Bible Stories: The Camel in the Needle's Eye

    

This story is called "Day 259: The Camel in the Needle's Eye" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: "Forgive Others from Your Heart"

    

This story is called "Day 258: 'Forgive Others from Your Heart'" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: The Greatest in the Kingdom

    

This story is called "Day 257: The Greatest in the Kingdom" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: Nothing is Impossible with Faith

    

This story is called "Day 256: Nothing is Impossible with Faith" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: The Voice on the Mountaintop

    

This story is called "Day 255: The Voice on the Mountaintop" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: "Who Do People Say I Am?"

    

This story is called "Day 254: 'Who Do People Say I Am?'" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: A Gentile Dog and the Bread of Life

    

This story is called "Day 253: A Gentile Dog and the Bread of Life" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: Jesus Walks on the Sea

    

This story is called "Day 251: Jesus Walks on the Sea" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: Jesus Feeds the Crowds

    

This story is called "Day 250: Jesus Feeds the Crowds from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: The Death of John the Baptist

    

This story is called "Day 249: The Death of John the Baptist" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: Jesus Teaches on the Mountain

   

This story is called "Day 239: Jesus Teaches on the Mountain" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: "You'll Fish for People"

 

This story is called "Day 224: 'You'll Fish for People'" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: John Baptizes Jesus

   

This story is called "Day 221: John Baptizes Jesus" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: Christ is Hidden in Egypt

   

This story is called "Day 218: Christ is Hidden in Egypt" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: Precious Gifts for Jesus

   

This story is called "Day 217: Precious Gifts for Jesus" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: The Rising Star of Christ

  

This story is called "Day 216: The Rising Star of Christ" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Bible Stories: The Birth of Jesus Christ

    

This story is called "Day 213: The Birth of Jesus Christ" from 365 Read-Aloud Bedtime Bible Stories by Daniel Partner.

Matthew

As I mentioned, I am making a fact sheet for the New Testament books as we go through them, so each child can have a booklet at the end of the year, if they want to keep the sheets together.

We started the first Sunday of July setting the tone for the next 6 months. What is the New Testament? What is the purpose? Why is it important to us? The kids were able to ask questions they had, and I hyped them up a little with "You'll learn about..." comments to get them excited. I had a NT Books puzzle the kids had to solve using the index from a Bible (think: "The first letter of the second book") to solve Why was the New Testament written? and they were so into it they didn't want to stop at noon to go outside for a few minutes as I had told them we could. That makes my heart happy!

The second Sunday we started with the Book of Matthew. I gave the kids a hand-out and had them color specific parts ("color the speech bubble blue as xx reads it aloud") as I read and we talked about the facts. This let them listen but also gave them a specific thing to do which kept their little minds from wandering. The first half tells about the book itself, and the second tells a few facts about Matthew, the tax-collector/disciple/probable author.

The kids asked some really good questions and I was able to go a little deeper than anticipated thanks to the group of kids being a little older than usual. They seemed really excited about learning more!

After I have a few more of these sheets made, I'll probably put them on my Teachers Pay Teachers store so you can snag a copy.

October 4: God's New People are Called

Read "God's New People are Called," part 15 of The Big Picture Story Bible.

Give each child a coffee filter and blue marker. Show examples, and have them decorate their coffee filter anyway they want- zigzags, stripes, polka-dots, etc. Then place a paper towel under and gently spritz with water.

{I use these bottles for all of our water needs, but I noticed they're discontinued.}

As the filters are drying {We swapped out for dry paper towels and it only took about 15 minutes} each kiddo chose a bird feather and eyeball to glue on a dove pattern (I drew it by hand so I don't have a copy, basically a big circle for the body, a small circle for the head, add a beak and a rectangle tail.)

Then glue the bird onto the coffee filter and have students retell the story of the dove landing on Jesus after John baptized Him to tell everyone that Jesus was, indeed, His Son. Remind everyone that just like Jesus had followers back then, we are His followers, too!

September 20: God's Promised One is Born

Last week the kids played a game to learn about the purpose of the census and why Mary and Joseph had to travel to Bethlehem. This week is the actual "Christmas Story" of Christ's birth, but since it's only September I desperately wracked my brain trying to think of what would bring everything we've learned up to the point where we FINALLY learn who God's Forever King is.

I decided to focus on the genealogy of Jesus. BORING! You say. TOO HARD! You agree with yourself. THERE IS NO WAY TO TEACH KIDS THE GENEALOGY OF JESUS! You scream in your head.

Wrong.

That's what I thought, too, until I figured out a way to do it. And I was blown away by the awesomeness my kiddos remembered from the last 3 months as we went over it. It was a PERFECT review! (Not many lessons make me as pleased as this one did).

Basically, we reviewed last week and read the story this week from The Big Picture Study Bible. We talked a little about Mary and Joseph, and then I mentioned that all of the stories we learned from the Old Testament have led up to this moment, and I gave them this paper I created:

I gave them a minute or so to read over it and asked if they recognized any of the names. Surprising themselves, they did. I explained that this was a list from the first man, Adam, to Jesus, following through dads {except in one or two cases where there were no males and it used the female that married back into her own tribe. I also mentioned also that this is Joseph's genealogy, but Mary's is available, too. Since we talked about Jesus being born in Bethlehem because of his dad-Joseph, I decided to take the "legal" way.}

Then I gave each student a highlighter and we reviewed, beginning with Adam, all of the names that we read about. As we read, we discussed that character and what he did... "Even though Adam disobeyed God, he still got to be part of Jesus' family line... God promised Abraham that he would be the father of many- can you believe his family line traces all the way to Jesus!?... Remember David, who killed Goliath and eventually became King?! Jesus had the royal line for a bit!" The kids were SO excited and loved highlighting the people they remembered that we've read about. Some even noticed a couple others we didn't talk about... "Hey, is that the Boaz from the Ruth lady?" I was really pleased to see how much the kids remembered as we reviewed Jesus' line.

After we finished highlighting, they cut out their book and glued it onto a piece of construction paper. Then we cut around it to make a book cover, and some chose to fold it to make their own part of the Bible.