Expedition in the Desert: Joseph

Die Wüste. Obwohl sie gefährlich ist, sind trotzdem viele wichtige und wunderschöne Dinge dort geschehen. In der Bibel (und in der Godly Play Pädagogik) ist die Wüste nicht nur ein geographischer Ort, sondern ein existentieller Ort. Ein Ort, in den wir nicht unbedingt freiwillig hingehen, sondern einer, wo wir an unsere Grenzen kommen. Ein Ort, in dem Gott uns mit seiner Gnade begegnet.  The desert. A dangerous, but fascinating place. In the Bible (and in the Godly Play concept), it is not just a physical place, but an existential one. A place where we come to the end of our own strength and resources. A place that we don't go willingly. But a place where God meets us and gives us a new perspective. 

Materials for the Joseph story.
Click here for more about the dream boards.

Joseph is reunited with his brothers.

In der AG, "Expedition in die Wüste!" entdecken wir die Wüste und was Gott da mit seinen Kindern macht. Wir fingen mit der alt-testmentlichen Geschichte von Josef an. Was für eine Geschichte! Man hat Geschwisterkonflikte, Eifersucht, Räche, unverdiente Strafe und veil mehr in dieser Geschichte. Aber Josef stellt etwas Wichtiges fest: er ist nie allein gewesen und Gott kann immer etwas Gutes aus einer traurigen Situation machen. As you may have already guessed, in our latest after school club, called "Expedition in the Desert!", we explore the desert and how God interacts with his children in it. We began with the story of Joseph. What a story! There is something for everything to identify with here: sibling rivalry, jealousy, revenge, unjust accusations, imprisonment. But Joseph finds out something very important, namely that he is never alone and that God can make something beautiful out of the worst situations.

Die meisten Kinder sind schon lange in diesen AGs zusammen gewesen, deswegen gibt es ein gewisses Vertrauen unter ihnen. Man hat das im Ergründungsgespräch gemerkt, da sie viel verbal geäußert haben. Als ich gefragt habe, welcher Teil der wichtigste sei, haben einige die Stelle gennant, wo Josef seinen Brüdern hilft ohne sich zu rächen. Die Kinder haben wahrgenommen, wieviel es Josef gekostet hat um die richtige Entscheidung zu treffen. Noch eine Frage war, ob die Kinder selber erlebt haben, wo Gott eine entäuschende Situation zum Guten verwandelte. Dann haben wir uns daran errinert, wann vor einem Jahr unsere AdventsAG im letzen Moment aus Mangel an Räumlichkeiten ausfallen musste. Dadurch fanden wir ein zu Hause bei der evangelischen Gemeinde in der Nähe von der Schule und haben die Pfarrerin, Christina-Maria, kennengelernt. Jetzt haben wir einen schönen, ruhigen Ort, wo wir Gott entdecken können. Eine Lampe ging da bei den Kindern auf. Most of the children present have been in every after-school club that we have offered. Because they know each other and some trust has been established, the kids were verbal from the get-go during the Wondering. For many, the favorite and most important part of the story was that Joseph blessed his brothers in the end instead of trying to get back at them. One of the questions I asked was about whether or not the children had experienced a situation where God had turned something bad into something good. Together, we remembered how last year at Advent, our club had been cancelled at the last minute for different reasons. But as a result, we got to know Christina, the pastor of the church on the same street as our school, who now co-leads the club with me and Melinda. And then, we were able to use the beautiful rooms in this church that are quieter and more comfortable than the ones at our school. A light seemed to come on in the kids' heads at that point.

Während der Kreativzeit dürfen die Kinder entweder mit dem Geschichtematerial spielen oder sich hit dem Kunstmaterial beschäftigen. Es hat much gefreut, dass einige Kinder auch mit dem Material von den Geschichtentisch spielen wollten. During our creative phase, the children can either play with the story materials or work with the art materials. I was delighted that several children wanted to explore the materials.

Wie wäre eine Wüste-AG ohne Sand? Neben Farbe und Buntstiften bieten wir Projekten mit Sand an. Diese Woche haben wir Sandbilder gemacht. Melinda und ich haben vorher den Sand gefärbt. Dann "zeichneten" die Kinder Skizzen mit Bastelkleber und streuten den Sand darauf. Schöne Bilder sind entstanden und es war ein taktiles Vergnügen für die Kinder.  In addition to paint and colored pencils, we will be offering art materials that use sand in order to explore the desert a little more. This week, we made sand pictures. Melinda and I dyed the sand beforehand. The children then "drew" pictures with glue and sprinkled sand over the glue to create some unique artwork.

Mehr Aktion von der Wüste kommt in den nächsten Tagen! Stay tuned for more action in the desert! 

(One important point for my readers who are particularly interested in Godly Play: though I borrow heavily from Godly Play and use its principles and structure in the club, this particular story of Joseph is not actually a Godly Play story, but rather a story that has been written for our German-speaking context. If you are planning to share this post or pin it on Pinterest, please honor Jerome Berryman, the creator of Godly Play, by not labeling it as Godly Play. Thank you!) 

To see our other desert adventures:

Expedition in the Desert: Moses

Expedition in the Desert: Abraham & Sarah

Expedition in the Desert: The 10 Best Ways to Live

Linked to:

Godly Play: The Holy Family

Materials for "The Holy Family": a nativity set
and the cross that is also the Risen Christ

In our Sunday Godly play group, I am currently preparing two children, one of them a special needs child, for baptism. Because of this, I am focusing on many of the core stories of Godly Play that allow the children to explore the basic beliefs of the Christian faith. "The Holy Family" is a simple story that helps children connect Baby Jesus in the manger to the Risen Christ they hear about at Easter.  

In fact, children often think that I am going to tell them the Christmas story when I pull out the materials and sometimes exclaim, "But it's not Christmas!" or "I already know that story . . ." But as soon as I begin by showing them Baby Jesus and explain that "his arms are stretched out to give you a hug . . . ", they usually begin to refocus and listen intently. The climax of the story is when I hold Baby Jesus directly in front of the figure of the Risen Christ (which is also in the form of a cross) and say, "Now Jesus can stretch out his arms to hug the whole world. He's not with us in the same way he was earlier. Now he is with us everywhere and all the time." (My translation from the German text!) Such a simple statement, but so powerful. 

The Wondering questions for this story have to do with which figure of the Holy Family the children like best, which is the most important, which figure tells something about them and which one we could leave out and still have everything we need for the story. There is also a question about where the children might have seen the figures of the Holy Family outside of our Godly Play room. Last time we met, there was no verbal wondering at all, probably since it was our first time together as a group. But this week, the children war quite chatty. Perhaps they were more used to each other, or perhaps it was easier for them to verbally process the Holy Family than the Great Family.

One of the children was quite distracted during the story and spent most of her time with my door person. I sent the story home with her mother, so that she could bring it up with the child at home at a more peaceful moment. Parental support is an integral part of any Godly Play program.

If you were specifically preparing a child for baptism, which Godly Play stories would you choose?

Art Project: Sand Pictures

Here is a super easy project that is a tactile delight for children: sand pictures. All you need is colored sand, glue and paper! I found this great idea here when planning our newest after-school club, "Expedition in the Desert!". 

To make the colored sand, I used this recipe. You simply mix food coloring and a little water into sand and let it dry out. In Germany, the food coloring is a gel rather than the liquid that one finds in the States. The gel doesn't work at all, so we had to go to a hobby store to find powdered food coloring (pictured). It then worked fine with a little water.

Then, the children "draw" a picture with glue and sprinkle the sand over the glue. They dust off the excess sand and a simple, yet beautiful picture emerges. 

To hear more about "Expedition in the Desert!" and see how we used this project, click here.

Linked to The Magic Onions

and Naturkinder

Montessori Musings: Wheel of Choice

I don't often write about my "other" life as an English teacher for the first through fifth grades, but it goes hand-in-hand with my work as a children's pastor. Through Godly Play I became interested in Montessori pedagogy, and I've been able to use its principles in my classroom as well as at church.

Montessori is all about empowering children to make good choices. As both a teacher and a children's pastor, I feel it is my responsibility to prepare children for life. One huge tool for survival in this world is learning to deal with conflict. When children are equipped in this area at an early age, they are much more able to cope with and view adversity positively as adults.

Up until this year, I had only been teaching smaller groups of up to 15 students. This year for the first time, I was given a class of 27 third graders. I have to say that I panicked a bit at first at the thought of trying to teach a foreign language to that many students at one time with no other assistance in the room.

In coming up with a structure, I also realized that the students had to have a way to settle conflicts on their own. Last year, I instituted the "peace table" to help the students, but they still needed me to help them get to the peace table. With 27 students, I had to come up with a way to help them problem-solve on their own, so that I could actually teach English.

I turned to one of my go-to books for classroom management, Postitive Discipline in the Classroom, by Montessorians Jane Nelson, Lynn Lott and H. Stephen Glenn. One of the tools in the book is the "Wheel of Choice". It works like this: when the children have a conflict, they go to the wheel together and decide on a course of action.

Here is my modified version of the book's wheel:

Students must try at least two of these options before coming to the teacher.

I tell my students to try two of them first, before they come to me. And you know what? It actually works. Even though our classroom is a bit like a circus with three stations going on at one time, I have not once had to take time out from working with a group to referee an argument. In fact, my classroom is more peaceful than ever.

I recommend trying this with any large groups of children that you work with. It make take some time for them to initially learn what to do, but the long-term results are worth it.

Godly Play: The Great Family

Two new children have joined our Sunday Godly Play group, and I am helping to prepare them for baptism. From now until their baptism in October, I will be presenting some of the "core" Godly Play stories that explain deep truths of the Christian faith.

We began with "The Great Family", a story that I never get tired of telling. This is the story of childless Abraham and Sarah who discover not only that God is always with them, but that he brings amazing things out of barrenness. In this story, the children learn how the Jewish people came to be and that Jesus himself was born into this Great Family; that the Christian Church was born from this family, and that the children themselves are now a part of this Great Family.

The Great Family: this is the point in the story where Isaac is born.

Once again, my kitchen has become my Godly Play room. (For more on adapting GP to different situations see, Chameleon Godly Play and Godly Play on the Go.) Here is a quick view of my focus table and story "shelf".

This are my art shelves for the creative phase. I have three simple options: paint, colored pencils, and modeling clay.

To my delight, the children seem to be playing more with the materials this year instead of always rushing immediately for the art supplies. (Not that this is bad, but I do enjoy seeing a variety of things going on.) This is my "door person", Melinda, playing with a child during the creative phase. 

Two children playing with the materials from "The Ten Best Ways to Live".

I managed to snap a picture of some of the work with clay. The pink thing in the middle is a boat, perhaps a reminder of Paul's Discovery which this child heard a few weeks ago. 

One of the children in our group is a younger, special needs child, so I prepared a Practical Life activity for her. This is a simple transfer exercise where the child places a small wooden bird (left in the bowl) into each apple. My door person explained to the child that "the birds were hungry and wanted to eat an apple". Not only is this great fun for younger children, it trains their fine motor skills as well as developing mathematical skills.

Sneak Preview: Joseph's Dreams

On Wednesday, we'll be starting a new after-school club called "Expedition in the Desert!", which will cover some of the foundational Old Testament stories that take place in the desert. Some of the stories will be Godly Play and some won't. However, everything we do will be firmly grounded in the Godly Play and Montessori principles of respecting the child and giving them space to approach and be approached by God. 

I've been working on some materials for a biographical story of Joseph and thought I'd give you a sneak preview. Here are some panels that I have painted depicting Joseph's dreams and his interpretations of dreams found in the book of Genesis.

This is Joseph's first dream with the wheat stalks that gets him into trouble with his brothers. 

The second dream with the sun, moon, and 11 stars bowing to him also does not help his popularity with the siblings.

After being sold as a slave and being thrown in jail, he interprets a dream as a favor to a fellow prisoner. The prisoner will be released and become the king's cupbearer, but Joseph will be forgotten.

The final dream that he interprets of the seven fat cows and seven lean cows gives Joseph a new start in life.

Godly Play: Paul's Discovery

Most Godly Play storytellers present Paul's Discovery, about the life of the Apostle Paul, in the spring after Pentecost. But because our church plant only has two Sunday gatherings a month, we finally got to it in July. This is a longer story that gives some historical background into Paul's world. It emphasizes the drastic change that occurred in Paul and why he so was transformed. 

As you can see, the materials are reminiscent of The Faces of Easter, about the life of Christ. Like Faces, it is a biographical story told with pictures laid in chronological order.  The red underlay reminds the listeners of the Holy Spirit and the season of Pentecost. 

To make the panels, I ordered prints by the German artist, Juliana Heidenreich, from the Diakonie Leipzig, the Godly Play supplier in Germany. I then mounted them on wooden panels, and finished them off with a coat of matte varnish. 

Because this story is so long, I chose to tell it in two parts. On the first Sunday, we heard the first three panels that depict Paul's early life up until he meets the Risen Christ on the road to Damascus. 

Although the children present had heard the story of Paul's conversion many times in children's Bibles, they hung on every word of the story. When I stopped after the third panel, they begged me to go on. But since I wanted them to really have a chance to digest what they had heard, and because I had not yet had a chance to memorize the rest of the story (!), I gently told them that I would continue at our next children's service. 

At our next gathering, I told the second half of Paul's story, which deals with how he was  transformed by God's love and able to teach others to love as well. The listeners also hear about Paul's calling and how he used all of his gifts to do what God asked of him. 

Everyone knows that working with children is very unpredictable. While they hung on every word of Part 1, they seemed quite distracted during Part 2. During the Wondering, one child was a bit upset that no one knows exactly how Paul died. 

Another child drew ships both times during the creative phase, perhaps due to a combination of hearing about Paul's shipwrecks and a recent visit to the Deutsche Museum in Munich, which has a vast collection of historic sailing ships.  I love seeing the connections that children make!