Elijah

This page is devoted to sharing the actual lesson plans I used while teaching Elijah to a preschool class in a Bible class setting. I also throw in a few personal thoughts along the way.

Below is a list of the lessons taught. Scroll down to view each lesson.

Click here to see and hear the song, Elijah, that is used during these lessons.

Elijah Is Fed By The Ravens

Tomorrow we begin our study of Elijah. The main point I want to get across to the kids is that God took care of Elijah. The song I have written about Elijah stresses this point. We will be talking about:

• God using the ravens to feed Elijah
• God feeding Elijah, the widow and her son
• God helping Elijah raise the widow’s son
• God showing his power over Ahab’s false god in “the contest of the altars”
• God parting the Jordan so Elijah and Elisha could walk across on dry ground
• God taking Elijah in a chariot of fire.

We will also be learning the hymn “God Will Take Care of You”. I made a flip chart to illustrate the phrases of the 1st verse and chorus. The pictures came from Thru-The-Bible Coloring Books.

My lesson plan is:

Sing:

I’m going to change our opening song to Jesus Loves Me. I’m hoping to learn it in sign language and teach it to the kids. We’ll sing it normally tomorrow.

Magnetic Puzzle — Elijah is fed by the avens

Sing: Elijah. I hope to have this song online in the next week or two.

Elijah Flip Chart.

Sing: God Will Take Care of You using the flip chart.

Attendance Chart — Our attendance chart this month is a picture of Elijah seated by a tree next to a brook. Each time the children come to class they will add a raven. The picture came from Soul-ly For Kids.

Small Flannelgraph boxes. These are pencil boxes with a piece of flannel glued to the inside of the cover. Each child has their own. The pieces used for class are stored in the box. They really enjoy doing this activity. We will add pieces to the boxes each week. This week there is a picture of Elijah and 4 ravens.

Have children sit on their pillows on the floor.

Read When I’m a Daddy. This book is similar to When I’m A Mommy. It takes passages from the Bible that tell a daddy what to do. A little boy talks about what a good daddy he’ll be someday. I was supposed to read this Wednesday night, but I forgot to take it to class. We’ll read it this week.

Sing Whatever I Will Be When I Grow Up. This is a great song. I have several career hats the kids get to wear. When we talk about their “career”, they get to stand up. We also sing the verses If I should be a mommy/daddy when I grow up. I bought a cowboy hat this week. Someone will get to be a Christian cowboy tonight.

Review previous lessons learned with Song Timeline.

Prayer

If time permits, do some of the generic activities on the shelves.

Elijah, The Widow and Her Son

I’ve been teaching this class for 6 months now. For the first time, I failed to get a lesson plan ready for class 2 lessons in a row (Last Sun AM and Wed PM). The lesson plans really help me keep things moving in class. It helps me stay focused so I can concentrate on the kids not on what I’m going to do next.

Sunday AM I had a visitor from Germany. Actually, she grew up here in Huntington, but her husband is stationed in Germany. She is teaching this age group over there and wanted to sit in class to get some ideas. I enjoyed having her in class. She was very helpful.

I’ve been wanting to teach the kids the books of the Bible. I made a half-hearted effort earlier. I was actually just continuing what the previous teacher had done. I get frustrated teaching kids to memorize something that means absolutely nothing to them. To just say the books of the Bible, is the same as just saying a list of words that don’t make sense.

We previously had the name of the book printed on a worm segment. Each worm segment (or circle) was a different color. The kids did well with this. I think they were associating the book they were saying with the color they were looking at. They can’t read, so the name of the book wasn’t helping.

I was folding socks last Saturday (I have 6 boys, so it takes me quite a while). I was thinking about this and came up with an idea. They need pictures. The The Beginner’s Bible Card Collection is an excellent source. So, after I finished the socks and the supper and whatever else there was to do, I went to the resource room and looked through all the cards. I found a card that I thought represented each book of the Old and New Testaments. I scanned them into my computer so I could crop and resize them. So far I’ve finished the Old Testament cards. Since that’s where we’re studying, I thought that would be a great place to start. Each division — law, history, poetry, major prophets, minor prophets have a different colored border. The name of the book is below the picture.

I made a set of these cards to be put on the wall and an identical set with flannel on the back to be used with the flannel board. I made small sets of these cards (trading card size) so each child would be able to work with them individually. I hope to have the older ones (4,5 year olds) saying the books of the Old Testament by the end of the quarter.

My lesson plan is:

Sing: Jesus Loves Me and The B-I-B-L-EWe are learning The B-I-B-L-E in sign language. The kids like challenge and so do I.

Magnetic Puzzle — Elijah and the Altars

Sing: Elijah. I hope to have this song online in the next week or two.

Elijah Flip Chart.

Sing: God Will Take Care of You using the flip chart.

Attendance Chart — Add a raven to the picture of Elijah sitting down by the tree.

After a child adds his raven to his attendance chart, have him choose a pillow and sit on the floor in front of the flannel board.

Retell Elijah’s story using the Betty Lukens Flannelgraphs.

Elijah Cheat Sheets PDF

Old Testament books — Work together with the large blue cards (books of law). Then let each child take a turn pointing to and saying the books on the wall with the hand pointer. After each child has had a turn, pass out the individual sets of cards with the blue cards (the law). Let each child practice putting them in order.

Review previous lessons learned with Song Timeline.

Return to seats.

Small Flannelgraph boxes. This week we will add the widow, her son and the flour oil pictures.

Prayer

If time permits, do some of the generic activities on the shelves.

Elijah Lesson 3

Okay, confession time. I don’t really follow these lesson plans to the letter. I just have to go with the flow when I get into the class. Depending on which kids are there, if I have an adult helper, what my mood is and what the kids’ moods are, I adjust the lesson plan. Sunday AM I didn’t do the small flannelgraph boxes, the large flannelgraph or the song timeline. I didn’t think we had enough time to do a good job with them. I knew we would have enough time Wed PM. I also didn’t think the kids were in the mood for it. We will try to do it tonight.

We did a memory game instead. Soul-ly for Kids has some great pictures to use. I made 4 sets of each picture (Elijah, the widow, her son, flour/oil, altar, chariot of fire). We had 2 games going at the same time. One on one end of the table and the other one the other end. We played memory (each child turns over 2 cards and if they match they keep the cards and go again). Each time they got a match, they had to tell me something about the picture. They really seemed to enjoy it. It was a little too advanced for my 3 year olds (there are 2 in this class), but they enjoyed watching and we let them turn over cards whenever they wanted to.

I finally got the song for Elijah online. You can see and listen to it here: Elijah song.

There is also a new one for Jonah if you click here:
Jonah song

My lesson plan is:

Sing: Jesus Loves Me and The B-I-B-L-E We are learning The B-I-B-L-E in sign language. The kids like challenge and so do I.

Magnetic Puzzle — Elijah and the Ravens

Sing: Elijah.

Elijah Flip Chart.

Sing: God Will Take Care of You using the flip chart.

Attendance Chart — Add a raven to the picture of Elijah sitting down by the tree.

After a child adds his raven to his attendance chart, have him choose a pillow and sit on the floor in front of the flannel board.

Retell Elijah’s story using the Betty Lukens Flannelgraphs.

Old Testament books — Work together with the large blue cards (books of law). Then let each child take a turn pointing to and saying the books on the wall with the hand pointer. After each child has had a turn, pass out the individual sets of cards with the blue cards (the law). Let each child practice putting them in order.

Review previous lessons learned with Song Timeline.

Return to seats.

Small Flannelgraph boxes. This week we will add the widow, her son and the flour oil pictures.

Prayer

Elijah Lesson 4

My Elijah lessons have not been as organized as I would’ve liked them to be. I am just now finishing some of the activities I had planned. So, I’m doing activities as they are done, not as they come in order in the story. Tomorrow we will add a flip chart about how bread was made in Elijah’s time. I will also add Joshua, Judges and Ruth to the Old Testament Books cards. The Small Flannel Boxes have an altar, and 3 water jugs added to them. They should be able to tell the story of Elijah and the Ravens, Elijah and the Widow and Elijah and the Altar with their little boxes.

My lesson plan is:

Sing: Jesus Loves Me and The B-I-B-L-E We are learning The B-I-B-L-E in sign language. The kids like challenge and so do I.

Magnetic Puzzle — Elijah and the Altar

Sing: Elijah.

Elijah Flip Chart.

Sing: God Will Take Care of You using the flip chart.

Cut and Tell Story — Elijah and the Widow — In this story, you cut out a large jar as you tell the story about Elijah and the widow.

Attendance Chart — Add a raven to the picture of Elijah sitting down by the tree.

After a child adds his raven to his attendance chart, have him choose a pillow and sit on the floor in front of the flannel board.

Old Testament books — Work together with the large blue cards (books of law). Introduce Joshua, Judges, Ruth. Then let each child take a turn pointing to and saying the books on the wall with the hand pointer. After each child has had a turn, pass out the individual sets of cards with the blue cards (the law). Let each child practice putting them in order. Let them take turns using the hand pointer to say the books as they point to them on the wall.

Small Flannelgraph boxes. This week we will add the widow, her son and the flour oil pictures.

Prayer

Elijah and the Altar Contest

This is our next to the last class on Elijah. I’ve already been thinking about Daniel (our next study). We will start studying Daniel on Mar 7. These last 2 lessons will cover the altar contest and Elijah riding to heaven in a chariot of fire. We will be adding the altar and pitchers of water to the small flannel graph boxes tonight. Sunday AM we will add the chariot of fire.

A dear friend is completing the last activity for Elijah. This activity will reinforce the whole month’ lessons. There are 5 pictures depicting Elijah and the ravens, Elijah and the widow, Elijah and the widow’s son, Elijah and the altars and Elijah and the chariot of fire. There is a set of large (1/2 of a regular sheet of paper) pictures that we will do together. Then there are individual sets for each child. After we go over it as a group, they can put their own pictures in order. We’ll do this activity tonight and Sunday AM.

My lesson plan is:

Sing: Jesus Loves Me and The B-I-B-L-E We are learning The B-I-B-L-E in sign language. The kids like challenge and so do I.

Magnetic Puzzle — Elijah and the Chariot of Fire

Sing: Elijah.

Elijah Flip Chart.

Sing: God Will Take Care of You using the flip chart.

Attendance Chart — Add a raven to the picture of Elijah sitting down by the tree.

After a child adds his raven to his attendance chart, have him choose a pillow and sit on the floor in front of the flannel board.

Elijah Flannel graph story using Betty Lukens Flannelgraphs.

Old Testament books — Work together with the large blue cards (books of law), and the first 3 red cards (Joshua, Judges, Ruth). Then let each child take a turn pointing to and saying the books on the wall with the hand pointer. After each child has had a turn, let them return to their seat. Give each child his set of OT cards to put in order on his own.

Small Flannelgraph boxes. This week we will add the altar and pitchers of water.

Prayer

Elijah And The Chariot of Fire

This is our last lesson on Elijah. I don’t think I’ve talked much about the song “God Will Take Care Of Me” yet. I’ve been singing it with the children every class time. It is an easy song and they enjoy it. I found pictures in Thru-the-Bible Coloring Book.

After about the 2nd class, I realized that although I understand all the words in the song, the kids don’t. The very words of the song are: Be not dismayed whate’er betide. What in the world does that mean to a kid. The picture I chose for that part of the song is of a little boy with a worried look on his face. There is lightning and rain in the window behind him. I’ve told them every time now that those words mean: Don’t worry about whatever happens.

I won’t go into all of the song (we only do the 1st verse). But, I had to be reminded (by the blank stares on their faces) and so I’m reminding you that they don’t understand everything we say. We’ve got to be careful to make sure they understand the words we use.

I don’t think it’s a good idea to just talk to them in words they understand either. It’s important to stretch their vocabulary by talking to them with big words. But, it’s just as important that they understand what those words mean.

My lesson plan is:

Pre-class activity: The kids that arrive early have usually worked puzzles (we have quite a selection of Bible story puzzles) until time for class to start. A couple of times this month, I have let the early birds play the memory game we have for Elijah. This works out really well. The game takes some time, so it’s hard to fit it into the regular class time. It gets their mind on the subject of the day. And they enjoy it.

Sing: Jesus Loves Me and The B-I-B-L-E We are learning The B-I-B-L-E in sign language. The kids like challenge and so do I.

Magnetic Puzzle — Elijah and the Chariot of Fire

Sing: Elijah. br>

Elijah Flip Chart.

Sing: God Will Take Care of You using the flip chart.

Attendance Chart — Add a raven to the picture of Elijah sitting down by the tree.

Cut and Tell Elijah’s Altar.

Small Flannelgraph boxes. This week we will add the chariot of fire.

Old Testament books — Work together with the large blue cards (books of law), and the next 3 red cards (1/2 Samuel, 1/2 Kings, 1/2 Chronicles). Then let each child take a turn pointing to and saying the books on the wall with the hand pointer. After each child has had a turn, let them return to their seat. Give each child his set of OT cards to put in order on his own.

If there is time read the flip chart on how they made bread in OT times.

Prayer