Nehemiah Memories

For our VBS lessons on Nehemiah, we came up with a memory for each lesson to help the children remember that lesson. We used these memories also as each child's attendance chart for VBS. We had small box for each child. Each night we would talk about the item we were placing in the box and, then, allowed each child to place their item in their box. These are the items we used as memories as well as attendance:


Lesson One: a small cup (you could use a communion cup)


Lesson Two: a sad face or praying hands


Lesson Three: tool fruit snacks from Oriental Trading


Lesson Four: a small scroll (use flat ended toothpicks with paper cut to fit rolled between the toothpicks)

Nehemiah Celebrates

Nehemiah Celebrates the Wall Being Rebuilt

Bible Time:
Songs
Bible Facts
Review

Nehemiah celebrates the wall being rebuilt
Nehemiah and his friend, Ezra, read from God’s word to celebrate the walls being rebuilt. Everyone listened to God’s word being read and praised God for how good He is.

Activities
Snack – scroll made from pretzel sticks and fruit roll-up
Make Scrolls
Lacing – scrolls
Coloring – Ezra reading from God’s word
Role-Play – Reading from a scroll around the wall (Take a picture to put in scrapbook)

Past Lessons

Lesson 1: Nehemiah is a Cup Bearer

Lesson 2: Nehemiah Prays to God

Lesson 3: Nehemiah Rebuilds the Wall

Nehemiah Rebuilds the Wall

Lesson 3: Nehemiah Rebuilds the Walls

Bible Time:
Songs
Bible Facts
Review

Nehemiah Builds the Walls
Nehemiah goes back to Jerusalem to rebuild the walls with a lot of helpers. When they all worked together, they were able to rebuild the walls in 55 days. Importance of the walls: to protect people from danger.

Activities:
Snack – graham crackers and marshmallow cream – build the walls like Nehemiah
Potholders – “____________ is a helper” and painted handprints
Lacing – tool belts and tools
Coloring – colored a picture of the walls being rebuilt
Role-Play – Using shoeboxes covered with brown paper (bricks) have the children rebuild the walls – working together. Bought hard hats from Oriental Trading (take a picture of this for scrapbook)

Past Lessons:

Lesson 1: Nehemiah is a Cup Bearer

Lesson 2: Nehemiah Prays to God

Nehemiah Prays to God

Lesson 2: Nehemiah prays to God

Bible Time:
Songs
Bible facts
Review

Nehemiah Prays to God
Nehemiah hears about the walls of Jerusalem being torn down and is sad. He prays to God and goes to see the king. The king tells him to go and fix the walls. Nehemiah is happy.

Activities
Snack – sugar cookie with sad face (use chocolate chips to outline the sad face)
Make a crown like the king would have worn
Lacing – a child praying to God
Coloring – colored a picture of Nehemiah praying
Doorknob hangers – (Shhh! _______ is praying!)
Role-Play – took turns praying to God for help (took a picture for the scrapbook)

See Lesson 1: Nehemiah was a Cup Bearer

Nehemiah is a Cupbearer

I thought I had pictures for all these things, but I cannot find them anywhere!!! I do have some of the things in my possession, so I will take pictures of them and add them later. Today, I want to share with you the first lesson in our Nehemiah series entitled,

Nehemiah was a Cup Bearer

The whole lesson and all the activities were centered around this sentence. It was the main idea we wanted to the kids to take with them when they left. Here is our lesson outline for this lesson.

Bible Time:
Songs
Bible facts – Divisions of the Bible, who gave us the Bible, where we will find Nehemiah in the Bible

Introduction to Nehemiah
We had one of the men at church (my dad, actually) who was Nehemiah each night. He would come in, dressed in Bible clothes, and tell the children the story for the night. The kids LOVED this!!! They still call him "Knee He Miah!!"

Talk about what his job was to the king and why it was important

Activities **
Snack – cheese and fruit with juice
Decorate cups – let each child decorate a cup ** We bought the kind of cups you can slip the piece of paper into after it has been decorated.
Lacing – a cup
Coloring – colored a picture of Nehemiah being a cup bearer
Role-Play – took turns being the king and Nehemiah taking the cup to the king (took pictures of each child as Nehemiah for a scrapbook at the end)

** The different activities were done as centers. We divided the class into small groups and had an adult (or two) at each activity. The students rotated through the activities during this time. This was done during VBS. When I taught it in a Bible class, I just chose different activities to do as a whole class.

Name Tags - Nehemiah

When we were preparing for the VBS lessons on Nehemiah, we were trying to make everything tie together. We wanted something for their nametag that the kids could use as well as going with our story. I had remembered that my children had attended a workshop at Home Depot or Lowe's where they got worker aprons. We contacted Lowe's and they gave us 25 aprons to use in our class. There was a pocket for us to put the children's names and they were able to wear these during the class as their name tags. It also protected their clothing when we painted, ate and did other activities. Each child was able to take their apron home with them at the end of the week. They loved being builders all week long and we loved the aprons being practical as well as donated!!!

Melody Mondays - Nehemiah

This week we are going to focus our posts on the story of Nehemiah. This has become a favorite Bible story of mine for the last few years. A couple of years ago, my friend, Kim, and I developed 4 lesson plans on Nehemiah for Vacation Bible School. We were teaching the toddlers that week and had a great time developing these lessons to use that week. Since then, I have taken the lessons and used them in the Kindergarten Sunday school classroom as well as the primary grades. I hope you enjoy these ideas as much as we enjoyed teaching them. We used this song to teach each part of the story of Nehemiah. We found the second and third verse from Mission Arlington and I wrote the other verses to go along with our lessons.

The Story of Nehemiah
(tune of “The Wise Men Built his House upon the Rock.”)

Nehemiah was a cup bearer.

Nehemiah was a cup bearer.

Nehemiah was a cup bearer.

And the king was his friend.

Nehemiah prayed to God for help.
Nehemiah prayed to God for help.
Nehemiah prayed to God for help.
And God did hear his prayers.

Come let’s rebuild Jerusalem’s wall.
Come let’s rebuild Jerusalem’s wall.
Come let’s rebuild Jerusalem’s wall.
And work until it’s done.

Ezra read the scroll that day.

Ezra read the scroll that day.

Ezra read the scroll that day.

And the people loved the law.

(remake of song lyrics from Standard Publishing)

Trash-Filled Thursdays - Old Shoeboxes

Ask your congregation to bring in old shoeboxes and you will have a treasure unlike any you could ever buy!!!! Yes, that is right!! All you need are old shoeboxes and brown paper (mailing paper or bulletin board paper works great!). Get the boxes, wrap them with paper and off you go!! These boxes are over 2 years old. Some are showing their age, but how easy is it to replace? VERY!!! Once you get your boxes ready, you can do the following:

1. Noah's Ark - have the students build the ark
2. Tower of Babel - have the students build the tower
3. Build altars
4. Build the temple
5. Nehemiah - rebuild the wall of Jerusalem
6. Pile them up for a mountain

Of course, there are more things you can do with them. Do you have any more ideas?