Now I know why the resurrection story is essential to the Christian faith.  Without it, our faith is false.  That’s why it is so important to me to teach my children all about the Easter story.  I’ve made some simple cards that I use to teach young children about the resurrection story.  These cards break the story up into six small parts that make it easy to remember.

Don’t miss the giveaway at the bottom of this post!

Games to Play with Resurrection Story Cards

These games are so simple, but young children thrive on simplicity.  Add a few Easter treats or other rewards and they’ll be begging to play over and over.  

You could play these games in lieu of an Easter Egg hunt.  Before playing, make sure you read the resurrection story from a Bible and tell the children to listen carefully so they can play a game afterward.  

I shared this free printable with my subscribers before this post, so make sure you’re on our mailing list to get updated on all our freebies! Sign up below to download the cards for free!

All Mixed Up

If you want to play this game with lots of children, print off a set of cards for each or enough for pairs.  To play, simply mix all the cards up and have the children put the story in order from left to right.  If you’re playing with a big group, whoever can sort them first, wins!  

You could mix this game up by blindfolding one child or yourself!  You would mix the cards up and put them in front of the blindfolded person.  The person with the blindfold is the only one who can touch the cards.  Their partner would tell them what is on the card and help them put the cards in order by giving them verbal directions.

Hide and Seek

Another easy one; just hid the cards and have the children find them and put them in order.  If you are playing in a big group, simply print the cards off on different colored paper.  Give each child or team a color to find.  First team to put their cards in order, wins!

Can You Read My Mind?

Go over each of the cards with the children and talk about each event.  Then write down in a secret place which card you are thinking about.  The children have to read your mind by asking yes or no questions about which resurrection card they think you wrote down.

Whatever activity you play with them, may the hope of Risen Lord be with you!

Happy Easter!

Praying hands clip art from http://www.clipartbest.com/clipart-nTEnp5zTA

The post Free Easter Resurrection Story Cards! first appeared on True Aim.

The History

If you’ve read any portion of Leviticus, then you may remember reading about something called appointed times. These are known as specific times that the Hebrew people were commanded to observe for a particular reason.

Each one mentioned had a meaning then and foreshadowed things to come. Anyone who celebrates these in the present day usually understands that although we cannot do it perfectly, we do it because:

1. It was commanded to be observed throughout our generations.
2. It is practice for what is to come.
3. It glorifies the Father.

Before you get confused on what this means for the believer in Messiah today, let me address a common misconception. When it comes to observing the biblical feasts (fall or spring), it should be noted that they aren’t “Jewish feasts.” Instead, the proper context is to consider them the Lord’s feast given to His people, both those apart of natural Israel, and those grafted in.

With that in mind, let’s look at each of the fall feasts as well as practical ways to observe them with your family this fall – and beyond!

Yom Teruah

Scripture says in Leviticus 23:24-25 “Speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘In the seventh new moon, on the first day of the new moon, you have a rest, a remembrance of Teruah, a set-apart gathering. You do no servile work, and you shall bring an offering made by fire to YHVH.” I won’t get into why we don’t do sacrifices today, but I will say that we still observe this day by not working and gathering with others (if able).

Teruah literally means soundings, by instrument or human voice so you can imagine how fun (and loud) this Holy Day can be.

Below are some great resources to help teach about and observe this feast day:

• Use coloring and activity pages by Bible Pathway Adventures (our favorite)
• Help your kiddos make their own shofars with this easy DIY craft
• Here is a Yom Teruah BINGO game by The Kefar
• MTOI has some great resources called Parsha Pearls that are perfect for this feast

Yom Kippur

Scripture says in Leviticus 23:27 “On the tenth day of this seventh new moon is Yom HaKippurim. It shall be a set-apart gathering for you. And you shall afflict your beings, and shall bring an offering made by fire to YHVH.” This passage also goes on to describe how to set this day apart: no work. There are also various ways people have attempted to describe “afflict your beings” but we choose to use this day to fast from food and reflect on teshuva (repentance).

Yom HaKippurim means Day of Atonement or Day of the Coverings so spending this day in total reflection and observation of how one can follow YHVH’s instructions is a day well spent.

Below are some practical resources to help teach about and observe this feast day:

• Use these free Atonement activity pages by Bible Pathway Adventures (did we already say they’re our fave)
• This is a neat song that my kiddos love that relates the story of Jonah to Yom Kippur
• Enjoy this lapbook by Anna Matrix

Festival of Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles)

In Leviticus 23:34-44 we read about the Festival of Sukkot being observed on the fifteenth day of the seventh new moon and celebrated for seven days. This passage also sheds more light on the how-to: first day is a set-apart gathering with no work, last day is a set-apart gathering with no work, and dwell in booths (tents) for the seven days.

Some people have the amazing privilege to be off work the entire week and camp out with like-minded believers. Our first year of observing this we camped out at a lake and had an amazing time with our little family (just 5 of us at the time).

Below are some resources to help teach about and observe this feast day:

• Don’t forget your activity pages by Bible Pathway Adventures
• Bim Bam has a pretty cool video
• From the edible Sukkah to the real deal and decorations, there are lots of activities for kids here

Don’t Forget the Food

One thing that is well-known with Feast Day celebrations is the FEAST! Cooking big meals is common and expected. The few times we have had the privilege of observing feast days with others, none of them lacked in food.

Check out this YouTube playlist of clean eating recipes for feast days and beyond!

Now that you’ve gotten a run down of three celebrations to consider this fall, we’d like to hear from you! What are some celebrations you and your family do during the fall season? Share in the comments below!

Author, Speaker, and Curriculum Resource Creator Michelle Huddleston is first and foremost a child of the Most High, wife to an incredibly patient husband, and homeschooling mama to four blessings (and another on the way). She is passionate about educating, encouraging, and empowering other homeschooling families to homeschool their way. Michelle would love to connect with you on her Blog, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube!

The post 3 Celebrations to Consider this Fall. first appeared on True Aim.

Are We There Yet? – A Lesson on Patience

Remember Donkey during his journey to the Kingdom of Far Far Away in the movie Shrek 2, where he repeatedly asked Shrek and Fiona, “Are we there yet?” We may have found that scene amusing, but Donkey’s impatience sure got on Shrek and Fiona’s nerves!

For all of us with kids, I’m sure we’ve been in Shrek and Fiona’s shoes more often than we’d like. So how do we teach our kids to be patient?

Play a Game to Teach Patience

Play a game of dominoes with your kids. Have them arrange the dominoes in a formation (either straight row or any creative pattern). After completing the formation, have fun watching the dominoes fall.

Tip

It is common to accidentally topple the dominoes while arranging the formation. Leave bigger gaps every now and then so that only small sections of the formation will topple (and not the entire formation) when this happens. Go back and carefully fill these gaps after you have completed the rest of the formation.

After the game, talk to your child about the game.

• Was it easy arranging the dominoes in the formation that you wanted?
• What were some difficulties that you encountered?
• How did you feel?

Explain that arranging the dominoes neatly is not easy and it takes time to do it well. When we are impatient and try to hurry, we can accidentally topple the dominoes. This can lead to frustration and we sometimes feel like giving up.

In the same way, in real life, we sometimes feel frustrated and want to give up. But God wants does not want us to give up doing good. God wants us to persevere.

Colossians 3:12 (NIV)

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.

Pray for Patience

Pray together with your child. Thank God for his love, patience and continual forgiveness. Confess to God those instances where you and your child have been impatient and ask for God’s forgiveness. Ask the Holy Spirit to produce patience in your lives.

Galatians 5:22-23a (NIV)

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

Model Patience

Don’t forget that actions speak louder than words. Your child will notice those instances where you show impatience to the people around you, especially if he/she is the one bearing the brunt of it.

Don’t make excuses for yourself, but acknowledge your weakness to your child, humbly ask your child for forgiveness and pray together with your child for God’s forgiveness. If we model patience for our kids, there is a higher chance for our kids to learn to be patient!

Being patient is sometimes easy – like when we are doing things that we enjoy or dealing with people we like, or when we have something to look forward. But it can become challenging when we are doing something that is difficult or takes very long to do, or when we are dealing with difficult people or someone we don’t really like.

But God wants us to be patient with ourselves and with one another. If we walk closely with God and yield to the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit produces good fruit in our lives, including patience!

View the full character building series here!

Do you have any interesting ideas to teach patience? We’d love to hear from you!

Alvin Gan is the father of three noisy (but lovely) teenagers and founder of www.BibleGamesCentral.com. At Bible Games Central, you will find a variety of fun and captivating games complete with Bible learning points, recommended scripture passages and discussion questions.

The post 3 Easy Ways to Teach Kids Patience first appeared on True Aim.

When I went to Bible college, Bible reading, prayer and memorizing scripture was mandatory. That made it easy to want to study and put God’s word to memory. It is also easy to make my children study scripture as part of their homeschool curriculum. We have them memorize certain verses we feel are the most important. Verses that will encourage and strengthen their faith. But, as for my own studies, I find myself very undisciplined.

This post contains affiliate links. Please read my full disclosure for more information.

That’s why I have found that Bible verse coloring pages really help! While I color the image that captures the meaning of the verse, I say it over and over to myself. I will also use it as a time to pray with and about the verse and what it means.

Bible Verse Coloring Pages

These coloring pages are free and will help you remember 6 verses that capture the whole Bible. Hand drawn by a Christian mom, she captures the essence of the verse beautifully in her images.

Older children will really enjoy this as part of their scripture memorization or Bible study. You could even read the chapters that the verses are from while they color.

These pages include the following verses that represent 6 events of the Bible.

1. Creation – Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”
2. The Fall of Man (Adam & Eve) – Philippians 2:11a “every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord”
3. Judgement (Noah and the Flood) – Genesis 9:13a “I have set my bow in the cloud”
4. The Promise (Abraham) – Luke 12:31 “Seek the kingdom of God above all else, and He will give you everything you need.”
5. God’s People (Moses) – The Ten Commandments
6. Jesus – Matthew 28:6a “He isn’t here! He is risen, just as he said”

The 6 events are the most important to teach your children and what all the other events in the Bible can be categorized under. It is what we use to summarize the Bible and help our children understand the past present and future!

Download your Bible coloring pages here.

If you like these pages, you might also like this new Bible Verse coloring book! What a fun family devotional activity!

Share your finished coloring pages on Instagram and tag @trueaimedu #Biblecoloring. Can’t wait to see them!

The post 6 Bible Verse Coloring Pages first appeared on True Aim.

This post is sponsored by Tyndale Publishing. All opinions are my own.

One Sentence Bible Storybooks

I love being able to weave God into every subject in our homeschool. That’s very difficult when finding material for my daughter to practice reading. With her limited abilities, I’m lucky to find stories that have a point at all. One Sentence Bible Storybooks help my daughter remember the most important stories and characters of the Bible. Plus, she gets to practice her reading skills because of the simple words and repetitive text.

We really enjoyed reading the storybooks together, then doing the devotional in the back. There’s even a short prayer to make it easy for parents.

Since each book just gives one sentence on the Bible story, you can expound upon the storybooks by talking about the whole Bible story if your children remember it, or reading to them from larger Storybook Bible.

The story also gives a verse to remember in the back, so we made it our memory verse for the week. A fun and hands-on way to help children memorize scripture is to make a craft and hang it up where they can see it. Then, throughout the week, have them say the verse as they look at their craft that they made. You can make it stick even more by offering a reward for repeating the verse without help at the end of the week.

One Sentence Bible Storybooks come in sets of ten books. The sets that are now available are; Bible Favorites, Bible Heros, Bible Animals.

The Burning Bush Bible Craft

One week, my daughter read Moses and the Bush. The illustrations are adorable and she really liked the image to word guide in the back to help her identify the important words in the story.

After she read the story, I did the short devotional and then helped her do a simple craft for the memory verse of the week.

For this craft, you can draw a bush outline on a piece of green construction paper, or print of this handy printable that I made onto card stock or construction paper.

You’ll need pieces of orange, red, and/or yellow tissue paper and glue. Have your child put a small amount of glue on the bush and attach their tissue paper where they want to represent the bush being on fire. After they are done with this simple craft, have them repeat the verse to you.

There are LOTS of simple Bible crafts you can do with these Storybooks on my Bible Activities for Kids Pinterest Board.

One Sentence Bible Storybooks Giveaway!

Enter to win 1 of 5 sets of One Sentence Bible Storybooks: Bible Heroes! This boxed set of 10 delightful mini books helps beginning readers recognize basic vocabulary words while learning about 10 of their favorite Bible heroes.

Stories include:

• Adam and the Goat
• The Men and Their Horns
• The Wise Woman
• The Strong Man
• The Brave Queen
• Three Friends in the Fire
• Shepherds and the Angels
• The Boy and His Bread
• Paul and His Pal
• King Jesus

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The post Teach Reading and Bible Stories with One Sentence Bible Storybooks first appeared on True Aim.

One thing we try to do every night is eat dinner together. And so it struck me recently: Why don’t we do our family Bible time while enjoying a meal together?

This simple change has brought so many blessings to our dinner table! Not to mention that our family Bible time conversations have made our dinner discussions extremely rich.

We keep it very casual. My husband simply pulls out his Bible (or uses the Bible app on his phone) and he reads a passage.

Sometimes we work through a specific chapter or book of the Bible; and other times we pick a set of verses that are appropriate to a specific behavior we’d seen earlier that day (ahem).

As we go along, we give background to the passage or ask our kids questions about what we’re reading.

Family Bible Time Discussion Starters:

• How would you summarize these verses?

• What do you think God is trying to say through these verses?

• What other stories in the Bible (or stories from your life) does this remind you of?

• How can you apply these truths to what’s going on in your life right now?

These questions are similar to what our family refers to as the “Five Rs”—a system we’ve developed for helping them (and us!) to have meaningful independent Bible study times. You can download a free “5 Rs” printable bookmark here if you’d like to incorporate this concept in your family Bible time (or your personal devotions).

I love that family Bible time over dinner makes spiritual conversations incredibly easy. Along with discussion about the passage, I’ve also noticed that our kids ask some awesome questions about God or the Bible during this time. My husband and I want our kids to ask these hard questions and to discover how to find the answers, so we welcome this!

God intends for us to share his truths with others through relationships. What better place to do that than at the family dinner table?

Question:

How would a simple change like having family Bible time during dinner bring new levels of spiritual growth to your family? Have you experimented with this technique before and what were your results?

Share with us in the comments!

The post Easy Tip for an Awesome Family Bible Time first appeared on True Aim.

All you need to make this card is a piece of cardstock paper, a paper heart cut-out, tape or a glue stick, a pen or marker, and whatever you choose to decorate it with. Here is how we did it!

Easy Kids Craft: Pop-Up Greeting Card

First, take the piece of cardstock paper and fold it in half widthwise. Be sure to line up the edges and press firmly to create a good crease.

Then, unfold it and fold it in half lengthwise, again pressing firmly.

Now, draw two lines centered between the edge of the paper and the widthwise crease and have your child cut along the lines. Depending on how large your cut-out heart is, these lines will need to be 1-2″ apart and 1-2″ long. Ours were 1.25″ long and 1.5″ apart.

The cut lines will create a flap. Push that flap toward the inside of the folded paper and crease the edges. Now, fold the paper down widthwise so that the back of the pop-up flap is covered. We taped ours down to make the card a little more sturdy.

Next, we taped a heart onto the pop-up flap, and I chose to write “Happy Valentine’s Day” on the front and “Jesus  You! And so do I” on the inside of our cards because, as I mentioned above, I wanted to use this in a lesson with the kids about showing Christ’s love to others. You could always write “I You” instead. Next, I had my son sign his own name. Grandparents just eat that stuff up.

Finally, it’s time for your little one to embellish their card with whatever they’d like – crayons, markers, glitter glue, etc. My kids opted to decorate their cards with stickers. They are excited to put them in the mailbox next week!

And yes, that is my daughter in a dirty camo shirt – God gave her a down-to-earth country girl heart, just like her mama, and she loves playing outside, getting dirty, and taking bows out of her wild, curly hair. No sense trying to cover that up for the sake of a blog post…

Valentine’s Day always reminds me of this verse: “We love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19). Janine has used that verse with her kids to create a Valentine’s Day Bible Craft, and she also offers a free printable of hearts with Bible verses about love on them for craft time with your kids as well. Be sure to check those out! You could even use those free printable hearts on the front or back of your pop-up Valentine’s Day cards. They fit perfectly!

I hope this card inspires you to encourage your children to share God’s love with others this Valentine’s Day.  Do you have any more simple ideas for kids or families to spread the love of Christ on this holiday? Please comment below!

The post Easy DIY Valentine’s Day Pop-Up Card for Kids first appeared on True Aim.

Take the giraffe for example. Many people believe that the giraffe’s neck slowly became longer over time so it could reach leaves on the tops of trees. However, a giraffe has many different things in it’s body that would have had to evolve at the same time with exactly the right functions. If not, the pressure from the blood rushing to it’s head when it bent over would cause brain damage!

For day 6 we read a lot about the amazing animals God made and how our bodies work. We did a lion craft, jungle scene, and talked about what makes each person unique with a little silhouette activity.

Creation Craft

For our copy-work printables, we did a super simple craft. First we talked about some amazing features of Lions. Then, the kids drew lines with different shades of orange and yellow for the lion’s mane. Then I printed out some lion heads on yellow paper (they could have been bear heads. I don’t remember). Here is a template for a lion head if you need something like it. Just click the green ‘download template’ button.

The older kids also did a project when the little ones were taking a nap. We made some Jungle Dioramas out of tissue boxes.

It was a little difficult to cut the box, but they didn’t give up. Well, I wouldn’t let them

Then they used construction paper, stencils and an animal drawing book to make a jungle scene. I showed them how they could cut slits in the top of the box and hang vines down to give it a 3D look.

A great book to go with this project would be the Shine-a-light Rain Forest book from my Usborne store.

Watch Amazing Animals

This video is great to show children in little bits. It might be too long for younger children, but we LOVED it! Even I learned a TON about God’s amazing animals and how hard it is to imagine them being randomly formed.

Who Am I? Silhouettes

We did another activity about ourselves; to show our unique traits and also similarities.

First I had the children take turns standing by a wall facing to the left. I had another child shine a light at their face and I traced the silhouette on a piece of paper on the wall.

Then I asked the children things that they liked, about themselves and just in general. We talked about how every person in the whole world is unique. Millions and millions of individuals, not one exactly the same as the other. It really is amazing to think about!

We ended every activity with a prayer to thank God for all that He has made. For making it so beautiful, complex, and interested so that we would know that He is God. We prayed for help with remembering how special every person is so we can be nicer, more generous, and think about how others feel more often.

More Ideas for Day 6 of the Creation Story!

Animals & Man – No Sew Quiet Book for Toddlers

Preschool Animal Sort

The 7 Days of Creation in Legos {Day 6 – Animals & Man}

View all Creation Posts in this Series

The post Creation Story for Kids: Day 6 – Animals & Man first appeared on True Aim.

Space is such a fun subject so for day 4 in our Creation Story books, we did 2 crafts and a couple of simple experiments.

There are so many different activities you could do for this day, as numerous as the stars really. Here are a few that we did, plus you can find more resources for studying space here.

Creation Craft

The first craft we did was a Sun Sun Catcher. Yes, real original, I know. They turned out beautiful though!

To make our suns, we used yellow, orange, red, and pink tissue paper. First I had the children cut the tissue paper up into little pieces, but that didn’t work out very well. So we ended up just tearing it into pieces. It was a lot funner that way too.

I cut a whole in the center of a piece of blue construction paper by folding it in half and cutting a half circle on the folded edge.

I helped the children place their construction paper onto contact paper and then they placed the tissue paper where they wanted it.

For our stars and moon, we made scrap paper collages again. This time, I had the kids glue a bunch of pieces of yellow paper, in different designs, on yellow construction paper.

We did the same with blue paper for the moon.

Then after they were dry, we cut the yellow paper into a star shape and the blue paper into a circle for the moon.

We glued them onto our copy-work page and practiced our handwriting. If we ever do this again, I might have the children paint the paper black before they put their star and moon on.

Experiments to Demonstrate Earth’s Orbit

Our galaxy is so unique, it is impossible to think that it happened through random chance. If any one thing was off you would have, extreme temperatures, low oxygen levels, drought, high radiation levels; life just would not be able to exist on earth. Click here to print off an experiment worksheet for this activity and record your findings.

First, I showed the children how the earth revolves around the sun and why that is important. First I took a round cake pan and put a piece of yellow paper in the middle for the sun. I drew a black dot on a marble to represent us on the earth. The kids took turns moving the earth around the sun by turning the pan.

They could visualize how the earth goes around the sun and gives us nights and days. Now, I should have put the sun a little bit off centered because that is what it is really like.

For our second experiment I wanted to show the kids what gravity is. I had the children take turns spinning a basket around with toys in it. They had to spin it fast enough to get the toys to stay in the basket. I told the kids how our whole solar system works together to help us stay put and not float around because it gives the earth it’s gravity. So gravity is basically a force that pulls things together.

The moon is very important to the earth because it’s gravity helps us stay in our orbit and gives the earth a constant tilt. If the moon disappeared one day, everything on the earth would change.

What if the Moon Disappeared?

To give the children an example of what would happen if something in our solar system changed or disappeared, we watched some of the video below.

Everything in our solar system was made so that life could exist on Earth. So, after I finished each activity, I reminded my children of God’s amazing power, wisdom and how He cares for us sooo much.  Psalm 147:4-5 “He determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name.  Great is our Lord and mighty in power; His understanding has no limit.”

More Ideas for Day 4 of the Creation Story for Kids

Creation: Sun, Moon & Stars- No Sew Quiet Book for Toddlers

Creation Daily Number Flip Book

The 7 Days of Creation in Legos {Day 4 – Sun, Moon & Stars}

Paper Plate Craft & Day 4 Memory Card Printables

View All the Posts in this Series

The post Creation Story for Kids: Day 4 – The Sun, Moon, and Stars first appeared on True Aim.

Our craft for the 3rd day was making leaf prints on our Copy-Work printables and putting together a beautiful collage to visualize all that God made on Day 3. Plus we did an easy experiment to show how plants get nutrients and water from the soil.

This is a craft you can customize for all ages. For the little ones, I like to cut out some of the shapes ahead of time. I let the older kids cut everything for themselves.

Creation Craft

This was my favorite craft that we did through our whole creation project. It just turned out so good even with the toddlers in my class.

To make the collage, we used natural colors of scrapbook paper, craft scissors, glue and sticker paper. I tried to choose colors that matched what everything looks like in real life. I guided the children on how to make the background and then the foreground with the trees and ‘sea’.

I had ages 2-5 doing this craft, but even older children will enjoy it. We talked about each thing that was made and how it benefits the earth and all the living creatures in it. The seas, the land, the plants; everything works together to support life. God was preparing a perfect place for man to live.

How Plants Get Nutrients Experiment

This experiment combines all three elements that God made into one. It shows how plants get what they need from the water in the soil. To do this experiment I bought some white carnations from the grocery store. I cut the ends at a diagonal and put them in water that had different colors of food coloring in it.

It took a little while to get them to really change color. I also added some of the plant food that came with the flowers to see if that helped them absorb the color more and the kids recorded what they found on their Experiment Observation Worksheet.

The kids were amazed and could see that what is in the water or soil is sucked up into the plant.

Photosynthesis Video

We also watched this video to show how plants turn light into food.

I finished both of our activities by thanking God for making everything we need for food and to help us take better care of ourselves by eating more fruits and vegetables.

More Ideas for Day 3 of the Creation Story for Kids!

Creation: Land, Plants & Sea- No Sew Quiet Book for Toddlers

 Creation Game Board

The 7 Days of Creation in Legos {Day 3 – Land, Plants & Seas)

More Creation Story Ideas

The post Creation Story for Kids: Day 3 – the Land, Plants and Seas first appeared on True Aim.