F
God and Air
Aim
To acquaint children with the idea that God is both invisible and omnipresent.
Lesson
Before the lesson make a magic box by covering a shoe box with brightly coloured wrapping paper. Provide yourself with a windmill or flag which will blow in the wind.
Begin lesson by showing children your magic box. Tell them that it is magic because, when you open its lid, you can see inside the box anything which you would like to see. Demonstrate the box's magical powers by imagining that you can see a herd of multi-coloured elephants. Ask the children to think what they would like to see inside the box. Choose a child whom you know will 'see' what she wants to see, to peep inside the box. Allow other children to do the same. If the children cannot see, encourage them to try harder.
After sufficient numbers of children have seen inside the box, remove the lid and show the contents of the box to the rest of the group. Discuss with the group whether or not the children reallly did see anything inside the box? Having established that the children were pretending, tell the group that there really is something inside the box which they cannot see. Do they know what it is?
The answer is of course 'air'.
Explore the children's understanding of air.
Send children to different parts of the classroom. Is there air, where they are? How do they know? Can they see it? What would happen to them if they found themselves in a place without air? Can they feel the air?
Ask children to blow on their hands. Can they feel the air now? What can air do?
Choose a child to blow the windmill. What can air do when it becomes a strong wind?
Tell the child that whereas some people believe God is just made up like the multi-coloured elephants in the box, some other people believe He is real in the same way that air is real. He is invisible. He lives everywhere. He can do things. You can feel him sometimes. Without Him, there would be no life.
