Babylon- Daniel's Courage in Captivity (Group Publishing), has been a great program that we've been using for our weekly Kids' Club. There has been a lot of excitement generated within our children's ministry and also our church family as we have prepared the scenery and presented this program to the kids. We take 2 weeks for each of the lessons which means that the program will cover one term. There is plenty of content material in the program so we're not struggling to fill each week's schedule and it helps to reinforce each Bible point and lesson, especially when some of the attendance is irregular.

We've been using clips from the animated dvd of the Story of Daniel by Nest, for the second week of the Bible story segment. We have also used a quiz during the Closing Celebration of the second week of each lesson which adds some interest and serves as a review of the lesson as well. The concept is simple: we have girls team up against boys. We ask  questions that relate to the lesson content. After answering the question, click on the slide for the fly to move onto the first leaf- 10 points. The child/team can then decide whether to take the 10 points or try for more. For more, click again and the fly moves to the next leaf with more points. They can keep moving but at any time, a fl-yswatter may knock off the fly and they will lose all points. If they make it all the way through the slide safely without the damaging fly swatter arriving, they get 100 points and go to the next slide for additional points. They must choose an animal. At the next click, they will see whether they gain additional points or if it goes to the other team. If their animal's points are blue, it goes to the boys; pink points go to the girls and mixed colours are shared by the teams.

If you'd like to use this powerpoint quiz, feel free to download it below.
 
Other similar powerpoint quizzes are available from Ed Dunlop's website.. here.
 

The team from Elevate Pastors has provided some brightly coloured clipart to use for decorating your rooms and other children's ministry areas. The collection includes the characters from their Elevate Junior series but also includes clipart of bookcases, picture frames, wall textures, and other useful designs elements.
Check out the range at their website and also take a moment to vew some of the previews of their materials for your younger age-groups.
See here...

There are times when you need a one-off lesson or special event and the team from Children's Ministry Deals has put together a range of single lesson resources, just right for this need. We recently needed a fill-in lesson for one of the weeks over the school holiday break before our regular program recommenced.
So, we decided to go with the Angry Words complete lesson. I really appreciated that the entire lesson is downloadable so it can be purchased and used immediately. We had noticed that some of the kids had increaingly been speaking rudely to each other so this lesson seemed opportune. In the lesson, students will discover what James has to say about the damage caused by our angry words and will learn the power of words filled with love.
The kids, of course, are very familiar with the Angry Birds game and we showed the YouTube clip of the full-sized version (see below) which really caught the kids' attention and started them talking.
The complete lesson includes: summary, skit, powerpoint quiz, object lesson, ice breaker, small group discussion, memory card sheet, take home activity and more. We couldn't get out iPad to project onscreen, as suggested in the lesson material, and so used a computer and online version of Angry Birds for the kids to play. (object lesson)
The final activity was to create an Angry Birds card and fill the message with encouraging words to give to someone. We were delighted to have three kids prersent us with their cards, thanking us for making Sunday morning Kidz Church such a great part of their week!
Check out the material HERE.
Cost: $25- downloadable

Looking for a special Mother's Day craft for kids in your children's ministry to create for their Mum? This newspaper-style presentation, that includes an illustration by the kids, is just a bit different and is sure to delight everyone this Mother's Day.
The design as a downloadable pdf is available from the Martha Stewart website, along with some other great designs.
However, as is often the case, this and other designs use the word 'Mom' in the designs. This spelling is unfortunate for Australians and others who use the 'Mum' spelling.
You can make these changes on the original pdf if you own software that enables you to do so.
If not, I have produced a copy with these changes included, with apologies to Martha Stewart.