The Thankful Leper
Group Activities

Sermon Titles: "The Thankful Leper" and "'Please' and 'Thank You'"

Scripture Reading: Luke 17:11-19

EXTRA! EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT!: An activity written by La Juanna Kotis to help the children review what they have learned in the lesson about Jesus healing the ten lepers. The children will enjoy moving around the room and making some noise, but the activity will also reinforce what they have learned. CLICK HERE for complete instructions.

CLASS THANK YOU COUNTING: The teacher will have everything put away and all the chairs stacked and as the children come in. The teacher will hand each child a chair and see how many children say, "thank you." For FUN and to keep the children's curiosity up for a while, the teacher can have a little score board on the chalkboard and every time she hears a thank you, she can rush to the scoreboard and add a mark to keep track of how many THANK YOUs she receives. The teacher can also hand out other things, such as supplies or a treat, and keep track of the THANK YOUs. Children will find out during the lesson what was being scored (kept track of).

CLAY THANK YOU: Roll modeling clay into long snake-like rolls to be formed into letters to say THANK YOU for children to take home. Each child will need a piece of cardboard covered with construction to lay their words on!

THANK YOU CARDS: Provide the children with a tri-fold card made out of construction paper for them to write or draw a simple THANK YOU card to someone they would like to THANK. Stickers and markers will make for good decorations and maybe a piece of gum to glue onto one of the folds to give away.

CLASS THANK YOU: Each class member takes a turn DOING something for another class member, who will in return say a loud THANK YOU! If teacher feels the children won't be able to think of anything, the teacher can have each child pick a slip of paper that will have an idea for what they can do if they need help.

THANK YOU SPOTS: Put a large poster board on the focal wall of the classroom that all the children can see as they enter the room. After the lesson today, all the children will take turns in going to the poster and writing THANK YOU on one of the spots and their own initials! Children can be creative in how they write their own THANK YOU -- different colors or THANK U, THX, thank you; THANK YOU, THANX or in another language. Questions and discussion about the SPOTS in our lesson and who said THANK you to Jesus!

THANK YOU TREE: On a piece of construction paper, the children will trace their arm and spread-out hand to form a tree and branches. Each child can draw some leaves on the "fingered-branches" and write THANK YOU in various decorative ways, and take home to hang for a fall picture and a remembrance of how important it is to say THANK YOU 2 JESUS (which can be the title of their TREE page).

"U" are in JesUs and JesUs is in U so we are very THANKFUL! Find words that have "U" in them - crUcified, JesUs, resUrrection, etc. Children may be able to find other words with "U" in it to remind them all that we have to be THANKFUL for!!! "U" have other things to be thankfUl for --- because Jesus said that "U" can pray; U were thought long before U were born; 4 U Jesus was born and died; His great love 4 U!

THANKFUL LEPER: The children should each be given a small paper lunch bag to decorate with spots of leprosy for a puppet. Bright colored markers could be used for THANK YOU written on their bags and let children use the bags to tell today's story and to say THANK YOU to the teacher or other classmates throughout the teaching time.

THANK YOU COLLAGE: Provide a large colorful poster board and many magazine or book pictures of things that children can be thankful for. The children can take turns gluing the pictures that they've chosen from all the pictures available to the THANKFUL poster board.

PLEASE AND THANK YOU JUMP ROPING: Divide the children into teams. One team can be the PLEASE TEAM and the other team will be the THANK YOU TEAM. The children can take turns to see how many JUMPS they can do before tripping. Each team will add up their points to see if the Please team or the Thank You team wins.

CIRCLE PLEASE: Children will gather in a large circle and take turns around the circle with each child saying PLEASE ______________, giving their ideas of things to say PLEASE for, such as things they would ask for or things they would like to do or PLEASE to places they would like to go.

SHARE A SNACK, PLEASE: Of course, the children will be encourage to say PLEASE and THANK YOU to each little snack that the teacher will supply for the children.

Song: "Praise Him, All Ye Little Children" - Anonymous

Sheet Music (PDF)

Piano Accompaniment (MP3)

Song: "To God Be the Glory" - By Fanny Crosby & William H. Doane

Sheet Music (PDF)

Piano Accompaniment (MP3)