Lesson 7 / Knowledge of God : part II

Today we continued our quest in gaining more knowledge of God. Our fabulous ‘Knights of Knowledge’ finished creating their armour, to be ready for the search of truth and answers… chest plates, provision bags, matches, swords and much more was added to the ‘equipment’.

 

We then started learning the new prayer for this unit. To help us memorise the words and understand the concepts within, we created a series of ‘pictograms’.

Do you know a melody, that goes with this prayer? If so please share it in the comments below – we’d love to learn it! Have found an ‘old’ one by Mary Davis but it doesn’t cover the whole prayer, only the first few lines.

We finished off today’s lesson by playing the game initiator/investigator – everyone stands in a circle, one person (investigator) steps outside for a minute. The rest of the group decide who the initiator is, and he/she starts various actions for everyone to follow (clapping, stamping, jumping, etc…). The investigator is called back in to stand in the centre of the circle, trying to find out who the initiator is. We had to play at least 8 rounds! 🙂 Fun game!

There won’t be a class next weekend, as it’s ‘Queens Birthday’ weekend and two of our teachers are away. See you all back on the 10th of June.

Lesson 22 : Steadfastness

…what does steadfastness mean? And how do you explain it to an audience of 3 to 11 year olds…?

Not an easy task, but we agreed, that there are some great examples of steadfastness – the mountains, solid steadfast, not moved by every little wind or change around them. Or trees – with their roots deep in the earth, holding on, maybe sometimes swaying in the wind, but not jumping from place to place, constantly changing their mind.

Looking at the Virtues Guide (p 237 onwards) we learned that being steadfast also means being true – to someone or something. To stick with it, even if there are obstacles in the way.

To help us with learning our quote for today’s lesson, we traced our feet, and decorated them into beautiful footprints. These we then layed on the ground like footprints on a path and practiced the words, while steping from footprint to footprint.

“Make firm our steps, O Lord, in Thy path, and strengthen Though our hearts in Thine obedience.”

The children did very well! It’s amazing to see how movement and interaction with the words, helps them memorise the quotes much quicker.

We finished our class with a game of “The Wolves & Goats” (see Ruhi Book 1, page 30) – where we set up a little obstacle course with cushions, representing the bridge the goats have to cross. Under this bridge a family of wolves are sleeping, they love to gobble up goats, but only do so if they hear them. So as soon as the wolves stop snoring, the goats (children) have to freeze. A great game to get everyone involved!

Oh – and of course, we started today’s class with singing along to the beautiful video ‘Strive’ – check it out here:

Have a great week everyone – see you next Sunday – where we’ll talk about ‘Humility’. 🙂

Lesson 17 : Pure, kind & radiant heart

This must be one of my favourite lessons 🙂 it is based on lesson 2 in Ruhi Book 3, and we’ve gone through it before. The children needed very little prompting to remember the quote for today’s lesson:

“O Son of Spirit! My first counsel is this: possess a pure, kindly and radiant heart.”

We changed the craft slightly too – painting beautiful hearts – pure, kind and radiant ones – but then stringing them up, instead of using them as magnets. We loved the way they look, when we wrote the words first with oil crayons, and then painted over with a water based paint – the brightly colourful results are gorgeous!

 (the lovely ‘heart-mobiles’ and their makers 🙂 )

For today’s story, we used an ‘old’ book I had from my parents, called ‘The Scottish Visitors’ – a story about ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s visit to London. It’s beautifully illustrated, and the story suits age groups from 5 to 12 alike!

We finished the class by playing the game ‘Burning thirst’ (Ruhi book 3, page 18). Sticks are tied to childrens’ arms – to prevent them bending their elbows – and they pretend to have walked in the desert and are very thirsty. A glass of water is given to them and they have to try and drink it (only works if they work together and hold it for each other). 🙂

And then sang Stefan Brown’s song on ‘kindness’. Always a favourite of everyone in class. Enjoy the rest of your Sunday everyone and see you next week, which will be the last class of this term (19th September).

Lesson 11 : Kindness

Welcome back everyone! It’s been a fabulous first lesson after the school holidays 🙂

We talked about kindness, and what it means to be kind to each other, to animals, the planet, ourselves – to EVERYONE… Memorising the quote for today’s lesson was a breeze. Our children are learning them so quickly, it’s becoming second nature. Well done everyone!

After singing Stefan Brown’s song ‘Kindness‘, we made some peaceful and happy kindness-birds. A fabulous craft idea from the Australian Peace Pack material. It’s the little kindnesses we show each other that give us wings and lift our hearts and spirits!

It was great to see all the beautiful birds take flight…

We finished the class with the ‘Hidden Virtue’ game. Have a look at the lesson pdf for a description of how it is played – we had good fun with it and did at least 4 rounds 😉

Thanks all for  great class and see you next Sunday – when we’ll learn about Generosity (some cookie baking/decorating might be involved….) – yum!

Lesson 2: Kind and radiant hearts

We had a lovely second lesson at the Community Centre today. The theme for this lesson was ‘A pure, kind and radiant heart’. We sang Stefan Brown’s song called ‘Kindness’ and had lots of fun, coming up with lots of different rhythms and percussion for it. We learned a new quote by Baha’u’llah (see quote of the week on the right) and did a craft activity – where we painted little heart magnets. Have  look at the pictures, and I’ve posted a pdf of the complete lesson as well.

2_KindHeart (pdf for downloading)

Busy hands – making the ‘heart-magnets’…

We used crayons first to create a pattern on the cardboard hearts and then painted over it with watercolours – so easy and very pretty looking 🙂 it was hard to stop!

…to end the class, we played the game ‘Burning Thirst’. The children’s arms are tied to sticks, so they can’t bend their elbows. Then they pretend that they’ve been walking in the desert for a long time and are REALLY thirsty. They come upon a cup of water – how can they drink from it, without being able to bend their elbows and pick up the cup….?

…after lots of giggles and trial and error, they realise that they have to work together and hold the cup for each other to get any of the water! Well done!!!!!

Thanks also to Keith, who paid us a visit during children’s class today – it’s great having people popping in – all welcome 😉