9-29 Class Baptism

This week we did Chapter 2. 

Before we got going with class, we took care of housekeeping. MOST of the class did their homework from last week! We reviewed ways to check on the homework in case you can't remember what it is such as: checking the website or looking at the circle pages or post-it flags in the book. We also collected bulletins and song sheets for those who attended Mass last weekend. One classmate lost his bulletin, but Mom wrote a note about attending Mass. That was a great idea!

We began by praying around the Prayer Table and asking for special intentions for those in our lives who need extra prayer.

The next several pictures will show you the mobiles we made. We talked about being God's people and we drew pictures of people in our lives that are important to us. Some of us drew pictures and some of us wrote names depending on what was more comfortable for us. 

Chapter 2 was about Baptism. We talked about our own baptisms and some of us shared stories we have heard about our baptisms. Take a moment this week to talk to your child about his/her bapstism. Find some photos if you can and talk about the special day. 

We learned there are 4 important symbols at a baptism
water-to symbolize cleansing our sins away
oil-symbolizes the Holy Spirit
white clothes-symbolizes purity
candle-represents the light of Christ in our lives

When you look at your baptism photos, keep an eye out for those 4 things!

We learned that with baptism we entered in as members of the Church.

After learning about baptisms, we acted one out. We came up with ideas of who would be there such as: parents, godparents, grandparents, and a priest!

We followed along with the book and acted our a baptism.

(The garbage can was the baptismal font)

Pouring "water" over the baby's head

Rubbing oil on the baby

Making the sign of the cross

Giving the godparents a candle lit from the Easter Candle

Proud Parents with their baby

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Our closing prayer

Homework:

Chapter 2 review: pages 33 and 34

Preparation for Chapter 3: pages 45 and 46

Attend Mass and bring a bulletin or song sheet to class from each week

First Day of Class

We had a super first day of second year religious ed today! This year the class make ups are a little different. We have second graders and third graders that are all making their First Communion this year. 

Mrs. Barb (the DRE) came to visit us. We learned she is like the "principal" of Religious Ed

We worked together to set up our prayer table. We added a green table cloth for Ordinary Time. We learned that the church has seasons, but they aren't fall, winter, spring, summer, like we are used to! Right now we are in the season of Ordinary Time and the color for that is green. We see green in the church and the priest wears green. All of us helped come up with ideas of things to put on the prayer table. What we have: candle (because Jesus is the light of the world), cross (because Jesus died on the cross to save us from our sins), rosary (to help us pray), Bible, and even a picture of Jesus. Someone had the idea to put a picture of Jesus, and even though Ms. Stephanie and Ms. Reema hadn't planned to use one, they found one in their supplies!

We all gathered around the table to pray for a good year of Religious Ed, to ask God to help us learn, and we also had a chance to ask for special prayers for people in our lives who need them. After each prayer request we said, "Lord, hear our prayer."

After that, we made nametags with our name and we drew two pictures of things that represent us. We shared them with the class. Ms. Stephanie drew a book because she LOVES to read and a pumpkin because she grows pumpkins and sells them at Halloween. Ms. Reema drew a book because she LOVES to read too and a craft table because she loves to do crafts. 

We are going to "grow in the spirit" this year, so we wrote names of people that are important to us, that can help us grow, on a flower and cut it out. Some of us wanted to finish coloring and took them home. But we need to bring them back! Ms. Stephanie took our photos and they are going to go in the middle and hang around the room.

We went through Chapter 1 in our books today. We talked about different communities that we are a part of such as: family, school, soccer, cheerleading, guitar, church. We all brainstormed was to be part of our family, neighborhood, and church communities. 

In our books, we read a story about Levi welcoming Jesus to dinner. We read another story about a young boy named Tommy who moved into a new neighborhood and how some people were caring and welcoming towards him. In our books we drew ways we can be caring and welcoming such as: bringing food, saying hi, inviting him to play, bringing clothes, teaching him about the neighborhood, etc.

At the end of class, we reviewed what we learned for the day. We learned that if we ever miss a class, we can still do the homework because Ms. Stephanie posts it right here on the website! We also learned that we are going to have a sticker chart for attending Mass and for doing our homework!

Homework:

-read the parent letter

-sign up for the Remind101 Text Messaging for Miss Stephanie AND Mrs. Barb

-fill out slip with email addresses and return next week

-Go on the BlestAreWe website and do an activity

-Do homework in the book with the post-it flags: 33, 34, 35, 36

4 pages may seem like a lot of homework, but don't worry! It won't take more than a few minutes to go through it together. A lot of it just just a quick review of what we did. The next two pages are preparing you to talk as a family about the chapters we will cover next week! I believe that YOU, the family, are just as important in the religious education process as me, the teacher!

VBS Day 4

You can check out the slideshow from our 4th day of VBS below!

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What you will see:
Sing and Play-singing our songs for the day and learning the Bible Point
Snack-Learning about the snack for the day and making it!
Games-The preschoolers running through the hula hoop obstacle course. Then the older kids picked up clouds (cotton balls) with their noses!)
Snack-Yum!
Imagination Station-Voting with our beads. 
Chadder-Chadder quizzed us about what we learned yesterday. 
Bible Adventures-We learned that Jesus died on the cross. Our crew leaders walked around the room with a cross to remind us how Jesus carried his cross. For us! For every one of us. We held our arms out and realized it must have been tiring! Then we talked about things that we do that aren't a good idea and put our sins on the cross. Jesus saved us from our sins!
Imagination Station-We threw our flyers outside!
Finale-We have raised over $170 so far for mosquito nets! Then Miss Sarah was trying to figure out how to make her kite work with the two halves. It just wouldn't work! Then she taped the pieces together and it worked! Through the cross, all things are possible!




We look forward to seeing you for our celebrations on Friday and Sunday!

VBS Day 3

We can't believe there are only 2 more days left of VBS! We have learned so much and made such great friendships in such a short time! You may notice in the pictures we look goofy. It was crazy day!

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What you see:
Sing and Play: Putting cotton balls on our poster to represent our God Sightings. Take the time to look around and notice God in everything you do! Silly Flash visits us at Sing and Play every day. We are teaching her to TRUST GOD!
Snack: We worked as a team to make the snack for the day.
Preschool Games
Snack: We had rootbeer floats! We put the ice cream in and then added the rootbeer. The ice cream floated to the top just like an eagle soars in the sky! The preschoolers also say our prayer when they have snack!
Imagination Station: Decorating our tube-a-loons
Bible Adventures: We found some clues in our garden and went on a hunt for clues. We found: 30 coins that Judas left when he felt bad for betraying Jesus, a crown of thorns Jesus wore, Jesus' clothes, and Pontius Pilate's belongings. With his belongings we found a bowl of water because he "washed his hands of Jesus". We went back to our garden and prayed together. 
Chadder Movie and Missions: We talked about Scout the eagle and then prayed together with Chadder. 
Preschool Imagination Station: We decorated our tube-a-loons and then threw them!
Imagination Station: Throwing our tube-a-loons outside. Just some plastic, but they could fly!
Sotlight Drama: Watching the powerpoint that WE starred in of the Bible Story.
Finale: We talked about mean things that people do. All of the crew leaders brought up balloons that represented bad things that kids do to each other. 

She felt the weight of the balloons. But when she trusted God, the balloons fell away!

 

VBS Day 2

Sorry I am late posting. We had a great day 2! You can read about what we learned today on the coloring sheet your child brought home.


Check it out!

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What you see:
Sing and Play: Reviewing yesterday and learning the Bible Point for today. Collecting donations for our mosquito net collection. For every $6 collected, one mosquito net can be purchased to protect 2 kids in Africa!
Snack Service: One group made the snack for the day. Jello hearts and strawberry hearts!
Preschool Games: The "raised" Lazarus from under the parachute. 
Snack: We all ate together. 
Imagination Station: Decorating our hover balls: getting ready for our experiment. 
Bible Adventures: We learned about Jesus' friend Lazarus who was sick. We took care of him by putting blankets on him, but he died. We wrapped him in toilet paper and he went in the tomb. Jesus arrived and was very sad.  Suddenly a light came on and he came out. Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. 
Preschool Imagination Station: Making our hoverballs!
Games
Spotlight Drama
Finale: We learned that even when there are dark clouds around, the sun is always there behind them. Just like God is always there, even when we are sad! We also sang our songs and reviewed the day!

VBS Day 1

We had a phenomenal first day of VBS today!

Your child came home with a coloring sheet with information containing our Bible Point, Bible Buddy, and Bible Story. Take some time to talk to your child about this at home. They have a lot to share!

Check out our slideshow from today! You can see all of the fun things we did. In the middle you can even see a video of our snack time prayer! You could do this prayer at home before you eat too!

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What you saw:
Sing and Play: singing and dancing and learning about the day
Snack: The preschoolers had snack service today. They made snack for everybody!
Spotlight Drama: Each day one group takes photos during games for our slideshow at the end of the day!
Games: Fun outside! The games focus on cooperation, not competition.
Imagination Station: Today we made our namebadge holders. They also hold our Bible Buddies!
Bible Adventures: We met out leaders and joined a Roman army! We saw a Roman officer's faith in action and discoverd Jesus' healing power!
Chadder Movie and Missions: We met Chadder and saw a movie about him. We started learning about our Operation Kid-to-Kid project. And got a Bible Buddy!
Snack: We all eat together. But first we pray!
Games: More games!
Finale: We reviewed the day, sang songs, played a game called "Will it launch?" and learned about our mosquito net donation collection. 1 net protects 2 kids for 4 years. Crazy!

Welcome to VBS 2012

Check out the VBS intro video here:

At Sky, kids discover that for God, ALL things are possible! Sky is filled with incredible experiences that allow kids to see, hear, touch, and even taste! Science-Fun Gizmos, team-building games, cool faith-filled songs, and tasty treats are just a few of the Sky activities that help faith flow into real life. Plus, we’ll help kids discover how to see evidence of God in everyday life – something we call God Sightings. Get ready to hear that phrase a lot. Ask your child about his/her God Sighting each day!

Your kids will also participate in a hands-on project, through a program called Operation Kid-to-Kid with Catholic Relief Services, that will let the kids in our community show God’s love to children in Africa. We will be collecting donations (even pennies are great!) Tuesday through Friday. For each $6 collected, we will be able to donate one mosquito net to children in Africa to protect them from Malaria. One mosquito net protects 2 children for 4 years! Your child can bring change, cash, or a check (made to Church of the Holy Spirit) if you would like to participate.

Click on this picture to learn more about mosquito nets: