ve attended I’ve helped them get a set of boxes to keep at the building.

For years, I would scour the clearance aisles, buy the baby kids’ meals at McD’s and confiscate toys out of my kids stash to supply my boxes with.  It’s amazing the things you can find to fill these boxes.  I have really tried to stay away from toys that represented a movie character to the kids or a toy that looks too cartoony.  Even though Nemo is a real looking fish, in most kids’ minds, he is a movie character.  Some of the fast food restaurants put their best toys (at least for my boxes) in their baby kids’ meals.  You have to ask specifically for these but they are worth it.  I have had my whole family buy happy meals with the baby toys so I could get enough for my class.

There is an interesting thing I noticed years ago and it happened again just Sunday AM.  These lessons are expected to last 1 month — that’s both Sunday and Wednesday classes.  Here in Huntington, that means 7 or 8 classes a month (we have a 1st Wednesday night singing each month).   With the older kids (around 2 years old) you can always tell when it’s time to move on to the next lesson.  They will get bored.  Sunday, Luke got bored.  He started out the month a little unsure of what all these activities were I was showing him.  Then, after a couple of weeks, he was really getting into them and feeling quite confident.  Then, Sunday, he was showing a lack of interest.  Time to move on to the next box.  Seeing as that was July 31st, it was perfect timing.  Sunday, August 7th, we’ll start our Baby Jesus box.

Color/Activity Book

Worship In Spirit & Truth — Lesson Book

The lesson books were added to throughout the week. The words on the top right hand side are their memory verse (John 4:23) were done with a dashed font so the students could trace them. Each day they traced a little bit of the memory verse and on the last day got a picture to put on each part of the memory verse they memorized. If they memorized it all (and they all did with a little help) they would get a full picture.

5-7 Year Old Class

Aren’t they just the sweetest things. This is the first time in many years that I have not had one of my own kids in my VBS class. These are the only pictures I got of them all week. It’s hard to take pictures and teach at the same time.

Pictures of the Wall Decorations in our VBS

Two of these were left up from last year and were in good condition so we kept them this year. I don’t know if you can tell it or not from the pictures but the I’m Happy Today wall is supposed to look like pictures in very large picture frames.

Worship In Spirit & Truth — Preach/Teach/Study God’s Word

Today is our last day. It’s been a good week. We’ve had smaller numbers than we’ve had in the past but that just gives more one on one time with those that came. Most of the children in attendance do not worship with us regularly or anywhere at all for that matter. They are friends, grandkids, nieces/nephews of our members. I hope, that for those in my class, I’ve given them something to think about as they grow and mature and that when they think of worship and God and the Bible that they’ll think about what we talked about.

Lesson Plan:

Introduction to our Theme — Discuss who it is we are to worship. Sing: We Worship God Week In Preview: Each day I want to go over the 5 things we’ll be talking about each day. During this time I will briefly show them visuals to help them understand. For instance: Lord’s Supper — communion trays, Giving — contribution plate, Singing — songbook, Prayer — picture of praying hands, Teaching/Preaching — Bible.

Sing: We Worship God

Art/Activity room: Each year one of our ladies here takes on the job of coming up with relevant artwork. This has been a great addition to our VBS again this year. The activities planned so far have been relevant to the lessons, simple enough for my little kids to do and each project has been completed in one setting. I think she is going to tie it all together this morning with a small bulletin board for the kids to take home with them that has all their little projects tacked to it so they can remember the lessons of the week.

Memory Verse: This is the day we’ll see how many of the kids have memorized the entire verse. If so (and probably even if they can’t — I’m a softy), they’ll get stickers for each section that when put in their lesson book in the proper place will reveal a picture of a Bible.

Timothy Learns About God Flip Chart: Again, the kids have a miniature book and I have identical pictures in a flip chart. This book introduces Timothy and how he learned about God — his mother, grandmother, Paul and letters Paul wrote. The last few pages talk about how important it is for us to read our Bible. We can read the very letters Paul wrote to Timothy and so much more.

Child Action Figure: Okay, this is a little bit of a stretch. It’s a paper doll boy with brads attaching the arms and legs to the body. He is our activity because we’re going to talk about the things we can all do to teach others about God.

Sing: God Gave Me…

Bethany Learns About Teaching The Gospel: We’ll take our walk around the building to the classroom we’re using as story time so we can read the Bethany book on prayer.

Color/Activity Book: I don’t think we’ll have time for this today so they can take it home and finish it there.

Get Read To Go: After gluing last attendance chart piece to chart, glue the chart to the back of the lesson book. Help children put both the lesson book and the color/activity book in their bags. Pass out Happy Day Book about Jesus to put in their bags. Pass out certificates of attendance. Help them put the songbook we’ve been using in the auditorium in their bags when we’re through out there.
Sing and Pray