Stars in My Crown Bulletin Board

I put this crown bulletin board up one year to help the kids to remember to bring their Bibles to class. Each time they brought their Bible, they got a star sticker on their crown.

Books of the Bible Visual

When my daughter was in preschool, her teacher used this shelf to teach the kids the books of the Bible and the divisions in the Bible.  The kids love this and it helps them to visualize the different divisions of the Bible.  Each book of the Bible is made of a block of wood.  The blocks are painted one color for each division of the Bible.  On the sides of the blocks of wood are the names of the books of the Bible.

On the shelves are listed the divisions of the Bible so kids can take the blocks of wood and place them on the shelves in the right divisions.  This is a great tool for ALL ages!

In my kindergarten class, we use this as we introduce the books of the Bible.  We will add the blocks of books 2-3 each week.  As we add the blocks, we talk about the divisions and why they are named that name.

Melody Mondays - The Gloryland Express

This is one of Sue Crabtree's song ideas. We enlarged the train on bright colored paper, laminated it and added magnetic strips on the back of each car. My kids enjoy being the song assistant on Sunday's - this is the job that helps me place the magnets for the song on the board as we sing. It is easy to do with any song.

This song is one of our favorites. I think it has an orginial tune but we sing it to the "Something in My Pocket" tune.

The Gloryland Express

I'm on my way to heaven on the Gloryland Express.

The sides of the boxcar spells J-E-S-U-S.

When the yardman yells, "Heaven," I'll surely shout, "Yes!"

I'm on my way to heaven on the Gloryland Express.

"Toot! Toot!"

Thankful Thelma

Thankful Thelma is a great way to introduce a lesson on being thankful. We used her during our lesson on the 10 lepers because our main focus was on the one who said thanks! The idea for Thankful Thelma came from IdeaShop magazine and was submitted by Emily Hurst.

My version of Thankful Thelma is a little different than Emily's (she actually used yarn for the hair, painted the face, etc...very cute) but is used the same way. Because I was running low on time I simply printed off a girl face, colored it, stuck it to an oats container, added clothes from scrap material I had in the closet, cut some arms out of poster board and poked them through the material to the inside of the container and taped them down. I filled the container with things we are thankful for: cars, food, sun, moon, cross (Jesus), pets, toys, etc! Add whatever you want. I let the kids pull out things one at a time and we talked about being thankful for that particular thing. When we finished with all of the items I went into the lesson about the 10 lepers.

The reason she is so happy is because she has SO much to be thankful for!!!

Mural Drawings

Any age of kids love to draw. This is an easy way to keep your kids busy as they come into your classroom as well as review past lessons. Put a big piece of bulletin board paper on your wall. As the students come in, give each one a different part of the lesson. They are in charge of drawing any aspect of that lesson they choose. They work on it until the bell rings. Then each student gets to talk about their part of the mural they drew to review our past lessons. This would be great to hang out in the hall afterwards for all to see!

Basket Full of Blessings

For your elementary classes, fill a basket full of card making supplies and watch their creativity take over!! Our second graders use this basket when they are finished with their center activity before class begins. It sits in a corner filled with paper (already cut and folded to fit the envelopes), stickers, markers, and other card making supplies. When a student is finished with their assigned center for that day, they can choose to go and make cards for the sick, lonely or soldiers. As a teacher, you can keep a list of those who might enjoy a card by this center or let the students make a card for someone they know. This is a great way to teach them they can do things for others even at a young age.

Building Bible Vocabulary

While the Bible is written in simple terms, there are some words that we all have trouble understanding the meaning. This is true especially for children. Again, I have adapted this idea from another lady who taught me so much about teaching. Her idea was basically this: Before the lesson begins, talk to the children about one or two words that they will hear or see in the story. Talk about these words - what they mean, who they are, where they are, etc. Then, when the word is used in the story, they will have an idea of what it is and can grasp the story better. To do this, I use Bear from Bear in the Big Blue House in my 5 year old class. On the Disney show, Bear lived in a big blue house and each show he highlighted a word for the children to learn. Laura Beth had a Bear stuffed animal that she had out grown, and so I borrowed it for my classroom. I made a big blue house out of a science fair project board. I made windows and a door to attach to the board and used the white header the project board came with as the roof.
Bear sits in the house and at the beginning of the lesson, students will find Bear holding the words for that lesson in his mouth. I usually write the words on sentence strips and add a piece of tape to hold it in Bear's mouth. We look at the words in Bear's mouth, spell them, say them and talk about them to open our lesson each Sunday/Wednesday. Once we learn the words, we add them to the house. This serves as an easy review later on because I can point to a word and we can talk about its meaning as well as what story it came from. I also use these words in a center game as seen here.
Of course, not everyone has a bear. You may have a bird and a nest. You could place words on eggs in the nest. You could have bees and a hive. The thoughts are endless.
For older children, you could just have a special word wall where we place the words we need to know. You could even put them at a center with a Bible dictionary and have them find the words and their meanings.
May this idea help you and your students dig into the Word a little bit more.