Scripture: Genesis 21-23
Learning Objectives:
- Students will review the story of Abraham, God’s Promises and Isaac.
- Students will learn God promised Abraham he would have more descendants than the stars in the sky.
- Students will learn how important these family stories were to the Jewish people and are to us today.
- Students will participate in an activity to help foster children gather and save memories.
Guiding Question: How can we help foster children record and save positive memories from their childhood?
Materials: materials will vary depending upon the desired scope of the service project
Procedure: Review the story of Abraham, God’s promises to him and the story of Isaac. Discuss how this families stories became part of our Bible. Discuss the importance of family stories, memories and photos to children. Explain children in foster care are often moved from home to home and may not have any photos or any place to store photos and moments from the pleasant experiences they may have. They may have no photos of their own childhood, of birth relatives or of the families who cared for them in foster care. Have the students work on collecting and packaging the items a foster child could use to begin gathering all of their photos and moments. Your group may even want to partner with a specific foster care agency and hold a special workshop where the foster kids bring their things and your students help them begin to create memory books. Or your group may choose to create memory packages the agency can distribute to interested foster families to use. Be creative.
Additional Questions:
- What other things might foster children miss? Can you create a way for foster care agencies and families to help fill this gap?
Supplemental Activity: Have more advanced students research foster care. If possible they may want to interview adults who were foster children at one time. Encourage the students to brainstorm ways to fill the needs they discover when talking with foster families and former foster children. If possible, have your students actually plan and complete a project taken from one of their ideas.