Ii is for ice cream.

 

This week we are talking about the letter Ii and having fun with ice cream!

Our KDI of the week is phonological awareness- Children identify distinct sounds in spoken language. We will begin to see words decoded and encoded, especially consonant, vowel, consonant words. We will show by example how important it is to listen for the sound of each letter in a word, not guess by the initial sound or looking at the picture. Sounding out each word until we gain automaticity is the way to reading success!

Table Activities- This week we will run an ice cream shop each day, use ice cream cones for printing, play with pretend ice cream, make sundaes and cones out of paper, count scoops and color ice cream pictures.

Small Group Activities- This week we hope to make ice cream, make our names out of scoops on an ice cream cone, participate in Arts and Scraps activity on Wednesday and add Ii is for ice cream to our journal.

Large Group Activities- We'll take the pretend ice cream outside and set up shop on our tables!

Books of the Week- "Groovy Joe: Ice Cream and Dinosaurs" by Eric Litwin and "Gorilla Likes Vanilla" by Chae Strathie are our books this week.

Bible Story- This week we are hearing the parable of The Good Samaritan. We have been focusing on the miracles of Jesus this far. Jesus often revealed God's truths by using parables which I learned long ago were earthly stories with heavenly meanings. In some stories, the characters represent God the Father and Jesus the Son, or different people on earth. In this parable, it is an illustration of how true believers should live, who our neighbor is. I have to admit, I sometimes fall short of treating everyone like they should be treated, especially in my mind. Some background about the relationship between the Jews and Samaritans. The Samaritans were Jewish people who the Jews felt did not worship the way Jehovah God wanted them to. They did not see the need to go to Jerusalem to worship at the temple, many of them married non-Jewish people and their religion was kind of watered down. The Jews were very prejudice against them and did not treat them as equals, but a people to be looked down on. So when Jesus used a Samaritan as the character in the story who did the right thing, it was kind of a slap on the face to the "righteous" Jews.

An expert in the law questioned Jesus, "What must I do to be saved?" Jesus told him to the love the Lord with all his heart, soul and mind and love his neighbor as himself. The man wanted specifics- Who is my neighbor? So Jesus told this story- There was a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho when he was attacked by robbers. They took everything he had, even his clothes, beat him and left him for dead lying along the road. A priest came walking down the road and when he saw the man, he passed by on the opposite side of the road to avoid him. Next a Levite (helper in the temple) passed by, he also went to the far side of the road to avoid him. Last a Samaritan came down the road. This man stopped, cleaned him up and bandaged his wounds. He placed him on his own horse and brought him to a boarding house. There he cared for the man. The next day, he had to leave, but he gave the innkeeper two days wages of money to use to care for the injured man. He told the innkeeper that he would pass by on his return and see if any more money was needed.

Jesus asked the expert, "Which one was a neighbor to the injured man?" He replied, "The one who took pity on him." Jesus said, "Go and do likewise."

I know that I could think of a lot of excuses not to help my neighbor- it's not safe, what if it's a trick, I need that money myself, why should I help them, they probably did something to get into that situation, etc.  Jesus just said- Go and do!

Lord help me to go and do likewise!