Holy Week with Children: Daily Lessons and Activities

I've compiled the 'perfect'  Holy Week lessons/activities for children! 

(Perfect for our family at these ages--- 'Perfect' is so fluid a term...)

I thought I would share my compilation with all of you! 

I've mentioned before that I love teaching my children. Easter is one of those holidays that is tremendously secular unless YOU bring the Truth into your home. I'm passionate about doing this and for Easter the past couple years I've been gathering teaching ideas* to make this week truly remarkable for my family. 

*Note 1: I've borrowed other blogger ideas and I owe particular credit to We Talk of Christ We Rejoice in Christ for the original inspiration. I've made it my own, but I definitely used her blog as a jumping off point! 

Here's how it works: 

Every day I have a devotional time with the kids. We use this layout of Jerusalem (a 2-page spread) and move a little picture of Christ with sticky tack each day to show His path through the week. We sing songs, read a scripture, and discuss an application question for their lives.

We put coordinating pictures on the wall each day to build a 'timeline' of how Christ's final week was spent. Some of these pictures are Gospel Art pics, others are from a stash of religious art I've collected from Friend/Ensign magazines. 

THEN we do the activities below to go along with the day! So here are the activities:

Saturday (one week and one day before Easter)-

• Plan of Salvation review and what Christ's role is in the plan. 
  

I made the one above by combining free illustrations and my own creations too. 

Palm Sunday: Triumphal Entry

• make paper palms
  
• or check out this blog for more amazing Palm Sunday ideas!

Monday: Purging the temple (teach about temples, our bodies, and/or repentance/baptism)

• play outside and then take a bath
  

Tuesday: Miracles and Teaching at the temple (parables and widow's mite)

• decorate Easter eggs using the Christ color theory sheet
  

Wednesday (actually occurred on Thursday)**: Last Supper and washing of disciples' feet

• Passover Feast
  
  
   Emmett wanted in on the unleavened bread! (He snatched it right off Eric's plate and swung it around triumphantly before attacking it)
  
  
  
   garlic and cumin rubbed roast lamb

eaten together the lamb and arugula (bitter herb) is truly spectacular!

**Note 2: The lessons follow each other in chronological order, but you'll notice that Wednesday's events actually occurred on Thursday. That is because the Gospels are very quiet about how Christ spent the Wednesday before Passover. And because Thursday has so many important lessons, I didn't want to gloss over anything. Splitting the subject matter into more than one day seemed appropriate. If you want to be sure you are teaching correct history, be sure to point this out to your children or feel free to put it all on Thursday. 

Thursday: Garden of Gethsemane and Christ's arrest

• carnation red stain experiment

Friday: Peter's denial, trials, the Crucifixion and the burial

• toothpick crown of thorns  and overnight meringue empty tomb cookies (don't open the oven til Sunday)
  
  

  Caroline crushing walnuts

 

 scriptures alongside recipe instructions--- my advice? NOT by the mixing bowl unless you like batter splatters on the Word of God!

Gwen beating the meringue--- she is becoming an actual helper in the kitchen these days! (as opposed to the little 'helpers' we love to have cooking with us but struggle to find a job for them--you know the kind I mean)

Saturday: no picture. Talk about the Spirit world and Jesus' teaching there. Review the Plan of Salvation. Talk about missionary work. 

• Easter egg hunt with golden egg for Christ (1 golden egg per child with picture of Christ inside)
  

This year we are using gold foil Cadbury eggs with a tiny picture of Christ taped over the candy logo for each child and one BIG golden egg filled with candy and a picture of Christ--- lesson? to SHARE with others once you've found the Lord! Gwen found it this time and was an eager 'missionary' as she zealously distributed "Jesus candy" to the family. :) Found that giant golden egg at Target.

Sunday: Christ visiting Mary, the Empty Tomb, Christ appearing to Apostles

• open the oven 'tomb' cookies (see Friday above)

• Easter lily craft.
  

Monday after Easter:

• serve honey and fish for dinner (ha! I know this should be served on Sunday to reflect the post-Resurrection meal Christ shared with his apostles, but... Yeah right! We're having ginger-thyme pork loin roast on Easter Sunday!...so I am actually planning this tradition for the day AFTER Easter for our Easter review)

• FHE review Easter (using ALL the eggs from the whole week-- see below)

• FHE: Atonement lesson (Brightly Street free printable PDF)
  
• marshmallow empty tomb rolls
  

The evenings of Wed-Sunday is when we open the corresponding Resurrection Eggs 

There are tons of these out there! Some have free printables too. I have a set from my mom that actually has 15 eggs instead of the usual 12. You have to sort through which ones correspond with each day, but it creates a nice evening recap of the day's lessons.

In the evenings we also watch the Bible Videos that correspond to that day's lesson and give the kids a chance to share with Daddy the things they have learned that day. This way they learn from teaching AND he gets to participate in their testimony-building experiences even though he's gone when we do the learning activities.

 If you are interested, I have a printable that lists the days/activities on one 8x11 sheet for easy preparation that I am happy to email to you. Just leave your address in the comments! 

I hope you all enjoy Easter week as much as we do!!! Share your Holy Week traditions in the comments!