baha’i children’s class ideas.

learning concepts
Truthfulness is a law that Bahá’u'lláh has established that the world may be united. We should tell the truth at all times, even if it is difficult. This way, we will be worthy of the trust of others.

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…)

the past week, I’ve been involved with a neighbourhood teaching/outreach project that’s endeavouring to offer all of the core activities in tandem to the local community. some of us are looking after junior youth activities, home visits with local residents, and study circles; I’m helping to look after a children’s class. After teaching a couple of classes to an enormous ring of kids the first few days, we split the class into a younger (5-9) and an older (10-11) class, with the younger children studying lessons from Book 3 of the Ruhi curriculum and the older children studying lessons from Book 3A (aka the old Book 5). As reported tonight, we’ve had an average of 8 children in both children’s classes together, and an average of 5 junior youth—and that’s only in one part of the neighbourhood.

learning concepts

God loves justice. Justice means that we must respect the rights of every human being and make sure we do not take away from anyone what they deserve.

activities

story: pp. 43-44, Ruhi Book 3: ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in the stagecoach.
games: we often play games as examples of justice… is it just to break the rules? how can we ensure that we can be just while we play games?

reference

Tread ye the path of justice, for this, verily, is the straight path. (Gleanings, p.250)  

The best beloved of all things in My sight is Justice; turn not away therefrom if thou desirest Me, and neglect it not that I may confide in thee. By its aid thou shalt see with thine own eyes and not through the eyes of others, and shalt know of thine own knowledge and not through the knowledge of thy neighbor. Ponder this in thy heart; how it behooveth thee to be. Verily justice is My gift to thee and the sign of My loving-kindness. Set it then before thine eyes. (Hidden Words, No.2, Arabic)  

“The light of men is Justice,” He moreover states, “Quench it not with the contrary winds of oppression and tyranny. The purpose of justice is the appearance of unity among men.” “No radiance,” He declares, “can compare with that of justice. The organization of the world and the tranquillity of mankind depend upon it.” (quoted in Advent of Divine Justice, p.28)

experience

May 6, 2006: ~2 hours, 6 children, average age 6-7. The class went well. I was able to consult with the children to see what sort of games we could play, and we ended up playing a game called "tic-tac-toe" which is basically a variant of "hot potato" – we passed a ball around in a circle while one child repeated "tic, tac, tic, tac…" and whoever was holding the ball when he/she said "toe" would have to leave the circle and replace him/her counting. The kids loved it.

August 9, 2007: ~1 hours, 4 children, average age 8. Outreach class. We basically took this class straight out of Ruhi Book 3 with very few modifications, and it went alright. The boys in our class, including one who seems to have something similar to ADHD, had some trouble staying still—and hence participating—so it wasn’t perfect. To accomodate, we introduced a new type of movement-based activity to help them have the patience to memorize quotes and prayers: the "step game", in which children stand in a line and slowly advance one step at a time, each saying one word of a quote in sequence when they step ahead, continuing until they cross a finish line. We used bristol board to write out quotes and prayers in large print so that they can easily be seen from a distance; the kids love this game, and always want to take turns holding the bristol board for the others. We’ll be using this game a lot in future.

starting the step game.

let’s go!

sharing towel space (from Ruhi Bk 3).

so after an evening of consultation about the children’s class, we’ve come up with a plan of action to help the class mature and grow. it’s simple, and, if we pray for confirmation and put the effort into it, it’ll be effective. in short:

1. Oct. 14: first class. welcome to new students, etc. parents are given written and verbal invitations to Open House on Oct. 21, taking place after the class (3:30-4:30PM).
2. Oct. 21: second class, 1:30-3:30PM. open house from 3:30-4:30PM. time to chat with parents, explain the class, answer questions, and ask if anyone is interested in helping out (teaching, logistics, or whatever). notice will also be given regarding other upcoming core activities organized by the Baha’i community (study circles, devotional meetings).
3. Oct. 22–Nov. 25: as classes continue, home visits begin with parents as follow-up, where we can create bonds and gauge their interest in deeper involvement with the class. if families are receptive, they can also be directly invited to participate in devotional meetings or study circles.
4. Nov. 25–Dec. 2: classes continue, and first devotional meeting begins, to continue monthly throughout the year.

What do we hope to achieve? Well, here’s a sample:

• Stronger relationships with parents and families whose children attend class.
• Increased parent/family involvement in the children’s class, through:
  • preparing snacks
  • preparing activities
  • giving rides
  • co-teaching or assisting
  • etc.
• Increased parent/family involvement in related core activities (study circles, devotional meetings, junior youth groups)

One interesting concept that’s been suggested to us is that if we get to a point where the class has grown so much that there aren’t enough teachers, interested parents and family members can be trained as children’s class teachers by taking them through the sequence of Ruhi courses. That’s what we’re hoping to explore in the long run—whether such a model of growth and human resource development could possibly work in creating a self-sustaining children’s class.

Étoiles Brillantes, our francophone children’s class, is shaping up well for the year ahead – although there’s still a whole lot left to do. I talked with Julie (co-teacher and co-organizer) and she says that all of the families from last year now know that we will be starting again on October 14th; that’s one hurdle crossed. Now our goal will be outreach. How are we going to grow our class and increase the number of kids (and parents) involved? One suggestion, which we’ll be discussing tomorrow night, is to assemble a small group of people to canvas the neighbourhood where the class will be held, asking parents if they’d like to send their children to the class. Now, if what we’ve already experienced in other settings holds true, we can expect massive interest – and a proportionate strain on human resources. So far, Julie and I have been the core of the class, resource-wise; if the class grows beyond a certain point – as it may very well do in the coming season – we’ll have to bring in more people to help. We’re even toying with the idea of having several concurrent classes for different age groups: for example, 5-7, 8-11, and even junior youth study circles for ages 12-14.

more on that tomorrow, when we’ll meet together to take some next steps, make some calls, and put together a quick-n-dirty plan of action. also, more about curriculum soon.