Tag: family activities

Learn about South Korea and the Winter Olympics

The 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea are a great opportunity to have some great family fun and learn about another country!

Here are some family activities for you to choose from: (Some of these are affiliate links, which means that if you click on them and purchase something, familiesformissions will be paid a small commission.)

Ideas about South Korea:

Ideas about the Winter Olympics:

Do you have other ideas?  Please share them with us!

Need Ideas for Travelling with Kids?

Here is a link to a great series of videos about a family that travels with their kids.  You can get some great ideas or just watch for fun!  These are free right now with Amazon Prime.  (Pricing on Amazon changes frequently, so make sure you double-check the price before watching!)  You may also be able to find some episodes on your local PBS station. 

Season 5: Includes videos about Cabo Mexico, Wales UK, Rome Italy, Churches of Rome, Tahiti French Polynesia, Moorea Island French Polynesia, The Yangtze River and 3 Gorges Dam, Vietnam – Hanoi & Ha Long Bay Adventure, Bangkok, Jungles & Elephant Adventures, Hawaii – Oahu & Honolulu for Kids, Park City Utah Ski Family Adventure, South Africa Safari Family Adventure, South Africa Cape Town and Sharks.

Season 6: Travel With Kids takes you to the Big Island of Hawaii for Families, Los Angeles California with kids, South Africa’s Garden Coast, South Africa’s Wildlife Adventures, Bora Bora Island French Polynesia, Cancun Mexico With Kids, Huatulco Pacific Coast of Mexico, Belize Islands and Jungles With Kids, Belize Caribbean Coast With Kids, Beijing & The Great Wall of China with Kids, Fiji & Castaway Island, Botswana, Africa Safari Adventure, Maui Hawaii For Kids.

 

(This post contains affiliate links.  If you click on a link and make a purchase, familiesformissions.com may receive a small compensation.)

 

Family Activity – Service Project

A fun way to teach kids about missions is to do a service project. I suggest finding an organization in your area and coming up with an idea for how to serve them. You might even ask them if they have needs or ideas.

Our family lives near a shelter for homeless men that are trying to get back on their feet. They offer a warm place to stay, meals, and Bible classes for those interested. They also serve the local community by giving out food boxes and supplies.

In the past, we have donated money and supplies. Last year I tried to come up with an idea of how the kids could get involved. They are young, so finding ways to involve them is a little trickier.

I went to the local fabric store and purchased fleece. (If you watch for sales or buy remnants, you can get the fabric inexpensively.)

fleece-for-scarves

Then we cut it into scarves to donate. My daughter helped cut them out and loved it. My son couldn’t cut as easily with the fabric shears, but he helped stack and organize the scarves. (He had fun counting them.) 🙂 We talked about how blessed we are to live in a warm house and have warm clothes and plenty of food. We talked about the needs that people in our own community have. They both went with us when we donated the scarves.

This was something they talked about for weeks afterward, especially on very cold days. It made an impact in their little lives and they asked if we could do it again this year.

There are other ways you can help locally, even on a budget:

  • Serve food at a local homeless diner
  • Play piano or sing for a local nursing home or shelter
  • Make Christmas treats or cards to take to nursing home or shelter
  • Purchase supplies to donate (clip coupons and watch sales to make this affordable)
  • Help clean or do yard work for a local organization
  • Collect coins to donate to a local organization – Let your kids do chores to earn extra money to donate

Do you have other ideas?

Reader Tip – 10 Ideas to Teach Children to Give

Check out the Reader Tip that I wrote for MoneySavingMom.com.

children-giving

As a parent, we want our kids to be kind and generous with others, but we all know this does not come naturally to most children. So, how do we teach them to give to others when they would rather focus on their own needs and wants?

Here are a few ideas…   Go here to read the rest!

Hopefully you can get some great ideas for how to help your kids learn to be more giving.

Do you have other ideas?  Please share them!

Family Activity – Children’s Map of the World Puzzle

(This post contains affiliate links.)

Here is a great idea for family fun if you and your children like puzzles!  We recently purchased this puzzle and our 5 and 8 year olds are loving it!  We spend time together working on putting it together, and we talk about the countries and illustrations on it.  There are 100’s of fascinating illustrated facts about the world. The finished puzzle measures 24″ x 36″.

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This would make a great Christmas present…or an activity for the family to do together during the Thanksgiving or Christmas break!

 

Family Activity – Cooking with Kate and Mack

Want a fun idea for an activity to do with the family?  Check out these recipes from Wycliffe sent in by real missionary kids!  You can try to make them with your kids and try foods from all over the world!

wycliffe-kids-cooking-picture

https://www.wycliffe.org/resources/kids/cook

Find a Great Local Experience for Your Family

Have you heard of Compassion Experience?  I recently learned about this event that happens in cities all across the United States.  This is a great way to let your family see what it would be like to live as a child in another country.   It is free and open to all ages.  I plan to attend with my family, and I would love to know if you have been and what you thought about it?  Leave some comments!

Want to see where you might find a Compassion Experience near you?  Look here:  Compassion Experience

Use the Olympics to Get Your Kids Interested In Missions!

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Are you having trouble getting your kids to want to learn about other countries and people groups? Do you wish they would care about others and be more generous?

Here are some inexpensive ways that you can use the recent Summer Olympics in Brazil to spark their interest:

  • Color a map of Brazil together. Label Rio de Janeiro (where the Summer Olympics were in 2016).
  • Create or color a flag of Brazil.
  • Read a book about Brazil from your local library.
  • Read a book about missionaries. Find one that includes people who have gone to Brazil, and talk about what kinds of jobs they have done. Missionary Kid Stories
  • Play soccer as a family. Look up the rules if you need to.
  • Make homemade lemonade/limeade from fresh squeezed lemons/limes.
  • Make a Brazilian dinner (include rice and beans) by looking up recipes online. You can use the recipe from MoneySavingMom Crockpot Beans for how to make crock pot beans (so simple)!
  • Put together a puzzle of the world. Find Brazil.
  • Learn some Portuguese phrases together. Bom dia!
  • Look up missions websites like JAARS http://www.jaars.org or Wycliffe (www.wycliffe.org) and search for articles about missionaries and mission work in Brazil. Pick some to read as a family. Sign up for updates from a missionary if you find one you are really interested in!

You won’t have to do all of these things to get your kids interested…just pick the ones that will work for your family! Your kids will already be excited about the Olympics, and you’ll be surprised how easy it will be to help the excitement carry over to learning about a new country and the mission work people are doing there!