Week five of Play Through The Bible is all about Joseph. The story of Joseph is one of my favorites, so many great lessons to glean from his life! However, the story is a long one and a little bit difficult for a toddler to follow. In the original Rhyme Bible the story is broken down into three smaller stories. Although K likes to listen to those stories, I can tell that he isn’t quite able to comprehend concepts like being a slave, or interpreting dreams. The Rhyme Bible for Toddlers manages to simplify the story down to just a few pages, which is much easier for a 2 year old to grasp. However, it does leave out a lot of the story. We found a compromise in reading the simpler story, but introducing a few more concepts through craft time. Hopefully it works out as well for you as it did for us!

If you haven’t read the introduction to this series yet I recommend going here. For all the plans in one place, go here.

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Week Five – Joseph

Focus Point

Joseph’s brothers are mean and send him away. Joseph still loves them.

Story Time Tips

• We read “Joseph Forgives” starting on page 40 of The Rhyme Bible Storybook for Toddlers.
• Take the story slow, pausing on each page to elaborate. For example, on the first page, we talked about Joseph’s coat and I had K point it out. On the second page we talked again about how Joseph’s brothers were very mean.
• On the second to last page, have your child guess if Joseph is going to be nice or mean to his brothers.

Activity

Find something to use as Joseph’s special coat (we used a robe) and pretend play the story. Have your child put on the coat and say “you are Joseph now! Here’s your special coat!” Then, you get to pretend to be a brother and take away the coat. This led to us playing a fun game of chase as I tried to get the coat off of K. After you get the coat, send him away to work as a slave. Then, follow on your knees, asking for food, saying “Oh! You are my brother! Will you forgive me?” End with lots of love and hugs.

Discussion

Parent: “Were Joseph’s brothers mean or nice?”

Child: “Mean.”

Parent: “Yes, they took his coat and sent him away. What did Joseph do in Egypt?”

Child: “Worked hard.”

Parent: “When Joseph’s brothers came to get some food, was he mean or nice to them?”

Child: “Nice!”

Parent: “Yes, Joseph forgave his brothers.”

Daily Craft

Day One – Joseph Coloring Page

http://www.biblekids.eu/anticotestamento/joseph/joseph_coloring/joseph_patriarch_coloring_page_16.jpg

Day Two – Joseph’s Coat

 

Materials needed:

• Variety of colored construction paper
• Contact paper (alternately, regular paper and a glue stick)

 

First, roll out your contact paper and draw an outline for your coat.

Then, cut it out.

Next, stack your colored paper together and cut off a strip. Then, cut the paper into small squares. This would be an easy cut for a beginning scissor user.

Peel off the backing on your coat. I used a little tape to stick it down to the table better.

All that’s left is to stick your different colored squares onto your coat!

Day Three – Journey To Slavery

 

Materials needed:

For the rest of this week’s crafts you will need the printable packet I put together. You can download it here – Joseph crafts

• Map printout
• Small Joseph with coat, printed and cut out
• Small Joseph in Egypt, printed and cut out
• Glue stick (not pictured)
• Marker (not pictured)

Even though he doesn’t quite understand them, K loves maps. Because of this, I thought it would be fun to show on a map where Joseph went when his brother’s send him away. First, we talked about Joseph getting his coat and I circled were he was when that happened. Then, we talked about how his brothers sent him away to work in Egypt and I circled that too and drew a line between the two.

Next, glue the Joseph in his coat onto his correct location.

And put the Egyptian Joseph over in Egypt.

Then, we talked once more about Joseph’s trip to Egypt. It’s a super simple project, but if you have a little one who loves maps, it’s sure to be a hit!

Day Four – Joseph Collects Grain

Materials needed:

• Medium sized Egyptian Joseph printed and cut out (from the Joseph crafts printable)
• White construction paper
• Brown construction paper cut into a rectangle with a rounded top
• Oats (or another grain)
• Glue stick

The story in The Rhyme Bible for Toddlers doesn’t go into what Joseph did in Egypt, so I used a simple craft to introduce the concept to K. Before we started we talked a little about how when Joseph was working in Egypt his job was to collect the food and save it so that people would have food when they were hungry. After we talked about it, we started the craft. 

First, put some glue on the back of Joseph.

Then put him over on one side of the paper.

Glue the back of the brown paper and put it on the other side of the paper.

Cover the whole piece of brown paper in glue.

Put the oats on the glue.

 

Press them in there really good! That’s it!

Day Five: Joseph Loves His Brothers

 

Materials needed:

• Large Egyptian Joseph page, printed (from the Joseph crafts printable)
• Red construction paper
• Glue stick
• Markers

 

 

Cut a heart out of the red paper.

Decorate the heart however you want. We wrote the world “love” on it and then K used markers. Put glue on the back and stick it onto your Joseph printout.

 

Make sure to use this craft as another opportunity to talk about how Joseph loved and forgave his brothers even though they were mean to him.

Extra Resources

We didn’t find any other Joseph materials to use this week. Do you know of any? I’d love to add them to this section!

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I hope you enjoyed week five of Play Through The Bible. I’d love to hear from you! Leave a comment below or use the hashtag #playthroughthebible on Twitter or Instagram! 

 

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