A few months ago I hung 3 oil drip pans on one wall of my Bible class to use as magnetic boards. The first activity I used them with was 3 gigantic puzzles about the first 3 kings of Israel — Saul, David and Solomon.
This quarter, we are studying the divided kingdom. There are a lot of names of people to learn in this section of Bible history. It can be daunting for a mature Bible student to figure out who is who. I wanted to use the magnetic boards to help the kids keep the kings and prophets straight.
The idea is pretty simple and can be used in a much smaller format (folder activity or even a project folder). I labeled each of the boards Kings of Judah, Kings of Israel and Prophets. There is a card with the king or prophet’s name. These cards are printed in black and white on purpose. The temptation was to color code them (all the Kings of Judah — red, Kings of Israel — green, etc) but that would take away any thinking on the child’s part. Each card has a small piece of magnet glued on the back. There are also smiley and frowny faces with pieces of magnets on the back.
As you can see from the pictures, we are just getting started so we are only using the cards the students are familiar with.
There are a few ways to use this activity:
- Let children take turns putting the names on the correct board
- Have names already on the boards and have children place smiley/frowny faces on appropriate names.
- Swap a few of the more obvious names (Ahab, Rehoboam, Joash, etc) and have the children put them back on the correct board.
- Have names on boards but out of order. The children can then place them back in order. This can be done as a race — boys on one board, girls on another would work well in my class.
Lists of kings vary. For instance, some include Tibni as a king of Israel while others exclude him. He was actually a king of a portion of Israel for a very brief time while Omri was king of the rest. After Tibni’s death, Omri became king of all of Israel.
Spellings of the names vary as well. Ahaziah (Ahab’s son) was followed by Joram or Jehoram depending on what list you use.
I have the timeline from Shaping Hearts For God on our wall. I use Glenda Schales’ songs for the Kings of Israel and and the Kings of Judah. These two conflict with each other. I have chosen to use Glenda’s list because I think the song will stick with them longer than the timeline. We discuss the discrepancies as they come up. The students seem satisfied with my explanation.
Below are links that will allow you to print out the cards for this activity.
Now that we have finished our study of the divided kingdom, I have a picture of this activity with all its cards in place. Don’t look too close, some may be out of order. I didn’t check before I took the picture.
Thank you very much for your wonderful materials on the kings and prophets! Your idea to use the oil pans is great! I have purchased the oil pans for the magnetic visuals game on the kings of the divided kingdom. I am preparing a unit studying the Divided Kingdom for my intermediate kids’ Bible class.
I did notice that for the 15th king of the Northern Kingdom of Israel you used an “a” in Zachariah instead of an “e” (Zechariah). I wanted to check to see if you intended to use that spelling. I know that both spellings are correct.
I have been using the usual spelling seen in the Bible text “Zechariah”.
Would you consider making a correction on the visual materials using “Zechariah” please?
Sincerely,
Patricia Ready
Hi Patricia, I’m so glad you find the ideas on my blog useful. I offer links to pdfs as an aid but I don’t keep them updated unless there is something scripturally in error.
I was wondering if you have a link to Glenda Schale’s Kings of Israel and Kings of Judah song.
I found two on you-tube, but they are not hers, so I would like to purchase or hear her songs if you could direct me to the right place.
Thank you for your wonderful, hands-on, ideas with the oil pans!
I’m sorry but I don’t have permission to share the songs online. I hope she publishes them in a format we can all have before too long.
wow! great ideas! thanks for sharing!
Thank you, Linda!
This is good because we are behind you in the curriculum, we are about to start with David.
And I like the faces by the names.
Do you follow Ronda Duvall’s blog? Hands on Bible Teacher She said she’s about to start the divided kingdom as well.