Sunday, September 12, 2010

They just can't sit still ...


Today we had a bunch of little ones sitting through the whole hour long worship service. It was our annual water communion service, a time when all are invited to bring waters (real or symbolic, or today someone brought "virtual" water) from their summer journeys - physical or internal. It's a more active service, not just listening to one or two people mostly just talk.

But it's still an hour of sitting still and being quiet, which is just Hard. So I prepare little Fidget Bags to hand out to the kids. They are simple canvas bags, and the kit itself is pretty simple too, but it's been very well received and successful so far. All I put in the bags is:

A small clipboard
A handful of crayons or colored pencils
A little bag of Model Magic (clay that does not leave residue everywhere, so we keep the sanctuary clean)
A few pipecleaners

That's it. Someday I might experiment with some yarn, and I once tossed around the idea of beads but then pictured them being dropped and rolling around under the chairs. There are other toys out there that are specifically meant to be "fidgeted" with, but the clay is so perfect I haven't felt the need yet to try them.

What do you do when you have to fidget? Knit? Doodle? Twirl a pencil? Chew on your hair? That's what they need, too.

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