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Description

Aim: For the children to be familiar with the story of Noah and its main messages. Introduction: The activities below work well together in that particular order, although all activities can also be done individually or in different contexts. The story of Noah can be found in Genesis 6:9-22. Taken from the BB Anchors Pro pack S-2-6

Resources

Activity 1 & 3
none

Activity 2
Maracas or similar percussion instruments to simulate rain.

Activity 4
Chairs

Instructions

Biblical background:
One of the challenges of this story is to reconcile the two sides of God displayed in it. God who kills almost all of mankind as a consequence of their sin and God who saves animals and makes an eternal promise to people as a sign of his love for them. It needs to be seen in the wider context of the Bible. It follows the stories of creation, the first sin (the fall) and the brother murder of Cain and Abel. This context explains something about God’s choice to send the flood. He created the world and all ‘was good but already there he hints at the fact that mankind would need rescuing from sin (Genesis 3:15b) showing both his anger over sin (hence the flood) and his desire to rescue mankind (hence the promise of the rainbow).

This story also encourages the children to love God and follow his laws— just like Noah did. It also talks about how this can lead to becoming an outsider, as Noah was the only one in the world who was faithful to God (Genesis 6:8).

The story closes with the encouraging ‘rainbow promise’ (God will never flood the earth again), reminding the children that God keeps His promises and loves them immensely as children of God’. The challenge is to live like Noah did — loving God and trusting Him.

Historical Background:
Ancient stories of great floods are known worldwide. There are several versions of the story of a great flood in the area of Mesopotamia, and archaeologists have found copies of a story from 1650 BC which tells a story very much like the biblical one (although this is about the creator God ‘Enki’ and his follower ‘Atrhasis’).

In Genesis 8:4 it tells us that the boat came to a halt on the mountains of ‘Ararat’. This is in modern day Turkey.

Activity 1 - Make A Noise

Aim:
• To practise making animal sounds (to be used later when telling the story)
• As a warm up activity

Instructions:
Decide on a number of animal noises (that are reasonably easy to make). Get the children into a circle and go around the group whispering the name of one of the animals into their ear. You need to say each animal name repeatedly e.g. twice for smaller groups, four or five times for larger groups.

When the game starts the children have to find all the other animals in their herd’ — by walking around the room making the noise of their animal. When they are sure they have a full herd they are to sit down together. The winners are the first group to sit down AND be sure they aren’t missing one of their herd.

When a group sits down, check that they are complete. Wait with announcing them as winners until all herds have found their animals.

Tips/Advice:
The benefits of this activity as an introduction are twofold:
• The children practise the animal sounds for the story
• You can start your story with everyone sat down and ready

Activity 2 - Tell The Story

Aim:
• To learn about Noah and the ark
• To listen out for key words and respond

Instructions:
Tell the story below. In order to help the children to concentrate and to keep them involved, tell them that they have to listen out for certain words and make the following noises/shout out words every time they hear the word. Practise this a few times by saying the word, until you get the correct response every time. If you think the children might find this too tricky, split the group into four, with every group just listening out for one key word and responding accordingly. The words are (you can of course come up with others).

Key Word Response
Noah Shout “What a good man!”
Rain/rained Shake the maracas
Animals Make their herd noises from earlier game
Ark Shout “Ahoy there!”

Then tell the story:
“God had made the earth and all animals and people in it. He thought that everything was beautiful and loved his creation very much. But the people on earth forgot about God altogether and they started doing very bad things. God saw what a terrible place the world had become. He saw that everyone was lying, and cheating, and killing. But God saw one good man. His name was Noah. Noah still cared about God. He listened to God, and he always tried to do what God said. And God was pleased with Noah. God said to him, “Noah, I have decided to put an end to this mess people have made of my world, and start all over, have a plan. And for this I want you to build a boat.” It was going to be a very BIG boat. It was going to be longer than a football field, and higher than a three storey house. God called the boat an “ark.”

Now, Noah might have thought, “This job is too big, and I am too old!” But he had God, and with God on your side, anything is possible. So Noah went right to work. He did everything just as God had told him to. Noah kept on working, and then one day the ark was finished. Then God said, “Now I want you to find two of every kind of animal, a male and a female, and bring them into the ark. And bring enough food for them all too.’ Think about what a noise all these animals must have made and what a mess! (It must have smelled pretty bad too Now it’s time for you and your family to get into the ark!’ The Lord said to Noah. So he and his wife, and his three sons and their wives; all got into the big boat Then the sky turned grey and then the rain came, lots and lots of rain. It rained. And rained. And rained. There was so much rain that it covered the whole earth and the ark began to float. It rained for forty days and forty nights. But God hadn’t forgotten about them.

One day the rain stopped, and the water began to go down. It was another 150 days before the ark came to rest on the very top of a mountain. Finally, God told Noah it was all right to leave the ark. He opened the door, and all those animals rushed out! God had saved them!

Noah was so thankful to God that he had saved all the animals and his family that he went to find lots of rocks. With those rocks he built an altar, which is a kind of table for God. God was very pleased that Noah went to all this effort to show that he was truly thankful.

And so God made this promise: “Never again will I destroy the world with a flood. I make this promise to you, all of mankind and all animals. And then God said. “Look up in the sky.” Noah looked up and saw a beautiful rainbow. “You see, I have set my rainbow in the sky. This will always remind us of the promise between you and me.”

So, the next time you see a rainbow, think of Noah and the flood. Remember that God loves you, and that he has promised never to send a flood again.

Tips/Advice:
This activity is supposed to be lively and therefore engaging. However set clear ground rules, such as to only shout the response once when you hear the key word, to only shake the maracas for three seconds etc.

Extension Tasks/Adaptations:
Follow up: You could draw a large boat and a Noah figure on a large piece of sugar paper. After they have heard the story you could ask the children to add drawings of animals. They could even add drawings of themselves or their family to show that God has saved us too.

Activity 3 - Noah Says

Aim: To be able to listen to instructions.

Instructions:
• Play the game “Simon says’ but use the phrase Noah says. instructions that contain the words Noah says’.
• If Children are wrong they sit down.
• Once a winner has been established remind the children that the said, and Noah did what God said.

Activity 4 - Colour Race

Preparation:
Setup chairs in a circle, one less than there are children in the group.

Instructions:
• The children sit on the chairs in a circle. Ask one child to volunteer to stand in the middle.
• Assign each child a colour, the colours must be repeated at least once.
• The child in the middle says: I see a beautiful rainbow and in it I see the colour....”.
• The two (or more) children who have been assigned this colour, stand up and race to swap seats, whilst the child in the middle tries to get to the seat first
• Whoever is left over at the end without a chair, stands in the middle and again says: I see a beautiful rainbow and in it I see the colour .etc.
• When the child in the middle simply says: “ I see a beautiful rainbow!” all children must swap seats.

At the end of the game ask the children if they remember what the rainbow is supposed to remind us of?

For full detail see BB Anchors Pro pack S2-6

Tags

• action story
• anchors
• noahs ark
• spirit

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