Easter

****I am several weeks behind in my posts. We have had FHE each week, but I just haven't had the time to share what we have done recently, as I prepare for our new baby. However I came up with our Easter FHE for Monday night and thought I'd share it with anyone still looking for ideas. There won't be any pics until tomorrow night, but here are the plans.

Opening Song: "Did Jesus Really Live Again?"

Attention Activity: Hide the 12 Resurrection Eggs (see below) and allow the children to find them and place them in a basket.

Lesson: Resurrection Eggs. The idea is to place objects representing the last week of the Savior's life inside eggs to teach about Easter. There are tons of ways to do these and I have found lots of ideas on the internet. I have combined my favorite ideas for toddlers and preschoolers here below. WE ARE NOT DOING THESE ALL IN ONE NIGHT. OUR FAMILY HAS DECIDED TO DOspread the 12 eggs over the entire week at bedtime for our family scripture study between FHE and Easter Sunday. But they could be used as a lesson if your kids' attention span is a little longer. We are just introducing the eggs and Opening the first one at FHE.

A-Gather 12 Easter Eggs and number them on the outside. Fill them with the following objects and collect the pictures from your Gospel Art Kit or find them online here.

B-Allow the children to open each egg in order and ask the children to look at the picture or listen for the scripture story to talk about the object in the egg. I am reading the scripture on the back of each picture. In some cases there was no picture so I am using the Children's New Testament. (CNT)

1- Palm Sunday: a leaf : GAK 223 (Monday Night)
2- The Sacrament/ Last Supper: a sacrament cup GAK 225 (Tuesday Night)
3- Jesus Washes the Disciples Feet: a cloth GAK 226 (Tuesday Night)
4- The Garden of Gethsemane: rock GAK 227 (Wednesday Night)
5- Judas's Betrayal: three dimes GAK 228 (Wednesday Night)
6: The King of The Jews: thorns CNT pg. 117 Chapter 41((Thursday Night)
7: The Cruxifiction: a cross made of toothpicks GAK 230 (Friday Night)
8: The Cruxifiction: a nail GAK 230 (Friday Night)
9: Mocking the Savior's Thirst: a sponge GAK 230 (Friday Night)
10: Preparing the Savior's Body for Burial: a bundle of cloves GAK 231(Saturday Night)

11: The Stone in Front of the Tomb is Moved: a stone–rounded would be best GAK 232/245 (Saturday Night)
12: The Savior is Resurrected: leave empty GAK 239 (Sunday morning before our Easter Baskets)

Activities:

1-We played the Savior Matching Game together. I printed and colored the pieces and placed them in a basket. The boys took turns taking out a piece and matching it to the game board while I read the sentence about Jesus.

2-I made these moveable Easter Story Pieces from the Friend for the boys and we said the fingerplay below while we moved the pieces .

Jesus is Risen (Fingerplay)

by Dana Eaton

Here is the place where Jesus lay; (point)

See, the stone has been rolled away!

Stoop down; look in (stoop sown and shade eyes with hand)

He is not here! (stand up)

Jesus is risen! Be of good cheer! (clap hands)

3-Then we painted Easter Eggs together. We have found painting boiled eggs with washable paint to be an enjoyable and less messy experience for everyone.

Closing Song: "He Sent His Son."

Obedience

Opening Song: "Quickly I'll Obey"

Story: I told the boys a story about a little lamb who kept leaving his fence and running away. I asked them why the farmer had a fence for his lamb. We talked about how the fence kept the lamb safe. I told them that this is why we have rules and why we need to listen to Mommy and Daddy, so we can be safe and happy. The boys helped me build a fence for our lamb while we talked about what kinds of rules keep us safe in our family. Then we read Ephesians 6:1.



Activity: We talked about the rules on the road that keep us safe, too. We played "Red Light, Yellow Light, Green Light" with our cars speeding around the house. We had to practice obeying the rules together.



Art: We made our own traffic lights that said "I Can Obey." Andrew cut his out on his own and wrote the words and glued it down. I had pre-cut Ryan's and written the words for him, so he just glued his down.



Closing Song: "Choose the Right"

Daniel and the Lion's Den

MUSIC: We sang the chorus to "Follow the Prophet" and "Called to Serve"

LESSON: I gave each family member a lion mask I had printed on yellow paper and cut out ahead of time.

Lion Mask

I then read the following version of the Daniel and the Lion's Den story . Each time I said the word "Lion" I had the entire family put on their masks and "Roar" as loud as they could. I added in a couple of extra "Lions" in a few spots. As we read I asked questions such as "Is it a good choice to pray?" "Who was making good choices?" "How did Heavenly Father protect Daniel because he made a good choice?" The kids loved this part and listened hard to the words to hear when to "Roar."

GAME: We played a variation of "Duck, Duck, Goose" but instead said, "Daniel, Daniel, Lion" and roared as we chased each other.

ART: Paper Bag Lion Puppet. The boys colored these and we helped cut them out.



SNACK: The boys and I made lion cupcakes during the afternoon for FHE snack. We used yellow and orange icing, and M&Ms for the eyes. (These are not the ones we made. Ours were eaten before we remembered to take a picture. Oops)!

Wiseman and Foolish Man

Opening Song: "The Wise man Built His House Upon the Rock"

Flannel Board Story: Tell the story from Matthew 7:24-27 of the Wise man and the Foolish man. Act out with Flannel Board Pieces.


Discussion/Activity: We want to build our house upon a rock not sand. Jesus taught us that his gospel is the rock. D&C 11:24 Jesus has given us some tools to help build our house on the rock. Satan wants us to build our house on the sand. He has given us tools to make our house shaky and sink.

Pull Out Tool Box (I labeled tools (Tools to Build Our House I modified this idea for preschoolers and toddlers) from the boys' play tool kit with good tools and bad tools. We sorted them and decided which ones Jesus would help us build a house on rock and which ones would help us build a house on sand).



(Rock tools were: Sharing, Scriptures, Prayer, Helping, FHE, Nice Words, and love. Sand tools were things we are working on extinguishing from our home: Mean words, hitting, lying, not sharing)




We played with the tools and built two houses out of lego blocks.


Then we placed one on sand in a casserole dish and one on a large rock in a casserole dish. We used duct tape as one of our rock tools and labeled it love. We made sure that we used a lot of this "love" to firmly attach our house to the rock.


Next we poured water on each house. The sandy one washed away and the rock house stood firm. (Thank goodness).



Art: We colored Wiseman Foolish Man "Filmstrip"of the song and played with them together. (This are really long, and neither boy finished coloring, much better for older children).

Scripture Memorization: We pounded our fist on our open hand as we repeated D&C 11:24 together over and over.

Snack: We made houses out of Rice Krispie Treats and ate them! We actually had a kit, but I found this cool site with directions for making your own.



Grown-up Lesson: After the boys went to bed, Chad and I used this time to make our own goals for the New Year together to help us Build our house Upon the Rock.

Gratitude and Thanksgiving

Music: Children All Over the World (CS 16) and I am Glad for Many things (CS 151).

Attention Getting Activity: I set up a bowl of water, a 1/4 measuring cup, and a glass goblet (inside a plastic container) on the table. I read Psalms 23:5 and we discussed what it meant to have so many blessings that our cup would overflow. We each took turns pouring water from the bowl into the cup and naming something we were thankful for. We each went several times until the cup overflowed with our gratitude. The boys loved the water splashing over.



Lesson:Using the Children's Scripture Stories, we read the story of the 10 Lepers. We talked about how only one came back to say thank you. I asked how he thought Jesus felt when only one said thank you. Then we talked about how Jesus felt when someone did say thank you. We showed on our fingers how many did say thank you and how many did not.



Activity: I have a flannel board Thanksgiving set that we used to tell the story of the first Thanksgiving. You could use the internet to print out pictures of your own to tell the story or get a book from the library. (If you choose to do this lesson at a different time of year, skip this part altogether).


Game: We played a turkey hunt game using turkeys I printed on different pieces of colored construction paper. We picked up the turkeys and said something we were thankful for that was the same color as the turkey we picked up. If you do this at a time other than Thanksgiving, you could just hide pieces of colored construction paper and play the same way.



Art: We made Mayflower boats as seen below.



Snacks: Make turkey cupcakes.

Creation Day 7-The Sabbath Day is A Special Gift

Music:
"There Are 7 Days in a Week" (This is a song I sang with my kindergarten class each morning during circle time). I used word strips with the names of the days of the week written on them. Then we counted them together to make sure there were 7.

There are 7 Days, there are 7 days, there are 7 days in a week. There are 7 days, there are 7 days, there are 7 days in a week. Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday."

"Saturday" (CS 196)

"The Chapel Doors" (CS 156)

Lesson/Activity: We read Genesis 2:1-4 together.

Heavenly Father and Jesus spent 6 days making our beautiful world. What are some of the things they made for us? (We looked back in our creation books we made). On the last day, Heavenly Father gave us a very special present. It is a gift that we get to enjoy each week. Can you guess what that gift was? I pulled out a gift box that I had filled with the following things.



*A set of scriptures, several Gospel Art Kit pictures showing Appropriate Sabbath Day activities, (Sacrament, attending primary, visiting the sick), Scripture Story Flannel Board pieces, Children's Scripture Stories, envelopes and crayons (for writing letters), picture of family members that live close enough to visit on Sundays, Friend magazine, a whisk, (we like to make treats for neighbors on Sunday together) and the Children's Primary Songbook.

The gift Heavenly Father gave us was Sunday. We call it the Sabbath Day. On Sundays we get to rest from all of our work and do things that help us feel closer to Heavenly Father and our family. In this box I have some things that we can do on Sundays to help us feel closer to him.

I let the boys take turns pulling out one object out of the box at a time and we talked about how we used those things on Sunday. I really tried to focus on what a special day it was and all the things that we GET to do, and not on the things we don't choose to do.



Scripture Memorization: After we pulled out all the items and discussed them, we opened the set of scriptures from the box and read Exodus 20:8 "Remember the Sabbath Day, to keep it Holy." We memorized this scripture together by repeating it several times.



Snack: Ice Cream Sundaes

Creation Day 6- Animals

Music: We sang All Things Bright and Beautiful (CS 231), Old McDonald Had a Farm (We pulled out different animals to sing about with each verse)., and I Went to the Animal Fair.

Lesson: We read Genesis 1:24-30 in the Old Testament. We talked together about Heavenly Father making all of the animals and then about him making us.

Activity: We named as many animals as we could think of together. I brought all of the animals in the house into the living room. All stuffed animals, flannel board pieces, plastic animals, Fisher Price animals, and puppets. We played three different games with the animals.

Game 1: Guess Who I Am? : I placed an animal underneath two pillows. Then I described the animal using clues such as "I am gray. I like to eat cheese. I squeak." After a few times of guessing, my three year old was ready to give the clues and the rest of us guessed.



Game 2: Animal Train: We placed all of the animals in a long line around our living room and then named and counted them. We talked about how many different kinds of animals Heavenly Father had given us and how they help us.


Game 3: Animal Sort: We sorted the animals into different groups. We sorted by colors one time, size, and habitats. Then we sorted them all back into their "place" in our home.



Art: We made our page for our Creation book using foam animal stickers.


Snack: We simply ate animal crackers with milk.