This week we ‘kicked it up a notch’ during our family time. We’ve started a morning prayer time together ~ just sitting at the breakfast table, putting our prayer requests down on paper and taking turns praying for the requests.

Some of the concerns the kids have had are so absolutely sweet, and they have brought up things that I many times overlook. I am really excited about this part though ~ knowing that it will give us a chance to see the many different ways that God answers our prayers and listens to us.

The Girls

This week we mainly reviewed the past verses the girls have learned and made sure that our little verse photo books were up to date with all of our verse cards. Their main assignment for the week was to tell me about one of the Bible people they have been learning about and also a few verses from the last few months.

Both girls are also a part of the Christmas program at church, so we’ve been reviewing lines and songs as well. We’re also gearing up for Advent! Next week we’ll be adding in some advent readings each evening ~ which we are all really excited about!

The Boys

Zachary’s lessons this week focused on Noah, so we added in a few little extras this week with our studies {full resources below}. We did several things as part of Zachary and Kaleb’s regular school time since they weren’t just ‘Bible’ related. Kaleb made his own Noah book too, which I’ll show you all a little later in a Tot School post. :)

Our Christian bookstore had some attendance sticker sheets/charts that were all about Noah, so I picked up a few of those for the boys to match up the animals and make their own ark scene.

Quite a few of the activities we did fit into a mini-lapbook {these were made from a file folder that was cut in half horizontally}. Zachary had some math and reading activities in his lapbook too.

Zachary’s verse this week was John 17:17.

Resources we used:

• Christian Preschool Printables ~ Noah’s Ark mini book and other resources
• 1+1+1=1 ~ Noah’s Ark Tot Book
• Coloring page of Noah’s ark

That’s it for this week! Don’t forget to visit Carisa at 1+1+1=1 and visit around to some of the other Raising Rock Star posts this week!

Before you think that teaching is all sunshine and roses in this household, I’ll tell you a little story. Kaleb apparently doesn’t like it when I read the Bible to the kids during breakfast. He likes to show his disapproval vocally…rather annoyingly…so there have been several days when I have literally dropped my head to the table and wanted to cry.

Because losing my temper while reading the Bible would be a little ironic, no?

When he starts acting up or being difficult, he get removed {strapped to his booster seat no less} and taken to his room, but that gets the kids giggling so much and reading becomes a lost cause. All that to say, when it says we ‘read’ the Bible together at breakfast every morning, most mornings involved me reading LOUDLY over the screaming toddler in the other room or repeatedly asking the kids to stop laughing at their brother’s disobedience.

The Girls

We’re reading {see above for definition} the Day by Day Kid’s Bible at breakfast each morning and have been reading through Corinthians and Paul’s letters. Is it wrong to say there are a few verses I have avoided?? As in the ones that involve a 3 letter word that starts with s and ends with x? {grins}

Both girls made up for the week they had missed with Awana and recited the entire 23rd Psalm last week. The lessons this week focus more on children of the world and learning about someone who lives in another country. I think we had that well under control with our geography studies, so we used our Children Just Like Me book for them to get information from from those two sections. We’ve also used the time to learn more about the child that we are sponsoring through Compassion and write her some letters this week.

We also worked on memorizing Mark 16:15 together. I have to say that I am personally enjoying Awana because it is really drilling stuff into my tired brain too!

The Boys

Kaleb is mostly along for the listening ride and the boys will sit down with me at some point during the morning to read out loud from the Beginner’s Bible. We’ve also been listening to the Songs for Saplings cd {the first few verses} at different points during the day and the boys both really enjoy that.

Zachary learned Romans 3:23 this week.

That’s it for this week! Don’t forget to visit Carisa at 1+1+1=1 and visit around to some of the other Raising Rock Star posts this week!

The girls and Zachary are in different levels of Awana, so for our ‘group’ time we’re doing something together daily that has absolutely nothing to do with either of their Sparks verses.

Every morning we are using the Day by Day Kid’s Bible: The Bible for Young Readers {Tyndale} to read together at breakfast. This version is simplified for the kids and has daily readings so that you can read through the Bible in a year. The passages are under 10 minutes worth of reading, so it isn’t so overwhelming for the kids, and it’s easy enough that I can also have the girls read it out loud {and get a little reading practice in with them}.

For Awana this week, the girls have been working on memorizing the 23rd Psalm and have it almost memorized completely. As part of the study, their WingRunner books also have character studies of different Bible figures, so we’ve been learning more about David, Solomon, and Elijah.

Zachary has been working on Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:31. We talked about the different days of Creation and talked about what happened each day of creation.

Stop by Carisa’s blog too and see what other families are doing to raise their own little Rock Stars at home!!

This is my first week participating in Raising Rock Stars ~ not that we haven’t been doing anything with our kids, but this would be a week that we actually took pictures and spent some time as a family {i.e. with Daddy} doing a focused activity together.

We’ve been talking about pumpkins with the younger two and we have never carved a pumpkin together as a family. Rick and I had different reasons up to this point for not doing it and this year…well, we decided to use it as a teaching/learning opportunity with the kids. We used the printables that Carisa put together her post last week and had fun making ‘Christian’ pumpkins. Kaleb had fun trying new ways to color…

We talked about how God scoops all the nastiness and yucky stuff out of our lives and how our lives shine the light of Jesus to others. We had fun coloring, reading a poem together and deciding how our pumpkin was going to look after Daddy got done carving. The end result?

During the week the kids are also attending Awana at a local church. This is our first year participating and they are loving it! All three of the oldest are using the Sparks books {Zachary is in Book 1 and the girls are using Book 2}. I am AMAZED at how much they are remembering!!

To make it a little more fun and incorporate it into our school time, I’m making printables to go along with the different verses the kids are learning. We have a large 8 1/2 x 11 sheet that hangs up for the kids to see, a 4 x 6 card that slips into a photo book so we can flip through the verses we’ve learned and sentence strip/word cards so they can put the verse together like a little puzzle. The word cards are great for Zachary and helping him really identify the words too!

The girls focused on Proverbs 20:11 {WingRunner Red Jewel 1:4} this week ~ “Even a child is known by his actions, by whether his conduct is pure and right.” We talked about Samuel and the importance of listening to God and hearing His voice.

Zachary’s verse was 1 John 4:19 {HangGlider Red Jewel 1:4}~ “We love because He first loved us.”

~ Pumpkin printables courtesy of Carisa!!

Be sure to stop by and visit Carisa at 1+1+1=1 and join in on Raising your own little Rock Stars!