What are Water Beads?
Water beads are quite popular on the Pinterest boards now a days, and I love it ! I plan to write an entire series on Biblical Water Bead activities for preschoolers, but until then… lets summarize! My absolute favorite blog post out there on water beads currently is over at Artful Parent. Jean does an absolute excellent job explaining where to get beads (Amazon not yet hydrated, Dollar Tree hydrated), how to prepare beads, and several different activities to play with them. Additionally, Play Dr. Hutch posted an exceptionally high quality listing of posts over the internet that have additional activities for water beads.
How Do I Make My Daughter’s First Bead Experience a Godly One
Honestly, I wasn’t too strict with her. With any new texture or experience, a child may react as expected or completely off the charts. We started by learning two important things about beads:
♦ 1. These things bounce on ANY surface, and keep bouncing. A lot.
♦ 2. They are so slippery!
We are studying the letters E and F this week, so playing “fish” in the beads lead us to creating a water habitat. How many two year olds know that the term “habitat” means where things live? Oh yeah, that’s right… mine! (so proud). However, playing these beads really opened up a strong opportunity for me to talk about God in our third week of Proverbs 31 for Preschoolers’ Study!
Talk about the Beads
- Color: You can find water beads in any color you wish, practically. Our beads were blue and clear/white. Blue is calming, healing, and soothing. Do we really need to explain how this relates to Christ and studying His word? Blue is also said to increase creativity and thought. White on the other hand represents cleanliness, purity, and hope. We all know in home remodeling white and other light colors make us feel more open and large in a small-square-footed room. Due to a freak accident Kara had months ago, she understands what blood and booboos are. When we placed her shrimp under the clear beads, she told me that the beads got hurt (blood). This was the perfect opportunity to discuss how Jesus shed blood to save us.
- Elasticity: These things bounce. Let me repeat. These. Things. Bounce. And Bounce. And Bounce. And Bounce. Then, they bounce some more. How many times can we bounce back into the loving arms of Christ? We might slip and fall onto the floor a thousand times (please don’t do what I did and drop the container of beads…. you will have thousands on the floor!), but we can always bounce right back up!
- Activities we can Play: You can always find some animals like we did and a boat to play Noah’s Ark. You can always find a toy whale and play Jonah and the Whale. A den of Lion’s needs a watering hole. Moses floating down the river. The red sea. The list goes on! Tons of scenes you can act out with your child.
- Eager as a Beaver (Proverbs 31:13): In any of the activities you choose (there is a great list in either of the two links shared at the beginning of the thread), talk to your children about participating eagerly and wanting, being excited to participate and work alongside of you. Men and Women of God are eager to perform the work they perform. They are positive.
Our Adventure
