Monthly Archives: March 2012

Where to Go Next With Our Bible lessons?

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We still have a couple months’ worth of Bible lessons to get through for the ABC Jesus Loves Me 3-Year Old Curriculum, but I know the end is going to sneak up up on me more quickly than I would like.  So for the past few weeks I’ve been searching and praying for the right path for our family to take when it comes to Bible teaching once that time is here.  A few thoughts:

We don’t use the majority of the material in the lessons from ABC Jesus Loves Me.  It’s not that they’re not wonderful. On the contrary, I think they are amazing, and I’m so blessed by Heidi’s willingness to share all her hours and hours of hard with us for free!  I just choose to focus on Bible and let most of the other stuff happen in its own time.  The main thing I utilize the curriculum for is the suggested activities to enhance our time with each Bible story.  Those suggestions have led me to many wonderful resources which have made it easier to plan lessons around stories not in the ABCJLM-3YO scope and sequence.

That leads me to ask myself, if I can plan my own lessons, do I really need someone else’s curriculum?  Well, no.  I tend to tweak any curriculum I get to suit our needs (one reason I’m not willing to pay big bucks for something all laid out).  Still, it’s helpful to have something there to provide a basic framework and provide ideas.  So then I start thinking about the big picture.

I think eventually I’d like to help my kids develop habits of both reading the Bible daily (maybe going through it once a year) and devoting time to in-depth study of the Bible at a slower pace.  But that’s still a few years off, so I find myself torn between reading something new every day or taking our time and spending a whole week on a story as we’ve been doing.  I see positives to both approaches.  I want to try to include Elijah more so a slower, focused approach (like we’ve been doing) might be better.  I started doing Bible lessons when Ian turned 3, and Elijah will be 3 in the fall.

My next dilemma is what sort of framework I want: chronological or topical?  I tend to lean towards the former, both in my personal devotions and with my lessons for the kids.  But that means spending a long time on all those fabulous Old Testament stories, which leaves me missing Jesus for a big chunk of the year.  And I’ve found a number of programs I like that are more topical that I don’t want to just dismiss without due consideration.  Broaden your mind, Deanna!  Think outside your little box!

Here are some of the ideas I’m tossing around for where to go from here (all would just be spines; I plan to pretty much do my own thing no matter what I choose):

  • ABC Jesus Loves Me 4-Year Old Curriculum  Bible portion (topical, based on character traits)
  • Bible and Rhyme from Hubbard’s Cupboard (chronological; pretty even split between OT/NT)
  • “Little Ones” Calvary Curriculum (could do chronologically or according to their schedule, which alternates OT/NT)
  • My ABC Bible Verses (topical, based on Bible verses, using ABC as framework; would require more planning)
  • Long Story Short devotional book (OT only, but a companion NT book to be released.  Would be a LONG time on OT.  I’ve actually already purchased this because I’m excited to use it in the future–just not sure if now is the right time.)
  • Fruit of the Spirit (I’ve found a few good online resources for spending time on each “fruit” with preschoolers); could use this for Bible “study” and read through at a faster pace for devotions; could lead into character trait focus to finish out the year
  • OR… do I just write my own outline.  Once it’s done it could be just as useful as most of these since I don’t plan on following any of them to the letter.

So why am I processing all this “out loud” with you?  Well, for one, it just helps me clarify my thoughts to put them down in writing.  But my main reason for sharing my thought process is because I’d love feedback.  What have you used?  What have you considered?  What factors have I NOT considered but should?  My oldest child is only four, so I’ve still got a lot to figure out (and thankfully a lot of time in which to do so!)  Input! I need input!

Posted in Our Vision, Preschool

Feeding the 5000

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We missed a week due to sickness, but now we’re back in the swing of things, just finishing up Week 28 of the Bible lessons from the ABC Jesus Loves Me 3-Year Old Curriculum.  I chose to use the story as it is told in John 6:1-13 instead of the suggested passage in Matthew because John mentions the little boy who shared his food and I thought Ian would appreciate that detail.  Our memory verse was “Nothing is impossible with God” Luke 1:37.

To introduce the story, I told it to the boys using our flannel board set while I read out of Ian’s ESV Seek and Find Bible.  The story was in several of our story Bibles, but I just had a lot of trouble getting into it this week.  We listened to the ESV story several times on our playlist and enjoyed watching a video, “Bread from Heaven,” together.  It took some artistic license, creating a back story for the boy with the fish and loaves, but it definitely helped Ian understand the story better.  There’s also a a game on the Charlie Church Mouse Preschool CD-ROM that goes along with it.

I have to admit, I was feeling very uninspired this week.  There wasn’t much I could find to go with this lesson from my usual favorite resources.  Then I stumbled upon whenyourise.com. Basically it’s a blog by two moms doing a fantastic job at what I’m attempting to do here.  After perusing their site, I realized I haven’t been tapping into my own creativity very much (something I hope will change!)  I also borrowed one fun idea from them.  We set up all the bears and dolls we could find to be our “crowd.”

 Then I showed the boys our basket with 2 “fish” and 5 “loaves” (goldfish crackers and croutons), though I’d really hidden more of each under the napkin. (Yes, I miscounted my “loaves.”  We fixed it when we started reading from the Bible.)

The food just kept coming!  It was a fun way to have our snack, and Ian enjoyed acting it out so much we had to do it all over again.  Thankfully I had a big carton on goldfish, because it would have been hard to explain that we’d run out of food!

  

I printed out a basket and some fish and loaves (I set my printer to print 2 pages on 1 sheet so they’d be smaller) to put in it. I just let Ian color, cut, and paste them onto a page for our Bible notebook.  This was the first time I’ve had him try to cut things out himself.  It was definitely a learning experience!

  

Our iPod playlist this week was short and to the point, but we listened to it a lot.  This is one of my favorite teaching tools since we can use it in the car or during playtime at home.  Here’s what was on this week:

I’m looking forward to the next few weeks as we talk about Palm Sunday and the Resurrection.  (I try to keep “Easter” as a fun spring celebration with bunnies and egg hunts, etc., while keeping “Resurrection Day” about Christ’s triumph over death.  That way we can still enjoy the fun cultural stuff without diluting the sacred nature of the true holy-day.) Okay, so I got a little ahead of myself!  But at least my planning is done for a while–now I just need to plan THIS week!

Posted in ABCJesusLovesMe, Bible lessons, Preschool

Counting the Hours

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A post I read this morning, “Counting the Hours” from fiveintow.com really blessed me, and I thought I’d share it with you.  I’m so thankful to have really good sleeper this time around (Praise the Lord!) so I don’t feel quite as stressed as I might by three young children.  Still, I do sometimes get caught in the trap of “counting the hours”: of sleep, of laundry, of refilling sippy cups… you get the picture.  Then I remember a moment from years ago, when I (still single) was chatting with a friend (married with a baby and a toddler) as she folded her laundry.  Oh, those precious tiny little socks!  Those miniature jeans!  For her, they were probably just every day items representing the hours of work she put in as a mom, but to me they were symbols representing dreams I was longing to see fulfilled in my own life.  I think of that moment often as I find myself tackling mounds of laundry.  I try to be thankful for each filthy little sock from my boys, for those precious onesies stained with spit-up after being worn by three babies, even for the countless prefold diapers that are fraying and starting to fall apart after so many washings over the last four years.  How I love my life!  How thankful I am to be a mom, to be able to stay home with my children, and to spend my time caring for them and my husband! And so instead of counting the hours, I hope I’ll remember to devote my mental energy to counting my blessings.

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The Good Samaritan

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Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37 is such a beautiful (and rather convicting) picture of compassion.  It was also our Bible story for the ABC Jesus Loves Me 3-Year Old Curriculum Week 27.  Once again, I chose a different memory verse (mostly because we just did the suggested verse with a different story).  So we memorized, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”  I didn’t include a reference because this phrase is found several times throughout the Bible (in Leviticus, 3 gospels, and even a few of the epistles).  In other words, this is a really important concept for us to grasp!

To be honest, I felt like I was barely keeping my head above water this week.  Our calendar suddenly got crazy last week, and between multiple birthday celebrations, multiple doctors’ and dentists’ appointments, a marriage seminar this weekend, and a few other “extras” this week, I’m surprised we did anything at all!  (And I’m considering taking next week off, since I’m writing this Sunday night and haven’t even started getting things ready for the next lesson.)

Here’s what we did manage to do this week.  We read the story from Ian’s ESV Seek and Find Bible and acted it out with our flannel board set.  I printed out a hidden picture puzzle and maze for Ian’s “workbook.”  We watched two videos: The Good Samaritan from Nest Family Entertainment and Veggie Tales: Are You My Neighbor? (available streaming on Netflix).  And we listened to our playlist quite a bit as we drove around town:

Posted in ABCJesusLovesMe, Bible lessons, Preschool
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