Today in Children’s Church we’re doing the plagues of Egypt. The suggestions page had some things to do, but I didn’t think they were as interesting as they could be. So I came up with some other ideas.

For hail:

Bring in ice. Let the kids feel that. That’s what hail feels like.

Bring in used paper. Let the kids wad it up. Have a contest for who can make the smallest person ball. Then everyone “pelts” that person with their hail. Older kids get several sheets of paper. The little ones get one.

Have the kids take some legos. Have them make a “house.” Have them stick their house on one of those lego sheets. This makes a town. Then put the sheets in a sheet pan with sides. Have them look at the aerial view of their town. Then pour rice or bird seed over it. That’s the hail. See what the town would have looked like after a hail storm.

I also went to National Geographic and printed out their picture of Bogota, Colombia after the hailstorm.

In addition, you could bring in a screen made of thin paper and some different kind of balls. Throw a ping pong ball at the screen. It bounces off. Throw a golf ball at it; the golf ball tears through. Then throw a baseball through it. Those are illustrations of what would happen to your skin with hail. A little wouldn’t hurt you, but a lot would. (You can use a picture frame with butcher paper or tissue paper for presents taped across the back.)

For flies:

Have a tray with graham crackers covered in icing. Have enough for each person to have one. Explain that the people of Egypt might have planned a party. The mom got the treats ready the day before. Show the kids the tray of treats. Then, the flies came! Have a shaker of sprinkles and throw it on the icing covered graham crackers as you say that. Oooh, no one wants to eat fly covered treats. (I did this with colored sprinkles and chocolate icing. But it would probably be better with chocolate sprinkles and white icing.)

For blood:

Tell the kids, in the old days, no one had running water. So they would get water and put it in a pitcher before they went to bed at night so if you got thirsty you would not have to go out to the well, which was often in the center of town. Have a pitcher of water. Also have a glass with red food coloring in it. Explain how someone might have poured water into their glass, and gotten blood! Show the glass full of red water to the kids.

For frogs:

Have a sandwich made. (I made a peanut butter sandwich.) Explain that people back then (about 3600 years ago) would have needed to eat too. Maybe someone’s mother made her a sandwich. And then, bite into the sandwich, scream/squeal. Show them the frog that got in the sandwich. (I used a small plastic frog from a set of them in the dollar store.)

Get a bag of stretchy frogs from the dollar store. Stick them to the outside of a glass, to your fork, to the food on a plate. Explain that this would have been what the Egyptians were facing when they were trying to eat.

…
It would have been fun to do, if I hadn’t been sick.

Turns out it wasn’t supposed to be my week. It was Casey’s. But she was glad to have the ideas to work with and I left her all my stuff. R will go back and pick it up later.