Archive for 'Early Childhood'
Free Children’s Bibles for Christmas
Posted on 15. Dec, 2011 by Kenny.
A few days ago I wrote a review about Group’s “My First Hand’s on Bible” and I’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback saying that the review was very helpful. Well, I’ve got something even more helpful for you. How would you like 18 of these Bibles for your ministry? I know I would! Click here to see more info on this great give-away! Merry Christmas!… Read the rest
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What’s your Biting Policy
Posted on 23. Jan, 2011 by Kenny.
So, you’ve got biters. What’s your policy? Do you even have one or do you wing it on a case by case basis? Do your volunteers and leaders know it?On of my Children’s Pastors sent me this great article from Childrensministry.com on biting. After reading this, we decided to update our biting policy to make it more clear and systematic.
We have a biting policy, but when put to the test this past summer, we found that we were all over the place. We had a chronic biter. This kid would bite anything that moved and he was a repeat offender. When first confronted with this situation, my first response to the Early Childhood director was, “what does our policy manual say?” We quickly came to realize that our policy on biting was a little lacking.… Read the rest
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Early Childhood Room Names
Posted on 01. Jun, 2009 by Kenny.
Okay, I’ve need a little outside inspiration. I’ve been thinking about changing the names of two rooms in our Early Childhood area. So, here are our existing rooms.
2 & 3 year old classrooms
- Tumbleweed Trail
- Little Lagoon
- Kids Kingdom
- Asteroid Alley
4 year old – kindergarten classrooms
- Beach Boulevard
- Amazon Avenue
- Treehouse Trail
- City Circle
Okay, here’s my dilema. The last four rooms are classrooms we added in January and they’re part of Kids Quest Backyard. They all have street themes. When we opened these rooms, Tumbleweed Trail has been previously retired, but we opened it back up again in February. So, we have two rooms that end with “trail.” Also, Asteroid Alley is a feeder room to Amazon Avenue.… Read the rest
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Another Child Dedication under wraps
Posted on 01. Jun, 2009 by Kenny.
If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you know that I’ve re-invented the way we do child dedication. Three months ago we did our first one under the new format. It had a few kinks, but overall the whole process was so beautiful. Just search “child dedication” on this site and you can read about all the changes we’ve made.
Two weeks ago I wrote about the changes we were making for the dedication we held last weekend. We made those changes and they went great. I’d say the dedication was near perfect. Here are some pictures.
I can’t tell you how happy I am about how we do our dedications. However, I’m not finished. There are some components that North Point does in their pre-dedication process that I want to add to ours.… Read the rest
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Early Childhood small groups
Posted on 21. May, 2009 by Kenny.
Say what? Early Childhood small groups? Aren’t you supposed to start this once kids get into elementary? That’s been the given assumption. Some churches are starting to break this mold and give this a try. We’re going to start this really soon and we are very excited. So, please keep in mind that everything I write below this paragraph is theory and a vision of what could be.
My staff came back from Orange with all kinds of ideas. On of the ideas my Early Childhood director had concerned alignment of terminology. Basically this is where churches use the same vernacular for positions and programs throughout every ministry. It makes perfect sense. In the Early Childhood area we have three main positions.… Read the rest
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Child Dedicaiton: Conclusion
Posted on 18. Mar, 2009 by Kenny.
Either I was really thorough or I beat a dead horse. I’ll let you decide, just don’t tell me. 
So, I’ve been very specific on how we’ve morphed our Child Dedication and all of its components. What we did last week was by far the best dedication I’ve been a part of, but there is still room to tweak. So, here are things I’m considering for the dedication we’re doing in May.
- Registration will stay the same. Parents will register online to attend the class and after the class, they’ll need to register the children. To make things easier, I’ll log a computer into Fellowship One and allow families to register their children that night.
- I’m thinking of creating a closer connection with the pastors/leaders and the families they pray for.
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Child Dedication: Dedication service
Posted on 16. Mar, 2009 by Kenny.
I thought I’d actually wrap up this series on Child Dedication this week. Last week (Saturday) we held our dedication service and I was more than pleased. To be honest, it was the best dedication I’d ever experienced. Sure, there are some things to tweak, but it won’t take much to make this whole experience stellar.
So, here is what the service looked like:
Since I used Fellowship One for registration, I had a list of kids who I expected to be there. Since I also used Fellowship One to register parents for the Prep for Dedication class, I didn’t publicly display the link for the dedication service. Once a parent attended the class, I emailed them the link to register for the dedication service.… Read the rest
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Child Dedication slide shows
Posted on 09. Mar, 2009 by Kenny.
Okay, I intended to get these posted on Saturday, but this weekend was CRAZY!
Here are the two slide shows I used. Thanks for the suggestions on the music everyone, I went with two suggestions.
So, my initial plan was to have three different slide shows that would be running as people came in. However, after I finished the first one I totally changed my plan. It was too good to arbitrarily run while people were coming in. So, I planned to begin the service with the first slide show and then end the dedication with the second show. It was amazing. Check them out here (Oh, and I have password protected these videos. The password is “moistcookies”):
This first song you’ll probably recognize, it’s from the movie: Meet the Robinsons.… Read the rest
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Child Dedication: Prep for Child Dedication Class
Posted on 05. Mar, 2009 by Kenny.
In the past ten day’s I’ve taught this class three times.
I wrote it out on a Saturday afternoon and taught it the next morning at our South Campus. I felt the information was good, but it came off a little flat. I had just one discussion question for people to interact with. After the first class, I added four more discussion questions, one after each of the four “essential parenting skills.” I also added some personal stories to add a little humor and liven things up. The second class was phenomenally better. This is the one I recorded in the video below. The discussion time was fairly active, but not as much as I woudl have liked. I finally taught the class one last time a week later.… Read the rest
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Child Dedication: Handouts and teaching notes
Posted on 05. Mar, 2009 by Kenny.
Attached are the notes I used to teach and for parents to follow along and take notes.
Child Dedication Teaching Notes
Child Dedication Handout
When holding classes like these, I usually want to provide amble informaiotn for my paretns. My hope is that parents will go home and continue conversations about their child’s spiritual formation. Giving them notes will hopefully help them continue these vital conversations.… Read the rest
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