Fruit of the Spirit

Art Workshop

Scripture Reference:

Galatians 5: 16-26

Memory Verse:
But when the Holy Spirit controls our lives, he will produce this kind of fruit in us: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Galatians 5:22-23a (NLT)

Purpose:
The purpose of this workshop is for children to develop an understanding that the Holy Spirit can help them control their actions. The key to being fruitful (living a life that exhibits "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control") is to experience God's presence daily by reading the Bible and by praying. By creating a torn paper collage of fruits, students will have a visual reminder of the type of behaviors they should be showing to the world. Students should be encouraged to look at the picture daily and think about whether or not they have spent time with the Lord in prayer or Bible study so that their fruit tree (their life) can receive nourishment (encouragement from the Holy Spirit) and their lives can be fruitful.

Objectives for the Fruit of the Spirit rotation
(see listing above)

Additional objectives for the art workshop: 
At the end of the session, the students will be able to

• Use the torn paper collage as a self-assessment tool (HOW DID I DO TODAY?).

Teacher preparation in advance:

• Read the scripture passages and lesson plan and attend the Bible Study, ...
• Prepare a closing prayer.
• Learn the memory verse.
• To our teachers at RCC: The design of this workshop is very intentional. The activities and discussion questions for this workshop were designed to meet the goals of the entire rotation and the educational objectives of the Rotation Model (tm) at River Community Church. While we feel it is important to follow the serendipitous leading of the Holy Spirit, please do not change the lesson plan without consulting a Curriculum Planning and Writing Team member.
• Check out the room before your first Sunday workshop so that you know where everything is located.
• The bin with supplies is located in the Children’s Ministries Office. .
• If you have never read any of the children's books by Eric Carle, please go by a public library and check one or two books out. His books are illustrated in the style that your students will use to create their fruit of the Spirit collages. Some titles by Eric Carle to check out are The Very Hungry Caterpillar, The Grouchy Ladybug, The Busy Spider; Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?, or you can visit his website on the Internet at www.eric-carle.com and view his illustrations there.
• A sample of a completed fruit of the spirit collage will be placed by the supplies for the teacher’s to look at, but it is not to be shown to the students!

Room set-up:
You will need tables for students to work at. They can either stand or sit.

Supply List:

• Whiteboard or flipchart to do brainstorming on and a dark marker to write with.
• Sheets of papers that have been watercolored (or different colors of tissue paper).
  Pre-cut pieces of mat board for pasting the collage on
• Gluesticks (one for each child)
• Scissors (one for each child)
• Printed Bible verses
• Eric Carle book The Very Hungry Caterpillar to show students the style of the art work
• Fine tip Sharpie markers for use by older students
• If possible, a basket of real fruit to use as inspiration!

Lesson Plan

Opening:

Greet the children and introduce yourself. Wear your name-tag. (Remember you are interacting with a different group of students each week who may not know you.) Make sure the children are wearing name-tags. If not, ask the shepherd to supply a temporary badge.

We had an opening prayer during the gathering time, but you may open with prayer if you feel led to do so.

Explain the purpose of this workshop. Use kid friendly words to give a brief overview of what the children are going to learn and do.

Scripture/Bible Story:
Read the scripture: Galatians 5: 16-26. (Encourage the children to use their Bibles in looking up verses.)

Dig:

Application:
Begin by pointing out to students that the fruit of the Spirit is really behaviors and that today we are going to make a collage of fruits to remind us of the NINE GOOD behaviors that the Lord wants to see in our lives!

Ask students to name different kinds of fruit (Example: apples, pears, grapes, etc.) Tell them we are going to try to name 50 fruits in 3 minutes! Write their responses on the whiteboard or flipchart (the Shepherd can write while the Workshop Leader calls out what he/she hears). Be prepared to write FAST! Stop at 3 minutes and leave the responses where everyone can see them!

Tell the students that their collage should contain 9 fruits. They can choose and create any 9 they want from the list. Point out to students that apples can be many different colors, and so can grapes! God loves variety and they should, too! There are thousands of different kinds of fruit in the world!

Show the students the Eric Carle book The Very Hungry Caterpillar (turn to the fruit pages) and ask them how they think he made his pictures. Students should realize Eric Carle cut out shapes from pre-painted pages to illustrate his book. Tell them that today we are going to work on our collage in the style of Eric Carle. They can either cut out shapes or tear out shapes. Give them each a piece of mat board and a stack of pre-painted pages, the pre-printed memory verse, a glue stick, and scissors.

Students can then begin working on their collages. The Workshop Leader and Shepherd should begin individual interactions with students encouraging them to think about how they behave on a daily basis. Point out to students that placing fruits in front of each other to create their design is acceptable and pleasing to the eye. They will tend to want to "float" their fruits individually on the mat board. Encourage them to cut out or tear out all of their fruits before gluing them down---that way they can place them and view them all together along with the Bible verse before they glue! Tell them artists are good at noticing how things are shaped and colored. In order to learn to draw, an artist must first learn to SEE!

When their collages are glued down, have the older children write the names of the 9 fruits of the Spirit---one by each piece of fruit with a fine tip Sharpie pen. If they write the word around the outline of the fruit, it becomes a part of the design. (Have the memory verse posted to help with spelling.)

Each child should put their name on the back, and many compliments about their artistic ability should be handed out! No matter how a child chooses to do this activity, his or her work should be praised.

Talking Points: While the children are working, talk about whether or not the children have ever noticed a tree or bush or plant in their yard that did not produce fruit. Ask them if they think that could happen in a person’s life also. Could a person be unfruitful? At the old church office, there were many fig trees. Some of them were loaded with fruit, and some weren’t. What would a Christian's life look like if it were unfruitful (guide the children toward thinking of opposite words for “love, joy, peace…”)? Ask them if they want to be fruitful and then discuss how! Fruit is born by believers when they are “fertilized by” the WORD of God in the Bible and when they pray.

Reflection:

Pulling it all together (closing discussion):

• Ask the children what the fruit of the Spirit behaviors would look like. [EXAMPLES: Self-control might be exhibited when another child hits you and you don’t hit back. Patience might be exhibited when you have to wait for a turn to play with a toy. Faithfulness might be exhibited when someone talks meanly about a friend and you defend your friend.]
• Discuss what you really want to do, and what God/Jesus wants you to do. How do you get help behaving in a “fruit of the Spirit” way? [By connecting daily with the Lord---through prayer and Bible study!]

Encourage students to hang their Fruit of the Spirit Collage in their home in a place where they will see it daily. Tell them to look at it and think about whether or not they behaved “fruitfully” that day! If not, then tell them to ask for forgiveness and to connect with God through prayer and Bible study and then the Holy Spirit will help them behave “fruitfully!” They cannot do it on their own---they have to have help from the Holy Spirit in order to live in a way so that others can see “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” exhibited in their lives. Have them encourage their own families to do this on a daily basis.

Review the memory verse (Use the Fruit of the Spirit song to practice the 9 names of the good fruits!)
The fruit of the spirit is not a banana.
The fruit of the spirit is not a banana.
If you want to be a banana
You might as well hear it
You can’t be a fruit of the Spirit cause
The fruits are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control-o-o.
Hey!
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
[Repeat with coconut, kiwi fruit, lemon and watermelon.]

At 11:50 a.m. ask the shepherds to pass out the journals and pencils/markers. Suggestion: You may wish to give the children a fruit shaped eraser as a reminder of the Bible passage.

Shepherd Time:
Journal writing topics (some children like words and some are allergic to them so offer a choice to either respond by writing or by drawing!)

• Name 3 ways I can be joyful or kind today (or choose any of the 9 behaviors!)
• Write a prayer asking God/Holy Spirit to help me behave in a “fruitful” way!
• Draw a picture in my journal of me standing like a tree with my arms out as branches and draw the 9 fruits hanging from my arms! Label the fruits. Draw roots from my feet down into the Bible.

You may want to provide an extra activity or worksheet for children who finish their journals quickly, such as coloring sheets, crossword puzzles, word searches, games. See the Workshop Leader’s Background Notes and rotation.org for ideas.

At noon, ask the students to close their journals and sit quietly for prayer.

Closing prayer:
Prayer suggestion: “Lord, We ask you to send the Holy Spirit to help us behave in a way that others can see we are joyful people, that we are full of goodness and gentleness, that we are not angry, that we are faithful and loyal to you and to each other, that we have patience in situations where others are impatient, and that we just OOZE love for others! Thank you Lord for the peace you give us when we are fruitful people!
AND ALL OF GOD'S CHILDREN SAID:
AMEN!”

Tidy and Dismissal: Ask children to help tidy the room. Give any specific instructions for clearing the workshop room.
Give everyone the parent take-home flyer the first week of the rotation; give it only to children who were absent and have not yet received it the other weeks of the rotation.

Additional Suggestions:
You will need to decide how best to adjust the lesson for older and younger students. Keep the children active and involved in activity. Do what works for you and the children. Some ideas:

Older children: Be careful that the children do not NAME other children who have hurt them with bad behavior when they give examples. Tell them not to use names when they give examples! The older children can write the names of the fruits on their collage if they wish to.

Younger Children:

• The children may wish to cut out their fruit shapes instead of tearing them. Whatever works for them is fine. Some young children do not have very good fine motor skills and have trouble using scissors so let them try both ways and choose the way that works for them.
• For classes composed primarily of pre-readers, show the children how to find the passage in the Bible using the table of contents and then have them do it. After everyone has found the passage, have them close their Bibles and listen while you read.

Resources:
Children’s author and illustrator, Eric Carle: www.eric-carle.com

Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

This lesson was written by Judy McIntyre for River Community Church in Prairieville, Louisiana.
Copyright 2003 Judy McIntyre. Permission granted to freely distribute and use, provided the copyright message is included.

A representative of Rotation.org reformatted this post to improve readability.