activities
story: The stories of Ruhu’llah, Badi, or Tahirih would be quite adaptable to this lesson. Ruhi Book 3, Grade 1 also tells the story of ‘Ali-’Askar, a Persian Baha’i merchant, who courageously stands up for his principles.
song: “Source of Courage”, from Ruhi Book 3, Grade 1.
game: “True or False”–children line up in a row, side by side. Make a statement about a well-known subject; if the statement is true, children must advance by one step, and if it is false, they must retreat by one step. Each time, allow the children to choose between “true” and “false”.

reading/prayer for study
The source of courage and power is the promotion of the Word of God, and steadfastness in His Love. (Bahá’u'lláh)

reference

experience
January 28, 2012: Coming soon.

“All men have been created to carry forward an ever-advancing civilization. The Almighty beareth Me witness: To act like the beasts of the field is unworthy of man. Those virtues that befit his dignity are forbearance, mercy, compassion and loving-kindness towards all the peoples and kindreds of the earth. ” Bahá’u’lláh. Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh. US Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1990 pocket-size edition. p.215.

activities
story: Story of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá: The Merchant and the Coal. From Book 3.

song: “It’s Me Who Builds Community”:

It’s me, it’s me, it’s me who builds commu-ni-ty. (x4)

Roll over the ocean, roll over the sea, come and do your part to build community. (x2)

Perform this song with actions. e.g. point out “me”, “you”, “we”, alternate putting one fist on top of the other at “build community”, etc.

drawing: Imagine that you have a shirt with a special pocket on it. This pocket connects to the spiritual worlds of God and allows you to pull out any virtue or spiritual quality you need to create unity in any situation, but you must decide which virtue or quality to pull out. Then imagine how the people involved could use it in the following situations:

• A classmate really wants to read a book you’re reading, but you’re not finished with it.
• An apple tree is growing between two houses, but the neighbours disagree on who the apples belong to.
• Someone stole and ate your lunch, and you know who did it.
• A friend borrowed your bicycle three months ago and hasn’t given it back, even though she said she would bring it back in a week.
• A car accident has happened. No one’s injured, but the cars are badly damaged.

game:The Octopus game: One player, the “octopus”, starts in the middle of the playing field, and the rest are lined up against one wall. The players try to cross the field over and over without getting caught by the octopus. Whoever gets caught must link hands with the octopus and catch more players. When all but one player has been caught, the game begins again and the remaining player becomes the next “octopus”.

pantomime:Children start with physical space exercises and basic mime exercises (as mentioned in Book 3A), and then start a group pantomime where they must mime being different parts of a complex object. Examples:

• A car. (Mime the engine, a door, wheels…)
• An elephant. (Mime the ears, a trunk, the belly, the legs, the tail…)
• A table. (Mime the four legs, perhaps supporting the top by picking it up and holding above their heads.)
• A crane (the machine, not the animal). (Mime the treads, the cabin, the driver, the neck and hook…)
• A room. (Mime the four walls, one with a door, maybe a window…)

reference
“O CHILDREN OF MEN! Know ye not why We created you all from the same dust? That no one should exalt himself over the other. Ponder at all times in your hearts how ye were created. Since We have created you all from one same substance it is incumbent on you to be even as one soul, to walk with the same feet, eat with the same mouth and dwell in the same land, that from your inmost being, by your deeds and actions, the signs of oneness and the essence of detachment may be made manifest. Such is My counsel to you, O concourse of light! Heed ye this counsel that ye may obtain the fruit of holiness from the tree of wondrous glory.” Bahá’u'lláh. The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh. US Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1985 reprint. p.52.

“I desire distinction for you. The Bahá’ís must be distinguished from others of humanity. But this distinction must not depend upon wealth — that they should become more affluent than other people. I do not desire for you financial distinction. It is not an ordinary distinction I desire; not scientific, commercial, industrial distinction. For you I desire spiritual distinction — that is, you must become eminent and distinguished in morals. In the love of God you must become distinguished from all else. You must become distinguished for loving humanity, for unity and accord, for love and justice. In brief, you must become distinguished in all the virtues of the human world — for faithfulness and sincerity, for justice and fidelity, for firmness and steadfastness, for philanthropic deeds and service to the human world, for love toward every human being, for unity and accord with all people, for removing prejudices and promoting international peace. Finally, you must become distinguished for heavenly illumination and for acquiring the bestowals of God. I desire this distinction for you. This must be the point of distinction among you.” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, “The Promulgation of Universal Peace”, p. 190.

If this warfare and conflict are not entirely effaced, if the whole world of humanity is not united and in accord, if the various races refuse to associate with one another, how can we ever aspire to the realization of that dream of the millennium of which it is said, “The earth will be transformed into a delectable paradise and all the children of men will live in the utmost happiness”? If the members of a family are perfectly united it will add to their comfort and joy. If the people of a city are inspired with civic unity the whole community will advance. If the inhabitants of a great continent become one spirit in different bodies marvelous progress will be made and if the people of the entire globe are welded into one great commonwealth the prayer, “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as in heaven,” will be a reality for each will have the kingdom within himself. Attributed to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. From notes compiled by Isabel Fraser Chamberlain. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá on Divine Philosophy. Tudor Press, Boston. 1918. pp.182-183.

We must be patient with each other’s shortcomings, and always strive to create love and unity among the believers, who, after all, are still immature in many ways and far from perfect. The Faith itself is the great thing, and the Bahá’ís must strive to become ever more perfect instruments for Bahá’u'lláh to use and to accomplish His purpose through. From a letter written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi, 26 May 1946 to an individual believer. Excellence in All Things, from the Compilation of Compilations, Vol. I. 1990 revision.

experience
April 10, 2011: 4 hours. Coming soon.

activities
story: The Boy Who Cried Wolf. There is an excellent retelling in Book 2 of Bahá’í Education for Children, aka the Furútan curriculum. Our children could relate to it a lot.
song: “Tell the Truth” or “Truthfulness”, from Ruhi Book 3.
craft: Nine-pointed stars—cut out three equilateral triangles for each child; help them put them together to form a regular nine-pointed star. They may either (1) place them on another piece of paper, trace them, and cut out the resulting nine-pointed star, or (2) glue the three triangles together to form a nine-pointed star. They can then decorate the star as they wish; they may also want to punch a hole in one point and run a string through to hang it somewhere when finished.

reading/prayer for study
Let truthfulness and courtesy be your adorning. (Bahá’u'lláh)

Truthfulness is the foundation of all human virtues. (‘Abdu’l-Bahá)

reference
O SON OF MAN! Neglect not My commandments if thou lovest My beauty, and forget not My counsels if thou wouldst attain My good pleasure. (Bahá’u'lláh, Arabic Hidden Word no.39)

experience
December 2, 2006: 2 hours, 10 children, average age 6-7. Pretty good class this afternoon; our only hang-up, lesson-wise, was that I didn’t prepare the craft in time, and we ended up cutting out the triangles at the last minute. Miraculously, the kids didn’t implode out of impatience. I was surprised to find such an amazing retelling of The Boy Who Cried Wolf, too. The kids weren’t looking forward to the story too much today—too much sitting quietly, I guess—but all of them got into it and could empathize with the main character. The story focused on the consequences of the boy’s actions (which were mainly along the lines of disappointing his family and his community and losing their trust) and wasn’t cheesy at all. I was afraid that telling that story would elicit groans from the kids—everyone’s heard that story way too many times, right? I was happily mistaken.

A quick word about our renewed focus on discipline: we have been taking certain steps to quiet the children down at the beginning of the class, and it seems to be paying off. While the children aren’t necessarily at their best every moment of each class, the class seems to be more manageable now. We haven’t yet had the need to apply a punishment (what Ruhi Book 3 refers to as “sanctions”—in our case, sitting apart from the class during the colouring period that now follows prayers); God willing, we won’t have to, but in the meantime all of us (the co-teachers) have to be ready to do so if disruptive behaviour arises.

August 17, 2007: 1 hours, 3 children, average age 7-8. Our calmest outreach class so far! Due to rain, we had to move the classes inside for the evening, at the home of a Baha’i who recently moved into the area. (more in a bit.)

December 5, 2007: 1 hour, 3 children, average age 8. Outreach class. wow. pretty interesting class. discipline went well even though we had some normally feisty kids in the class – things have gone better since we introduced the painting activity, which has given our more tactile/kinesthetic learners a stronger reason to engage themselves in the class. after reading prayers and singing two songs (“Tell the Truth” and “Blessed is the Spot”), we memorized the quotation (“Truthfulness is the foundation of all human virtues”), which brought us into a discussion about what a “foundation” means. I think we got the idea across well enough—we introduced the idea of the foundation of a house, and how a house would fall over if it didn’t have a good enough foundation; we then compared our souls to those houses, and explained that without truthfulness, our “soul houses” (as it were) would have nothing to stand on, just like a real house. We then launched into the story—which I hammed up a great deal, but which again seemed to have gotten the point across—and, to end off the class, we had about five or ten minutes to paint with the kids. usually we have more time to paint, but I guess I hammed up the story a little too much!

One of the children told me something interesting that made me think; I’ll share with you an abridged version. She said she had gotten into the habit of lying about little things, for example, making a mess in the house—and then blaming said mess on one of her younger sisters out of the fear of punishment. When guilt finally overtook her later on, she would confess the truth to her parents, at which point she would be punished—perhaps worse than if she had told the truth in the first place. We encouraged her to see that as a good reason to tell the truth up front, but instead she cited the inevitable punishments as being “why I don’t tell the truth anymore”. yikes. How do you go about helping a child to learn to love telling the truth when they come out with something like that? (comments welcome…)

July 3, 2010: Trying it yet again! Outreach again this time. A group of us have been doing outreach in Chinatown and met some families all living in one apartment building who showed interest in a children’s class. After meeting a few times and sharing Anna’s presentation with the families (through a significant language barrier), we finally had a class of sorts, with 4-6 boys (I’d say about 5-8 years old). We played a lot more games than usual for us, and they loved it. in fact the class was mostly games, proportion-wise. all the same, we worked on memorizing “O God, guide me” and the quote on truthfulness. The prayers were amazing, as the older children stayed in quiet meditation for a full minute after the prayers were done–I’ve never seen that in all my time doing children’s classes. My co-teacher suggested it might have been due to their Buddhist background… in any case, it was astounding and MOST welcome, and we’ll encourage them to continue doing this for sure. They loved the story about the Boy Who Cried Wolf, and they seemed to grasp all the concepts well. overall, a great summer class after a very uneventful spring season.

readings/prayers for study
Be ye the very essence of cleanliness amongst mankind.
(Baha’u'lláh, The Kitáb-i-Aqdas)

…[I]n all conditions, cleanliness and sanctity, purity and delicacy exalt humanity…
(‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Tablets of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá Abbas)

artistic activity
mirror flowers: children cut out five-petalled flowers from foam sheets, and use adhesive to stick the flowers onto a bathroom mirror. (similar to fun foam frames)
drawings: children divide a sheet of paper into two halves. On one half, they draw a person who exemplifies the Bahá’í standard of cleanliness (combed hair, clean face, neat and clean clothes, etc); on the other, they draw the same person, but who lacks cleanliness (dirty, smelly, smudged, dishevelled, etc.) Children could draw in ink (ball-point pen) first and then use water-based paint over ink, and could thus be taught how to use paints cleanly.

reference
"It hath been enjoined upon you to… bathe yourselves each week in water that covereth your bodies, and to clean yourselves with whatsoever ye have formerly employed…. Immerse yourselves in clean water; it is not permissible to bathe yourselves in water that hath already been used. … If the bather, instead of entering the water, wash himself by pouring it upon his body, it shall be better for him and shall absolve him of the need for bodily immersion." (Bahá’u'lláh, The Kitáb-i-Aqdas, pages 57-58)

"…Although bodily cleanliness is a physical thing, it hath, nevertheless, a powerful influence on the life of the spirit…. The purport is that physical cleanliness doth also exert its effect upon the human soul." (`Abdu’l-Bahá, Selections from the Writings of `Abdu’l-Bahá, pages 146-147)

Ablutions are specifically associated with certain prayers. They must precede the offering of the three Obligatory Prayers, the daily recitation of ‘Alláh-u-Abhá’ ninety-five times…

The prescribed ablutions consist of washing the hands and the face in preparation for prayer. In the case of the medium Obligatory Prayer, this is accompanied by the recitation of certain verses.

That ablutions have a significance beyond washing may be seen from the fact that even should one have bathed oneself immediately before reciting the Obligatory Prayer, it would still be necessary to perform ablutions.
(this above stuff is from Wikipedia – Ablutions)

experience
November 22, 2008: 1.5 hours, 4 children, average ages 9 and 5. the lesson itself was very short today. we had a quick conversation about cleanliness, pointing out several different ways of keeping clean (showers, baths, wearing clean clothes, brushing teeth, washing hands, trimming nails, and so on), and then looked at one of the quotes above: "…Although bodily cleanliness is a physical thing, it hath, nevertheless, a powerful influence on the life of the spirit." – ‘Abdu’l-Baha.  We set a 16×16 grid on the floor and used it to play a game sort of like hopscotch – words of the quote were placed in order throughout the grid and the children had to hop on each of the squares in order to complete the quote. After that, we continued with the masks we were working on last week.  I was going to encourage them to observe cleanliness during that activity, but we still got paint and glitter all over, because my mind was everywhere trying to keep everything else going.  You know, one kid needs help cutting while the next one wants more paint and the next one says he’s starving and wants a snack. And so on. Overall, a short lesson, the delivery wasn’t perfect, but at least we made some effort to examine a quote – which we’ve been lacking so far this year.

November 4, 2006: 2 hours, 8(?) children, average age 6-7. (…) 

March 11, 2006: 2 hours, 5 children, average age 6-7. during the fast. worked out all right. The children could relate to the topic. We managed to convey the idea that Bahá’u'lláh asks us to wash our face, hands and feet each day. This will be a useful reminder for the children in future classes. Many of them seem to have learned basic hygiene at school and/or at home. The craft was a good idea but was difficult to execute without a proper plan. note to self: refine this craft! the children liked sticking the flowers onto a mirror and seeing their faces reflected inside. when they saw an example they giggled and were quite impressed. didn’t mention the connection with the Fast, but there’s still another week for that.

• explain the purpose of the craft – what is this going to be for?
• have an example of the craft already done, so that the kids know what they’re working towards.
• write out the steps beforehand, so you know how to explain it to the kids.

activities
story: Stories of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá are very effective in conveying His kindness to the poor.
game: "Giving"—described below.

reading/prayer for study
"O YE RICH ONES ON EARTH! The poor in your midst are My trust; guard ye My trust, and be not intent only on your own ease." (Bahá’u'lláh, Arabic Hidden Words, no.54)

reference
"Know ye that the poor are the trust of God in your midst. Watch that ye betray not His trust, that ye deal not unjustly with them and that ye walk not in the ways of the treacherous. Ye will most certainly be called upon to answer for His trust on the day when the Balance of Justice shall be set, the day when unto everyone shall be rendered his due, when the doings of all men, be they rich or poor, shall be weighed." (Bahá’u'lláh, Summons of the Lord of Hosts, p. 189)

"O SON OF MAN! Bestow My wealth upon My poor, that in heaven thou mayest draw from stores of unfading splendor and treasures of imperishable glory. But by My life! To offer up thy soul is a more glorious thing couldst thou but see with Mine eye." (Bahá’u'lláh, Arabic Hidden Words, no.57)

"O SON OF MY HANDMAID! Be not troubled in poverty nor confident in riches, for poverty is followed by riches, and riches are followed by poverty. Yet to be poor in all save God is a wondrous gift, belittle not the value thereof, for in the end it will make thee rich in God, and thus thou shalt know the meaning of the utterance, “In truth ye are the poor,” and the holy words, “God is the all-possessing,” shall even as the true morn break forth gloriously resplendent upon the horizon of the lover’s heart, and abide secure on the throne of wealth." (Bahá’u'lláh, Arabic Hidden Words, no.54)

experience

November 1, 2008: 1.5 hrs, 3 kids: 9, 9, 5.  Revived the poverty card game from previous years. it was a hit, just like last time. this time, was able to make them a bit nicer (backed the printouts with card stock); still, was a little hectic–didn’t have same amounts of each six "essentials"; took a while to figure it out for the game.  the kids didn’t mind though, because they just kept on playing it and loving it. made for quite a few good conversation points, and we discussed lots of the concepts behind the elimination of the extremes of wealth and poverty. had lots of help, especially considering the fewness of the kids who came. the rest must have been sick from eating all the halloween candy, dunno.  All in all, a good class, even though I overshot our time a little and ended up having no time to work on the craft I had planned (masks, for Unity in Diversity week that comes in two weeks).

November 17, 2006: 2 hours, 5 children, average age 6-7. The key to this class was conceived at the last minute. We were missing the lesson plan we needed for this class, and I had few ideas about how to make it happen (I must admit, sadly, that I don’t know much about caring for the poor). Lacking a plan for activities, my co-teacher and a few visiting friends brainstormed until they came upon a brilliant idea for a game, which I’ll only describe in its most basic form here. Cards are prepared before the class; there are several categories, and in each category there should be enough cards for all the children. Each category describes a necessity of life: food, clothing, shelter, etc. Cards are given randomly to each child, and they must "give" away their extra cards by pairing up with other children and offering them cards. This continues until everyone has one card from each category. The game was a little complicated at first (we had no idea whether it would work!) but once we got into it, it was pretty fun. It probably needs some work, but it’s undoubtedly got a bright future. Watch this space for more news.

All in all, I think this class needs some work—we muddled through, but seeing as few of us actually have much experience caring for the poor, it’s hard for us to convey this clearly for the children. How can you explain something you’ve never done—apart from leaving a dollar for the guitar man in the market, or even washing dishes at the soup kitchen once? Comments and feedback on this class would be greatly appreciated!

activities
story: Feathers in the wind – a traditional story about gossip. There are many versions of this one.
drama: accompany the children through the skits outlined in Book 5, Lesson 13 (sin-covering eye). OR: dramatize the "Feathers in the wind" story. Have the children continue their skit after the end of the story by imagining what happens after the woman learns how not to spread gossip. What does she talk about? What has she learned about hurting people’s feelings? How do her friends react to her change of heart? How do they feel?
craft: wreaths; seasonally-themed, with feathers included to tie in with the story.

reference
Section 19.4, Book 4 of Bahá’í Education for Children, is about not hurting people’s feelings.

The Golden Rule [2] is a universal principle that kids can understand and apply in their lives every day.

O son of man! If thine eyes be turned towards mercy, forsake the things that profit thee and cleave unto that which will profit mankind. And if thine eyes be turned towards justice, choose thou for thy neighbour that which thou choosest for thyself. Humility exalteth man to the heaven of glory and power, whilst pride abaseth him to the depths of wretchedness and degradation.
(Bahá’u'lláh, Kalímát-i-Firdawsíyyih (Words of Paradise), Tablets of Bahá’u’lláh Revealed After the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, p.64)

Verily I say, the tongue is for mentioning what is good, defile it not with unseemly talk. God hath forgiven what is past. Henceforward everyone should utter that which is meet and seemly, and should refrain from slander, abuse and whatever causeth sadness in men. (Bahá’u'lláh, Kitáb-i-Ahd (Book of the Covenant), Tablets of Bahá’u’lláh Revealed After the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, p.269)

"Breathe not the sins of others so long as thou art thyself a sinner." (The Hidden Words, Arabic, no.27, p.10)

"Speak no evil, that thou mayest not hear it spoken unto thee, and magnify not the faults of others that thine own faults may not appear great…" (The Hidden Words, Persian, no.44, p.37)

"O Son of Being! How couldst thou forget thine own faults and busy thyself with the faults of others? Whoso doeth this is accursed of Me." (The Hidden Words, Arabic, no.26, p.10)

experience

October 25, 2008: 9 kids(!), ages 6-9. 1.5 hrs.  Class was not too bad at all. we took the extra step this class of putting up a poster with the ground rules that we defined during last week’s class.  if nothing else, this helped the children remember the rules, and in the long term it should help the class become a little more manageable ("what’s rule #4?")

we played a number of games today, and it worked out just as well, because I didn’t have the time to prepare the craft real well. a very bright spot was that the same parent who stayed for her children’s first class stayed again today, and indicated her desire to continue staying in the class throughout the year, in order to have some extra time with her children (being a single mother, she doesn’t have the chance to be with them all the time). having her in the class made it much more livable; otherwise, I would have been alone, and it would have been a lot more difficult to handle everyone.  the class built on the previous week’s theme of backbiting, and focused on gossip, using the "scattering feathers" story, which seemed to have an impact on the kids. (yay!) for some reason, toys seemed to start drifting into the classroom as the lesson continued; new rule required, perhaps? after we ended up with a squeaky ball on our hands (which I confiscated, along with a sort of LED taser/flashlight), we got in a circle and played a game of catch, where we had to say our name (to introduce the new children) and state a good quality (a virtue), without using the same ones more than once.  That worked well for a while, and then we switched to "telephone", which we used to illustrate how someone’s words can be twisted during the process of gossiping.

by the time we finished the games, it was nearly time to finish, so since I didn’t have my other craft idea prepared on time (feather wreaths), we just busted out the stamps that were used for the greeting cards we made during the class on obedience to parents. the kids seemed to enjoy that; one of boys, however, figured he didn’t need to play with the stamps since he was there when we did it last time, so he busted out the legos instead. i didn’t notice this until it was too late, and soon all the other boys were following his lead.  whoops.  oh well, it happens.

The Baha’i teachings condemn all forms of gossip and backbiting.We need to avoid gossip and backbiting at all costs.

activities

story: Feathers in the wind – a traditional story about gossip. There are many versions of this one.
dirty water: An activity to aid understanding of the damage done by gossip and backbiting, found at RuhiResources.org.
drama: accompany the children through two skits based on the same situation: one that shows what gossip looks like, and the other that shows how to avoid gossip.
scavenger hunt: described below. many strips of paper are prepared and scattered around the classroom or a designated area; some of them have virtues written on them, while others have faults written on them. the children must look for and bring back the strips of paper with virtues on them, and ignore the ones with faults.

reference

" … backbiting quencheth the light of the heart, and extinguisheth the life of the soul." (Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u'lláh, CXXV, p.265)

"Breathe not the sins of others so long as thou art thyself a sinner." (The Hidden Words, Arabic, no.27, p.10)

"Speak no evil, that thou mayest not hear it spoken unto thee, and magnify not the faults of others that thine own faults may not appear great…" (The Hidden Words, Persian, no.44, p.37)

"O Son of Being! How couldst thou forget thine own faults and busy thyself with the faults of others? Whoso doeth this is accursed of Me." (The Hidden Words, Arabic, no.26, p.10)

"…If any soul speak ill of an absent one, the only result will clearly be this: he will dampen the zeal of the friends and tend to make them indifferent. For backbiting is divisive, it is the leading cause among the friends of a disposition to withdraw. If any individual should speak ill of one who is absent, it is incumbent on his hearers, in a spiritual and friendly manner, to stop him, and say in effect: would this detraction serve any useful purpose? Would it please the Blessed Beauty, contribute to the lasting honour of the friends, promote the holy Faith, support the Covenant, or be of any possible benefit to any soul? No, never! On the contrary, it would make the dust to settle so thickly on the heart that the ears would hear no more, and the eyes would no longer behold the light of truth." (‘Abdu’l-Bahá: Selections from the Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, pp 230-31)

"…Thou hast written regarding aims. How blessed are these aims, especially the prevention of backbiting! I hope that you may become confirmed therein, because the worst human quality and the most great sin is backbiting; more especially when it emanates from the tongues of the believers of God. If some means were devised so that the doors of backbiting could be shut eternally and each one of the believers of God unsealed his tongue in the praise of the other, then the teachings of His Holiness Bahá’u'lláh would be spread, the hearts illuminated, the spirits glorified, and the human world would attain to everlasting felicity.

I hope that the believers of God will shun completely backbiting, each one praising the other cordially and believe that backbiting is the cause of Divine wrath, to such an extent that if a person backbites to the extent of one word, he may become dishonored among all the people, because the most hateful characteristic of man is fault-finding. One must expose the praiseworthy qualities of the souls and not their evil attributes. The friends must overlook their shortcomings and faults and speak only of their virtues and not their defects." (‘Abdu’l-Baha tablet to Dr. M. G. Skinner, August 12, 1913. Star of the West, Vol IV, No.11, Pg 192)

experience

October 18, 2008: 1.5 hours, 7 children, ages 5 to 9. This class went well; after an unpleasant attempt at going solo two weeks ago, I ensured we had another teacher present, and things went much more smoothly.  We had two new children present, and their mother stayed for the class to help them feel more comfortable.  The parents of one of our regular children also informed us that their child had been having behavioural problems at school, which was reflected in the class as well—but at least he didn’t melt down, and we found ways to encourage him (for reading a prayer beautifully, for example).  Anyway!  After prayers (I suspect we really have to assign prayers rather than let everybody flip through the books), we started on the lesson, about avoiding backbiting.  Some of the kids had a tough time maintaining their focus—that’s actually pretty normal.  (I also have to learn not to waffle as much when I present the lessons.  More about that in a forthcoming post.)

Next, we all stood up together and played Simon Says, which seemed to help them focus.  Next, we presented the day’s game—a scavenger hunt of virtues.  Strips of paper were hidden throughout the Baha’i Centre with qualities written on them: some good, some bad.  The kids were instructed to ignore the strips with "bad" qualities written on them, and to bring back the ones with "good" qualities.  In that way, we demonstrated how to "overlook" the faults of others—which, itself, just happened to be one of the "good" qualities they had to find.  The game was a success, and it was different enough from a usual scavenger hunt to challenge the kids.  They couldn’t just pick up any old strip of paper; they had to read it and analyze whether it was worth bringing back!  Once all the strips (9 of them, of course) were found, we incorporated them into a textured collage, where they glued one of the virtues onto a paper backing along with several other types of material (like aluminum foil, crumpled paper, old denim, yarn, and so on) to remind them of how we should focus on the "good" qualities even if they are surrounded by not-so-good ones.

Lessons learned from this class?  Make sure all your activities support one central theme, so that the kids have the entire class to soak up the lesson (even if they’re not listening at the start!)  Also, it pays to have teaching support.  It pays big time!  That makes me think—I should start rewarding volunteers with donuts or something… 

May 26, 2006: ~2 hours, 2 children, ages 6 and 10. Due to amazing weather conditions, most of the class was held outside, with a healthy dose of walking around. We started off by reciting prayers together (along with a few other adults), after which we continued memorizing Blessed is the Spot with the kids, accompanied by gestures to help with memorization. We had a good walk down to a nearby park in search of feathers, to help tie in with the ‘Feathers in the wind’ story. We didn’t find any – just some young leaves – so we headed back home for a break and continued along with the story. The children seemed to understand the story quite well; we asked a few questions to help some of the main concepts sink in. Afterwards, we went back outside and did about fifteen minutes of skits showing how to avoid gossip and backbiting. Afterwards, we took another walk outside to play some soccer (and tag, and marco polo).

We tried a few new things this week. One was to invite some of the adults into the opening prayers and readings. Another was to provide prayer books so that children who wanted to could read new prayers from books if they wanted to – we usually read the prayers we’ve already memorized or recite them from memory. We also put more of an emphasis on practice this time around. Much like participants in the local institute process are devoting more time to the practice included in the Ruhi curriculum, we took a little inspiration from Counsellor Scott’s talk and tried teaching some concrete skills instead of just learning what we "should" be and "should" do. I think it made a difference in the children’s understanding of how to avoid gossip. We’ll bring it up again next week and see what the reactions are. In any case, I think we’ll be using this skill-building angle more often – it seems to be much more in keeping with the spirit of the Baha’i teachings. Thoughts?

We must be fair and just at all times, even to animals.

activities

story: The Lion and the Mouse – Aesop’s fable. "Even the weak and small may be of help to those much mightier than themselves."
song: "God’s Creatures" from Ruhi Book 3.
drama/skits: Divide the children into teams of two. One team at a time, have the children improvise activities depicting kindness or unkindness to animals. (They may need to be cautioned about not acting too roughly.) One child is to be the animal and the other the person. Then have them reverse the roles.
drawing: have the children draw one of the scenarios depicted in one of the drama activities they did. Alternatively, have the children draw one scene each from the "Lion and the Mouse" story, and then bring the drawings all together in order to retell the story in pictures.
origami animals: One of the children showed us how he had learned to make origami animals last year, so I figured it might be a good activity for all of us to take part in. I guess I have to learn origami first :O

reading/prayer for study

"Do not be content with showing friendship in words alone, let your heart burn with loving kindness for all who may cross your path."’Abdu’l-Bahá, Paris Talks

reference

Because animals do not have the power of speech, `Abdu’l-Bahá states that they are to be treated with even more consideration than are people: ". . . ye do worse to harm an animal, for man hath a language, he can lodge a complaint, he can cry out and moan; if injured he can have recourse to the authorities and these will protect him from his aggressor. But the hapless beast is mute, able neither to express its hurt nor take its case to the authorities. If a man inflict a thousand ills upon a beast, it can neither ward him off with speech nor hale him into court. Therefore is it essential that ye show forth the utmost consideration to the animal, and that ye be even kinder to him than to your fellow man." (Source?)

"The world of existence is an emanation of the merciful attribute of God. God has shone forth upon the phenomena of being through His effulgence of mercy and He is clement and kind to all His creation. [...] Consequently man must learn the lesson of kindness and beneficence from God Himself. Just as God is kind to all humanity, man also must be kind to his fellow creatures. If his attitude is just and loving toward his fellow men, toward all creation, then indeed is he worthy of being pronounced the image and likeness of God." (‘Abdu’l-Baha, Foundations of World Unity, p.79)

Then, O ye friends of God! Ye must not only have kind and merciful feelings for mankind, but ye should also exercise the utmost kindness towards every living creature. The physical sensibilities and instincts are common to animal and man. Man is, however, negligent of this reality and imagines that sensibility is peculiar to mankind, therefore he practices cruelty to the animal. In reality what difference is there in physical sensations! Sensibility is the same whether you harm man or animal: there is no difference. Nay, rather, cruelty to the animal is more painful because man has a tongue and he sighs, complains and groans when he receives an injury and complains to the government and the government protects him from cruelty; but the poor animal cannot speak, it can neither show its suffering nor is it able to appeal to the government. If it is harmed a thousand times by man it is not able to defend itself in words nor can it seek justice or retaliate. Therefore one must be very considerate towards animals and show greater kindness to them than to man. Educate the children in their infancy in such a way that they may become exceedingly kind and merciful to the animals. If an animal is sick they should endeavor to cure it; if it is hungry, they should feed it; if it is thirsty, they should satisfy its thirst; if it is tired, they should give it rest.Man is generally sinful and the animal is innocent; unquestionably one must be more kind and merciful to the innocent. [...] This sympathy and kindness is one of the fundamental principles of the divine kingdom. Ye should pay great attention to this question. (‘Abdu’l-Baha, Baha’i World Faith, p.374)

experience

October 4, 2008: Argh! This class was a disaster, mainly because of me being completely unprepared for it, and being the only teacher for a class of five rowdy kids didn’t help either.  the idea of doing origami animals may have been a good one, but it was a whole lot harder to learn than I had originally thought.  most of the children just broke out the legos as I tried to wrap my head around making a crane with the one or two who actually wanted to stick with it.  In any case, I’m not sure it’d be very useful for me to report any further on this one x_X Maybe next time.

November 11, 2006: 2 hours, 7 children, average age 6-7. By now we’ve had some good experience with this lesson, so it wasn’t too hard to give. We used a nice new quote from ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to go with this lesson: "Do not be content with showing friendship in words alone, let your heart burn with loving kindness for all who may cross your path." It goes along with the subject, and it’s general enough that the kids can apply it to animals, people, and whatever else – so the kids could add it to the prayer book they’re creating. We told the story of the lion and the mouse again – many of them remembered it – after which the kids drew pictures of different parts of the story. We collected them all at the end so that we could stick them on the wall in order – a nice way to show off the kids’ work and a good way for them to remember the lesson later on. Many of the children had quite a few comments and questions about animals – including how to handle dangerous or poisonous animals, and so on. Their curiosity is really heartening. On the spur of the moment, we suggested that maybe we could dedicate a future class to learning about different animals of the world… maybe when we review the topic – either November 26th or January 6th (I love having a class calendar all planned out!)

June 24, 2006: 2 hours, 2 children, ages 6-7. This was a weird class! We were going to focus on another topic for this week, but one of the children brought his new pet hamster to the class so it seemed logical to switch topics. We had quite a lot of fun interacting with the hamster and talking about how we should treat animals with respect and do our best not to scare them. It was a bit disorganized and unfortunately, I didn’t have appropriate quotes with me to go over with the children. Should I put together a binder with materials we’ve used in the past, so we can go back to them at a moment’s notice? Or perhaps a small notebook with quotes we’ve studied? I guess I’m not really satisfied with my level of preparation for this class. Oh well, it’s done. One of our more difficult children (a 6-year-old boy) sang a prayer with the other boy who was present, of his own accord – usually we struggle to get him to say prayers. God bless these children – I can become so confused with them sometimes. Before going outside for the day, we worked on a craft we started last week – paper-people chains. OMG they loved this to pieces. One of them drew clothes and faces on his people, the other cut out pants and shirts from different-coloured paper. AWESOME activity (although not strictly in line with the topic).Another note – I was mostly alone in teaching this class today, which I found more difficult than usual. There were only two children present, so it wasn’t a major disaster or anything. I find that when I’m alone with the children, though, I get easily distracted. Me being easily distracted means that I lose control of the class easily. That’s why I prefer co-teaching to being on my own. I’m not sure what I can do to build up my ability to stay on top of things – maybe to build my own confidence, I just need more practice, more experience.

June 3, 2006: 2 hours, 5 children, average age 6-7. Apparently, the class went quite well – I was out of town for the weekend, so I wasn’t there to take part. We had two versions of the story available to read (our class operates in French, so we had to find translations). The versions we found used language that was a bit difficult for the children to understand, so the story was read once more in paraphrase to make sure everybody got it. Once the story was done, we made time for drama – we started by miming animals and having the rest of the kids guess what animal was being mimed. Afterwards, the children broke into groups and performed the skits as described above. It seems like they did well with these – I was afraid that there might have been problems with the kids being too rough, but that doesn’t seem to have been an issue. Once the skits were done, it was colouring time – we had prepared two drawings, one of a lion and one of a mouse, to go along with the story. Everyone in our class seems to love drawing and colouring time. They love getting their hands on the pens and colouring in different images.There seemed to have been two main problems during this class: first was that the materials we prepared didn’t last long enough, leaving us with jumping and screaming kids rampaging around inside at the end of the class (it was raining, so we couldn’t take them outside); second was the uncooperative attitude that some of the younger members of the class displayed. The first is relatively easy to take care of – we just have to be able to come up with more activities to have on hand during the class (potentially crafts, which are popular because of the hands-on aspect). The second isn’t so easy to resolve and has been a challenge with our class from the get-go. To be honest, it’s difficult to conduct a class for a wide age range (our oldest member is going on 11 (almost a junior youth!), and our youngest member is still 4 years old). Perhaps we need to split into several groups at some point in our class, so that each group can take part in age-appropriate activities that may better stimulate them and allow them to develop the capacities they’re struggling to develop. But what’s the difference? That’s what I’m wondering. I’ve become comfortable dealing with the older children (say, 7 to 10), but I admit that I still have a lot to learn about dealing with the younger children (4 to 6) in ways that really support their development. Any comments from readers?

activities
story of Lua Getsinger: ‘Abdu’l-Bahá asks Lua to take care of a sick man. Ruhi Book 3, Lesson 5.
story of Bahá’u'lláh and the hunter: Bahá’u'lláh asks an expert hunter not to kill innocent birds… Ruhi Book 3, Lesson 13.
simon says: the classic game. a teacher (or a child) is ‘simon’ and everyone must do as simon says, as long as simon says ‘simon says’ first.
circle, triangle, square: a memory game from Ruhi Book 3, Lesson 10.
‘blind man’: one child plays a blind person, and another acts as a guide. the guide must help the blind person navigate safely through obstacles from one end of a course to the other. var 1: the guide holds the hand of the blind person. var 2: the guide does not touch the blind person and only gives verbal commands. Ruhi Book 3, Lesson 13.
crafts: cards or gifts for parents – works well on Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, parents’ birthdays… something that shows the love and appreciation towards those who we obey.

reading/prayer for study
O Thou the Compassionate God! Bestow upon me a heart which, like unto glass, may be illumined with the light of Thy love, and confer upon me thoughts which may change this world into a rose garden through the outpourings of heavenly grace.
Thou art the Compassionate, the Merciful. Thou art the Great Beneficent God.
(‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Baha’i Prayers)

reference
O SON OF MAN! For everything there is a sign. The sign of love is fortitude under My decree and patience under My trials. (Arabic Hidden Words, no.49)

Say: From My laws the sweet-smelling savour of My garment can be smelled, and by their aid the standards of Victory will be planted upon the highest peaks. The Tongue of My power hath, from the heaven of My omnipotent glory, addressed to My creation these words: “Observe My commandments, for the love of My beauty.” Happy is the lover that hath inhaled the divine fragrance of his Best-Beloved from these words, laden with the perfume of a grace which no tongue can describe. By My life! He who hath drunk the choice wine of fairness from the hands of My bountiful favour will circle around My commandments that shine above the Dayspring of My creation. (Kitab-i-Aqdas, para.4, page 20)

experience
September 27, 2008: 1.5 hours, 3 children, average age 8-9. we’re back to one teacher again (me). got off to a bit of a rough start (wow, how many times have I written that) and had to go over the rules with the kids. now that I think of it, I totally should have expected to spend this class going over ground rules. one of the children was especially impatient, “we already know the rules!!” (yet was throwing pillows and sitting improperly, etc). so we ended up spending a fair bit of time at the beginning just trying to get ready for prayers, which is never much fun. same child also wanted to read “the longest prayer in the prayer book”; had to reason with him a little on that point (we don’t want to discourage children to say prayers!).  so I asked if the children knew people that they really loved talking to and listening to—conversing with—someone to whom they could feel comfortable telling anything.  then I explained that praying is the same, but conversing with God.  God listens to us, and we are able to tell Him anything that’s on our minds or on our hearts.  if we pick a prayer from the prayer book and recite what it says, and yet our minds are elsewhere being silly and not paying attention to what we’re saying, then God wants to hear us and listen to us, but there’s nothing to listen to.

we’ll have to revisit this concept with the children, but especially with that one child—the concept that prayer is not just parroting the words in a book, but is something you genuinely feel.  perhaps we should devote a part of one class to “how to choose a prayer”; is this an issue that others have had? how did you deal with it? is it something that becomes clearer to the children as they grow older? is it better to deal with it when they become junior youth? dunno, lol.

craft went very well; we made cards for our parents—I did a run to the new art superstore that opened up close to here, and picked up some really nice materials and stamps for the kids to use. it was genuinely fun to do for all of us—we weren’t many, of course, so that probably helped things go smoothly. kids were very excited to hear that there would be more art projects. need to fit in more games, though, especially for the one child who seems to have a lot of trouble learning without them. it almost seems like we should be taking more time for the class, that an hour and a half isn’t enough. now that our kids are older (8-9) they should have the capacity to keep their attention on the lesson as long as it is reasonably varied, and today’s experience seems to have borne that out.

October 21, 2006: 2 hours, 8(?) children, average age 6-7. (…)

June 17, 2006: 2 hours, 3 children, ages 4, 6, and 7. Another class that went well, especially since I didn’t really take all that much time to prepare. Before the class, we (the teachers) had a little time to chat and determined that we should focus on having each of the children say a prayer, or at least participate in the prayers. Some of our kids don’t really like saying prayers – we haven’t quite figured out why. I’ve been wondering whether it might be related to the atmosphere we create surrounding prayers – perhaps they need some quiet-down time before starting with prayers, or perhaps we just need to be firmer. Anyway, we took advantage of the class’s theme, starting the class by telling the kids we would be talking about obedience today, and that one way we show our obedience (to God) is by praying. One of the kids was more than happy to recite prayers, but the other two (the younger ones – not sure if that’s relevant?) didn’t want to. One of them eventually lip-synched a prayer and we ended the prayers by singing a prayer together, so we left it at that. I’d really appreciate feedback from people who’ve had similar issues surrounding prayers… we’re trying to understand what we might be doing or not doing that is keeping certain children from participating in the prayers (to the point of consistently refusing!)

The other point of revisiting obedience is because this week’s class falls on Father’s Day weekend – you know, obedience to parents and all that. After reading a story about Lua Getsinger and her obedience to ‘Abdu’l-Baha and performing some skits comparing obedience and disobedience, we set to work on Father’s Day cards. These were sheets of paper folded in 4, on which the kids drew and wrote “Happy Father’s Day” type messages. We had planned several other things to work on (such as prize ribbons made by paper-folding) in case we had extra time, but ended up finishing on time without having gone into the extra activities. The activities went well because folding paper is just fun, but I think the kids found it difficult not to have an example already finished to guide them. We’ve come across this before… food for thought! All in all, the class flew by (which is a good sign, I suppose). We seem to have some pretty good luck with this topic – every time we talk about obedience, the kids are more obedient. Maybe we’re too soft the rest of the time! Actually, that’s another thing we’ve discussed – we tend to be soft on discipline and not to push too hard when the kids don’t want to do something. That can be a big problem though, especially when it comes to prayers – God tells us to pray, so we can’t just not do it.

Thoughts about all this are greatly welcomed!!!

April 8, 2006: 1.5 hours, 4 children, average age 6-7. This class went well – better than we had expected! It had been a while since we had revisited the topic of obedience and it was long overdue. Most of the children had just come back from a birthday party (one of them was the birthday boy) so they were a bit rowdy and undoubtedly full of sugar, so it took a little while to get them calmed down, but miraculously, it happened. We said prayers (with some difficulty) and sang some songs, after which we had a talk about obedience. I think the children were able to catch what we were saying on some level; we gave all sorts of examples, and even asked them if some of the things they were doing (for example, writhing on the floor or sitting quietly, being loud or showing reverence during prayers, etc) were examples of obedience or not. Their conduct seemed to improve during the colouring period / artistic activity, where we used the drawing from Ruhi Book 3 – of a young boy kneeling to pray. We explained the connection between the drawing and the content of the lesson. They were even sharing pencils and felt pens while colouring, and patiently waiting for their turn with certain colours (with minimal grabbing)!

The simple nature of this lesson seems to be what made it so successful (at least in our eyes). In fact, most of the lesson was taken straight from Ruhi Book 3 – you can’t get much simpler. As well as being simple, the lesson was also focused – since the Ruhi lessons are designed to reinforce the theme of each lesson in many different ways (through memorization, songs, stories, games and art).

activities
story: any story about asking permission may do; the story of the fish inside the reservoir from Ruhi Book 3 might do in a pinch.
maze: “Obtaining Permission” (Obtenir la Permission) (PDF); children must navigate a maze that seems simple to complete, but before they are able to complete it, they must first “obtain permission” (in the form of a detour).
drama: children act out situations where they share their possessions with friends—for example, playing together with toys, sharing crayons, etc. how do the children feel when someone takes something of theirs without their permission?

reference

experience
Dec. 8, 2007: 1.5 hours, 6 children, average age 7-8. I was skeptical about how this class would turn out, because, to be honest, the topic seemed bizarre at first—how do you explain this Bahá’í law to children? Of course, the curriculum we’re using is quite clear—when we observe this law by asking permission before entering a home or laying hands on someone’s belongings, we are showing them courtesy and respect. So we spoke to the kids about this during the lesson; they seemed to get it, but in retrospect, I think I may have spent too much time talking. we could have integrated some sort of activity to help the children understand, for instance, a short dramatic exercise. that’s for next time, maybe. All in all, this lesson went well. the children found the maze challenging, which was the point behind it—I designed it from scratch to illustrate that we need to have the presence of mind to ask permission before impulsively infringing on someone’s property. in retrospect, this kind of thing applies in many different situations in class—sharing crayons during the colouring portion of class, respecting the property of the Baha’i Centre where we hold our classes, asking for permission before taking snacks out of the cupboards, and so on.