10 Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”--Nehemiah 8:10
Fruit of the Week: Grapes (we taste each fruit of the week for snack. If there are varying types of a fruit then we will taste different kinds. Today we tasted red, green & black grapes.
Craft: Fingerprint grapes. I pre-drew a green stem and curly vines on to a half sheet of card stock paper. Each child received a paper and a small plate of purple washable paint. They dipped their pointer finger or thumb into the paint and pressed on to the paper until they had a grape cluster they were happy with. Baby wipes provided an easy clean up.
Activity 1: Cup Pyramids. Since we are beginning our unit and have 9 Fruits Of the Spirit to learn, I wanted to be sure we named all of them each week. This cup activity will be used the remainder of the weeks while kids are coming in and waiting for class to begin.
I used blue solo cups and wrote a fruit of the spirit on each one. Since I have so many kids, I did three complete sets. I divided them into teams, and we raced to build cup pyramids. The first person built and then once it was complete and not wobbling, they would re-stack the cups and hand off to the next person. The game continued until all group members had a turn. Now this group was quite competitive, so they later a few wanted to do individual cup races--and we indulged cheering them each on.
Helpful Hint: I found that my kids were very good at this exercise and it was difficult to "eye" who had come in first. And, I prefer not to have winning teams as they make for pouty kids later on... So, I used my phone to time each group and allowed the other groups to watch leaving the room (slightly) quieter for those concentrating. Now, it shifts the mindset of beating a team, to beating a time.
Activity 2: Spreading Joy. We talked about how "contagious" Joy is, and how just as contagious anger and bitterness are. It is up to us to spread the good in the world and we have to choose how we feel and what we want others to feel from us as Paul wrote in his letters. Just like Joy, we want to spread God/s love. Each child was given a full sheet of smiley stickers (stars would work too, any type of stickers is fine, but the more they get per sheet, the more fun it will be), they were then instructed to try and stick their friends with the stickers without them noticing. Of course they start off sneaky, and within minutes they are all laughing and covering each other and themselves more purposely. This activity was actually for teaching about how germs can spread, but I decide to adapt it to our lesson, and these kids really responded. The whole room was happy and in a pile of laughs.
Printable. I try to always have a printed activity on hand. There are always the kids who finish up the other activities you give them quickly, and those who just really enjoy puzzles, word searches, etc.
**I used the above printable and several other things inside the free downloadable packet you can find when you click here**
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