All Hands On Deck - Learning How To Serve Others

Sunday February 10th was our eighteenth session together. This week we covered Unit 2, Chapter 11 "We Act On God's Word". In preparing for the session, I established the focus as ways we show our love for God by helping others. The lesson plan for the session includes the topics discussion, the activities worksheet, and craft activity.

Packing Light: If you just want the activity sheet for this session, you can find it here. It has a coloring activity, word search, word tumble, and matching activity.

When we met in the common area for the whole group activity, we started by joining with the First Graders in saying the Our Father, which they had worked hard to learn. Way to go First Grade!

Then we learned that each class was going to have a Prayer Bag that the children could take turns taking home to share with their families. The bag has prayer books, crucifix, holy water, cross to decorate and other stuff. Wow!

The first thing we did when we gathered in our classroom was to discuss the Mass. There were big changes to notice!

Did you notice anything different at Mass today?

"Father is wearing purple again! And who is that guy that was up there with him?" (said Rocking Horse)

You are right, he is wearing purple because it is Lent. The other man up there was a deacon. He is a friend of Father's and is visiting us this week. Was there anything else different?

"We sang the Our Father again, and the Holy, Holy - even though it was different. But I guess I missed the Gloria." (said Rocking Horse)

Oh no, you didn't miss it, we didn't sing it!

"Did we say it?" (said Sweet Pea Elephant)

Nope. We didn't say it either. During Lent we don't sing or say the Gloria. And you know what else? We don't sing or say the word "alleluia" either!/div>

(much amazement)

It's like we put them in a box and lock it up.

"Yeah, like we hide the key until Easter!" (said Fair Cheetah)

And so we talked a bit more about the happenings at Mass during Lent.

OK. Remember how we've been learning that the Bible is the Word of God and we listen to it at Mass? What happens after we hear the Gospel at Mass?

"Father talks for a while" (said Fair Cheetah)

... and after that?

(no takers)

And what does Father say at the end of Mass?

(again, no takers)

After the sermon, we hear what is called the petitions. We pray for our leaders, we pray for the sick, we pray for the parish...

"Oh yeah! Lord hear our prayer!" (said Rocking Horse)

And at the end of Mass, Father says 'The Mass has ended, go in peace to love and serve the Lord.' What do you think that means?

"That we can go!" (pretty much said in unison... duh!)

Well, yes... But he is saying that we need to SERVE the LORD! That means we can't just go away, we have to go and help others so we can show our love for God!

(much dramatics)

So then we read Isaiah 58:3-9 and Matthew 25:31-46. In both cases, whenever we read the part about "clothe the naked" there was a great uproar: "That's disgusting!" I had to calm them by adjusting it to explain that it could just mean the poor who don't have any money to buy any clothes.

Once we got past the clothing crisis, then there was great concern over "whatever you did for these least brothers of mine...". "Jesus didn't have any brothers!" Rocking Horse was quite emphatic on this matter! It took some convincing, but I think I was able to make the point that Jesus meant whenever we help others, we help Him. Tried to make the whole "Jesus is in all of us" point, which at least eased Sweet Pea Elephant's concerns.

(Maybe it would have been simpler if I just read the 'kiddie' version of the Bible verses, but then I would have missed all their wonderful questions and comments. And don't we all learn more by asking questions and solving problems than by sleeping through something that's easy for us?)

I went on to explain that we call these actions that Jesus taught us the "Seven Works of Mercy". I handed out the workbook pages, and Rocking Horse volunteered to read the section that talks about those works.

After she read the one about sheltering the homeless, Rocking Horse observed, "Well, it's not fair for people to be homeless. If someone lives in a gigantic house, it just isn't fair for someone else not to have any house at all." (she'll be ready for bear when we have the social justice discussion!).

We talked about how doing the works of mercy was being helpful to others. We talked about ways we could do some of those works: how we had brought food in at Thanksgiving time to give to the poor, how our moms save our clothes that are too small to give to others, how we visit our grandmas and friends when they don't feel good, how the priests go and visit people who are sick every day!

Then I described our craft for the day - that we were going to make a wreath out of the 7 Works of Mercy but tracing our hands and cutting them out and gluing them on. Construction paper! Tracing! Cutting! Gluing! Oh the joy! We got out our construction paper and scissors and got going!

Alas, I had forgotten my camera and even my cell phone and could not get pictures of all the wonderful designs the children created. But I did catch up with Rocking Horse on Monday and was able to snap a picture of her design. She had gone for the minimalist approach this time, choosing to use only white and green.




Time was so short it seemed... our session was over even as the children scrambled to finish the wreaths.

I handed out the worksheets, as well as the pages from the chapter in Blest Are We, and also the Family Time pages.

Side Trips: if you want more information, activities, and games...

• If you just have a bit of time, definitely go for the online activity for this chapter at Blest Are We
• If you have two-bits of time, check out the activities at MSSS Bible Lessons
• For more in-depth activities, check out some of the links in the lesson plan

Community Bonfire - Learning About Lent

Sunday February 3rd was our seventeenth session together. Having spoken to the DRE earlier in the week about the plans for the day, I realized that I wouldn't be able to start a new lesson from our workbook. Instead, I prepared materials to support the lesson on Lent that the DRE was going to cover with the entire group. As such, I did not prepare a lesson plan for this week.

Packing Light: I didn't prepare a worksheet of activities for this week, although I did put together a package of Lenten activities, they are listed below

When we met in the common area for the whole group activity, we were all so happy to see Pragmatic Tiger and Fair Cheetah back with us! Rocking Horse and Courtly Polar Bear were not with us though, so we were not a complete team.

We gathered outside to prepare some ashes just like the ones used on Ash Wednesday. We put some palms from last year in the bin and one of the teachers lit them. As they burned we talked about Ash Wednesday and how it is the start of Lent, and why the priest will put the ashes on our forehead. Once they were finished, since it was also the feast of Saint Blaise, we listened to a little history about the saint and how he healed the child who was choking on a fish bone. We all went over to the church and had our throughts blessed by Fr. C.

By the time we returned, the ashes had cooled down. A small amount was placed in a cup for each class. As we adjourned to our separate classrooms, I distributed a Lent Activity Pack to each of the children. These little kits contained

• a bag of pretzels, along with an activity to do with the pretzels as a symbol of prayer and penance from CatholicCulture.com, which you can find here


• a calendar spanning the season of Lent, with a sticker for each day, which you can find here.

We found we would be having the third and fourth graders joining us for the remainder of the day. The first thing we did was to talk a bit more about the ashes. I dipped a finger in the ashes and drew a "+" on the back of each child's hand. We talked about why we used ashes, and we noticed how each "+" looked different - just like each of us is different! I asked the children to be sure to listen to what Father says as he puts the "+" on their forehead and tell me next week what he said.

Since there was not much time left, we spent our remaining time playing a quiz game about Lent. The questions we used were from a game called "Journey Through Lent" posted at the OTHER_Creative_Kingdom Yahoo! group. I knew there were too many children (and not enough time) to play the full board-version of the game, so we simply split into two groups, engaged a score-keeper, and started reading questions. The children seemed to have a good time taking turns reading the questions, and several of the questions - especially those about fasting and abstinence - were source for quite a bit of discussion among the group.

Next week we will will the next lesson, Unit 3, Chapter 11, "We Act on God's Word".

Side Trips: if you want more information, activities, and games... check out some of the Lenten activities at catholicmom.com

On The Water - Casting Our Nets Into The New Testament

Sunday January 27th was our sixteenth session together. This week was part 2 of our two-part lesson that spans Unit 3, Chapter 9 and Unit 3, Chapter 10. In preparing for the session, I established the focus for this second lesson continuing the discussion of the Bible as a collection of books that are the Word of God, and then walking through the New Testament. The lesson plan for the session includes the topics discussion, the activities worksheet, and craft activity.

Packing Light: If you just want the activity sheet for this session, you can find it here. It has a crossword, word search, and coloring activity.

When we met in the common area for the whole group activity, we learned that Pragmatic Tiger and Fair Cheetah would not be with us again today, we again said a special prayer for their intentions.

Like last week, we gathered together in a circle on the floor and started off by discussing our regular Mass observations. Earnest Eagle was the first in the circle, rarin' to go! We were again surprised that we sang the "old" version of the Gloria, but we decided that was ok because at least we were singing. Since today was the "family" Mass, we noticed that the readings were done by children.

Remember what we talked about last week? Do you know what we are going to talk about this week?

"Last week was Old Testament so I'm guessing this week will be New Testament" (said Rocking Horse)

You got it! And just like the Old Testament, the New Testament is really a lot of books all together in one.

"Of course, we figured that out!" (said Effusive Jaguar)

But before we get into it too much, let's take a quick look how the readings at Mass match up. Remember last week we noticed that there were 4 readings, and 2 were from the Old Testament and 2 were from the New Testament? Did that happen the same way this week?

(looking at the readings in a Missalette I brought, they agreed it did happen that way again.)

During the Liturgy of the Word, we hear all these readings so we can learn and understand the Scriptures. The Old Testament looks forward to Jesus, the Gospels tell us about Jesus, and the Acts and Letters help us understand and learn about Jesus and how to live.

As this week's readings were a little tough to show how the readings are usually all related, we backed up a couple of Sundays and looked at the Baptism of Jesus. Those readings are very easy to demonstrate the relationship!

• First, Isaiah tells us "Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one with whom I am pleased" (Is 42:1).

• Then we have Psalm 29 with "The voice of the Lord is over the waters" (Ps 29:3).

• Then we have Peter describing John the Baptist's preaching and anointing of Jesus (Acts 10:34-38).

• And finally, John baptizing Jesus, with the voice from the heavens proclaiming again, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased." (Mt 3:17)

OK, they were done with that lecturing type stuff. So then I handed out the workbooks, and like last week we went through the pages, talking about the section of the Bible, and trying to figure out if we knew the Bible stories represented by the pictures in that section. The children knew so many of the stories - often in such detail - we often caught ourselves with three different children telling stories (the same or different!) at once! Courtly Polar Bear didn't want to fill in the blanks in her workbook, because she didn't know the stories and wanted to listen to the other children tell them. Once the other children realized this, they immediately made sure to point out to her which picture they were describing, and to give more details in the story. It was absolutely amazing to see them really want to share the stories with her. Even Earnest Eagle, who usually likes to stay quiet during our time together, jumped in to tell a story on two separate occasions (and not because I asked him to do it!).

We were so involved in the stories we didn't even get to cover the New Testament Letters and Catholic Letters books... but the children noticed that these sections were made as coloring activities and they said they were sure they would want to color them at home. I told them they could look at their Bibles and ask their parents if they had any questions!

Next week the whole group will be together for burning the palms to prepare the ashes for Ash Wednesday. It will be tough, but I will try to get us started on the next lesson, Unit 3, Chapter 11, "We Act on God's Word".

Side Trips: if you want more information, activities, and games...

• If you just have a bit of time, definitely go for this conversion of Saul online jigsaw puzzle activity


• If you have two-bits of time, check out other New Testament online activities at Calvary Chapel.


• For more in-depth activities, check out some of the links in the lesson plan there are many activities for Bible stories.

Travel To Ancient Lands - Learning About The Old Testament

Sunday January 20 was our fifteenth session together. This week was part 1 of a two-part lesson that spans Unit 3, Chapter 9 and Unit 3, Chapter 10. The two chapters together teach us about the Bible and its role in the Liturgy of the Word during Mass. In preparing for the session, I established the focus for this first lesson as the Bible as a collection of books that are the Word of God, and then walking through the Old Testament. The lesson plan for the session includes the topics discussion, the activities worksheet, and craft activity.

Packing Light: If you just want the activity sheet for this session, you can find it here. It has a secret code activity, crossword, word shapes, and word search activity.

When we met in the common area for the whole group activity, we learned that Pragmatic Tiger and Fair Cheetah would not be with us today as they had a family emergency. When we got to our room we said a special prayer for their intentions, and Sweet Pea Elephant lead us with the Prayer to My Guardian Angel.

After the prayers, we sat on the floor together and started off by our regular review of Mass activities. We talked a bit about why Father is now wearing Green, how we sang the "old" version of the Gloria, and just said the Holy, Holy, Holy instead of singing it.

I asked whether anyone knew what part was called "Liturgy of the Word"... no takers. I explained that this is when we hear the readings from the Bible. Effusive Jaguar happily reminded us that this is when her grandma went up and read. Exactly! Her grandma read the first reading, then the choir mistress went up for the Psalm, and then another parishioner for the 2nd reading, and then Father for the Gospel. So, 4 readings in all. I showed them how the first 2 were from the Old Testament and the second 2 were from the New Testament.

Tell me some things you know about the Bible?

"It is a big book" (said Courtly Polar Bear)... "it has 2 parts, Old Testament and New Testament. Jesus is in the new part." (said Rocking Horse).

Oh, I think you know more than that! (and I dumped out a whole tote bag full of bible story books onto the floor). Did you know it is really a whole bunch of books put together?

(lots of wows!)

Can you imagine having to carry around all those books when you get your Bible?!

(a general sense of 'oh my gosh!')

It's definitely much easier to have them all together as one. (and then I pulled out 5 or 6 Catholic Bibles, all different looking - some with leather covers, some with gilded pages, some with pictures, some large, some small) Look at all these Bibles... they all look different but they all contain the same "Bible", the same books, the same stories.

(a general sense of appreciation as they touched the Bibles and looked at them)

(getting back to the stack of story books...)Did you know that there are lots of authors who wrote those books, but they are all the Word of God? That's right, God inspired them to write.

And you know what else? I bet you know a lot of stories from those books! Today we're going to focus on the Old Testament. The Old Testament has 46 books in it! They are separated into 4 main parts, which we will look at together soon, but first, I know you want to have a look and see some of the stories and books!

And we dug through the pile, with the children happily (and proudly) shouting out when they found stories they knew: Samson and Deliliah, David and Goliath, Adam & Eve, Jonah, Noah's Ark, Queen Esther, and so on. We took turns telling the parts of stories we could remember, and sometimes peeked into the books to remember the rest.

At this point I handed out the activity books, so that we could discuss the pictures and the stories they represented together as we looked through the books. We had fun trying to match the story names with the pictures with the correct section of the Old Testament.

Next week we will be continuing this two-part lesson, so I did not hand out the workbook pages yet. I did send home the Good News pages for the upcoming weeks. You can enjoy following the mass with them through the rest of January.

Side Trips: if you want more information, activities, and games...

• If you just have a bit of time, definitely go for one of the online jigsaw puzzles at Word of Truth
• If you have two-bits of time, check out the Bible Story activities on Calvary Chapel
• For more in-depth activities, check out some of the links in the lesson plan

Waiting At The Station

Sunday January 13th was our fourteenth session together.

When we met in the common area for the whole group activity, we learned that only Effusive Jaguar and Sweet Pea Elephant were going to be attending today. So I decided not to proceed with our planned lesson until we had more of the children in attendance.

Instead, the three of us colored pictures and had a lively discussion. We of course talked about all the things we usually talk about Mass (what color was Father wearing, did we sing the Gloria, etc). Turns out, we all have the same favorite version of the Gloria, and it was the one we sang this morning during Mass. So we sat and hummed and the girls decided to color pictures of their pets. We talked about how much they love them (even when they are a 'handful' or snap at them). We talked about how it's the same as how much our parents love us and that Jesus loves us too, even when WE are a 'handful'!

Hopefully next week we will be able to begin our travels through Unit 3, "We Celebrate The Word of God."

Stories Around The Campfire - A Midyear Review

Happy New Year everyone! Hope there are still a few of you out there and that you feel fresh and renewed after a lovely break!

Sunday January 6th was our thirteenth session together. Can you believe we are half-way through already?! This week we used the session as a midyear review of what we have learned. In preparing for the session, I created an activity and coloring book where I re-used as many phrases and pictures as I could from our previous sessions, and created activities similar, but not identical to, activities we have completed in those sessions. I did this only partially to be lazy ~ really! The real goal was to provide reinforcers for the lessons we have already covered. In this way, each lesson's theme (pictures, phrases) will have been presented to the children 3 times (the original lesson, the unit review, and the midyear review).

Packing Light: You can find the activity book here. It has coloring, word searches, mazes, stickers, and other pencil puzzles. (It is a large file and may take a minute or two to open.)

When we met in the common area for the whole group activity, we learned that Pragmatic Tiger and Fair Cheetah would not be joining us this time. But we had some good news: Courtly Polar Bear, Effusive Jaguar, and Rocking Horse all received "perfect attendance" awards for December! Way to go!

Once we were in our room, we talked about whether we had fun over Christmas and what our favorite gifts were. We also discovered that some of us were able to stay up late on New Year's Eve and even made it to the new year! Wow!

The children settled in surprisingly quickly given the long break, and it wasn't long before they were clamoring for some coloring to do... what a coincidence since what I had with me was... coloring! But first, we talked about how we were half-way done with our learning already! And so, today we were going to review everything we have talked about so far.

I distributed the review books and sticker packs, and together we looked over each page and remembered what we talked about. We tried to find the right sticker to go with each page, and took turns reading from the stickers. The children did a great job with it, and really seemed to recall the key messages (or at least the activities we did) for each lesson:

From Unit 1, We Gather As Believers, we have

Our Church Welcomes Us - we remembered that we are a community and we come together to celebrate. Rocking Horse said she remembered making the church doors and the Welcome inside.

We Belong to The Church - we remembered that we have Baptism to show we are members. We talked about the 4 symbols used during Baptism: water, oil, white clothes, and candles. Sweet Pea Elephant remembered them all!

Our Church Shows Us How To Live - we remembered that we have holy people like priests and deacons to give us examples, and Saints as role models. The children definitely remembered tracing their footsteps!

We Praise And Thank God - we remembered how we can pray by saying our prayers or by singing. Earnest Eagle remembered the story about King David and how he was so strong and won lots of battles and sang lots of prayers.

From Unit 2, We Ask God's Forgiveness, we have

We Can Choose What Is Good - we remembered that we make choices, and that God wants us to make good choices. Effusive Jaguar remembered that this is when we talked about Max and we were all Wild Things!!

We Celebrate God's Forgiveness - we remembered the ways we can ask for and seek forgiveness. Everyone remembered the 4given card game!

We Think About Our Choices - we remembered the rules are called "commandments". We reviewed them together. Courtly Polar Bear remembered "that game" we played with them (fortune teller/cootie catcher).

We Say We Are Sorry - we remembered that Reconciliation is a way to say we are sorry. Rocking Horse remembered being in the puppet show!

Then, we had a review of the Sacrament of Reconciliation. The children remembered the little room and we read through the prayers and activities that happen when we participate in the sacrament.


After we finished reviewing the lessons, the children each chose which lesson they liked the best (or all of them), and wrote about it in their journals.

Then at last, we had one more segment to review: I reminded them that there were other things we have been learning too, about Mass:

We learned to notice what color the priest is wearing, and know that something special happens when he wears a different color. (And there was great discussion over why the priest was wearing white with red today and not just all red or all white!)

We learned to participate in the Penitential Rite, and notice that sometimes it is short like an answer and sometimes it is like a long prayer. (And there was indecision about how we did it today, but I reminded them that today we said the 'long' version)

We learned to participate in saying the Gloria, and notice that sometimes it we say it and sometimes we sing it. (And we just said it today, and Effusive Jaguar noted that we always just say it when Fr. C says the Mass. She likes the version we sing at Christmas and she and the others started to sing it! Wonderful!).

We learned to participate with the Holy, Holy, Holy, and notice that sometimes we say it and sometimes we sing it (today we not only sang it, but we are still using 'that new way' that we started using).

We learned to participate in the Our Father, and notice that sometimes we say it and sometimes we sing it (again today, we apparently just said it because that's the way Fr. C likes it ~ I reminded them that it is not just what the priest likes but also whether the community likes it and what is happening in the Mass and so forth).

The children finished up the session coloring (finally!) and working the puzzles. It was wonderful to see the children today and they were all in such good spirits. Next week we will be starting Unit 3, which focuses on the Bible as the word of God, the Liturgy of the Word section of Mass, works of service, and Prayer of the Faithful section of Mass.

Side Trips: if you want more information, activities, and games...

• follow any of the links above to find the activities and worksheets for the original lessons!

Sightseeing - A Reconciliation Lesson

Sunday December 9th was our thirteenth session together. This week we had a lesson dedicated to learning more about the Sacrament of Reconciliation. In preparing for the session, I decided we would go over to the church and see the confessionals, talk about them, and talk about what goes on during the sacrament. I put together a pamphlet that walks through the steps of the sacrament, which you can find here. I did not develop a formal lesson plan for the session.

When we met in the common area for the whole group activity, we learned Earnest Eagle would not be joining us. We missed him, but hope he had a terrific time on his special camping trip!

The children were very excited to be taking a field trip to the church! We went to see the confessional (aka the Reconciliation room). They were completely fascinated with the room! We looked at the side that had two chairs. We learned how the priest sits in one of the chairs, and then when we come in we sit on the other chair and we see and talk to the priest while we have our Confession.

Then we saw another door and looked in there. No chairs, only a place to kneel. What was that for? I explained that if we want to use this side, we do not see the priest. We have our confession by having the same conversation, we just are not face to face. The children were amazed! Why would anyone want to do it that way! I explained that was the way everyone used to do it, and today we have a choice of how we want to participate.

We all went back to the other side and climbed in (yes, we are happy we are a small class!!). First, we talked about Father's homily today. He had talked about how when he first joined the Holy Ghost Fathers, he learned that part of their credo was that they had to be true to go to Confession every week. He told how he was challenged by that and thought it was "just a rule in the book". After all, he was studying to be a priest, he was harmless... why would he need to go to Confession every week? He went on to discuss how he came to have a change of heart and challenged us to think about how we feel about the sacrament and how true are we? (He picked a perfect day to have this topic and couldn't have given a better discussion about why to go to Confession if we had planned it! The Holy Spirit is certainly with us!).

Then, we took turns reading sections from the Reconciliation pamphlet, and learning more about exactly what goes on in there. We read the Act of Contrition together.

We wrapped up the time by talking about how we felt about what we are learning about the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Do we have questions? The children had LOTS of questions. And a couple of interesting observations as well:

• Rocking Horse noted that she finally figured out that the sacrament has 3 names: Confession, Penance, and Reconciliation.
  
• Effusive Jaguar said this sacrament uses a lot of big words.
  
• Fair Cheetah said we shouldn't be scared.
  
• Courtly Polar Bear said we shouldn't be sad.
  
• Pragmatic Tiger said he isn't sure how he feels about this whole thing.
  
• Sweet Pea Elephant said she needs to think it over some more.
  

Next week we will be joining the parish for our Christmas party and then we have a break until after the new year. Enjoy this time with your family and with the Holy Family! Merry Christmas!