Free Web Conference to Educate About Kids with Disabilities
Inclusion Fusion will teach church professionals how to reach kids with special needs

CHAGRIN FALLS, OHIO – October 10, 2011 – Key Ministry, a non-profit organization based in Cleveland, Ohio,  is regarded as a leader in the field of inclusion ministry and is pleased to present Inclusion Fusion, our first annual special needs ministry web summit. In partnership with pajamaconference.com, we are offering this FREE, worldwide web conference to equip churches to more effectively serve, welcome and include families of kids with disabilities.

Inclusion Fusion, being held from November 3-5, 2011, is being made available free of charge to ensure the participation of as many church leaders, volunteers and families as possible. Presentations will be videotaped in advance by experts from all over the United States. Each training module will then be available online, free of charge, at any time from November 3-5.  A collection of all presentations will be permanently housed on a related website following the conclusion of the conference.

Chuck Swindoll, Chairman of the Board at Insight for Living, Chancellor at Dallas Theological Seminary, and Senior Pastor at Stonebriar Church in Frisco, Texas will provide the keynote address.  In addition to his professional responsibilities, Dr. Swindoll is the proud grandpa of a child with special needs.

Other speakers include Shannon Dingle, Founder of the blog “The Works of God Displayed,” and special needs ministry coordinator at Providence Baptist Church in Raleigh, NC; Amy Dolan, Founder of Lemon Lime Kids;  Connie Hutchinson, Director of Disabilities Ministry at First Evangelical Free Church of Fullerton, California; Marie Kuch, Founder and Executive Director of Nathaniel’s Hope in Orlando, Florida, and many, many more.

There will be topics of interest for those in professional ministry, as well as for parents of kids with special needs. Topics will include advocating for your child at church, how to set up welcoming ministry environments, how to establish respite care and different models for providing respite, common misconceptions about special needs ministry, and using social media in special needs ministry to name just a few.

To learn more about Inclusion Fusion, please visit the website at  www.inclusionfusion.org, the Inclusion Fusion Facebook page,  or e-mail Katie@keyministry.org.

Raise your hand if you are a cowboy or cowgirl today. Raise your hand if you are a princess today. Raise your hand if you are a superhero today. How many of you are enjoying getting to pretend to be someone else today? I love getting to dress up and play pretend too! When I was a little girl, I loved pretending to be a prima ballerina. I would imagine being on a big stage with my big pink tutu. I would dance my sugar plum fairy dance, and imagine beautiful roses raining down on me. But guess what. I’m not a prima ballerina. I grew up to be a Children’s Minister instead. Do you think that God loves me any less because I’m not a ballerina? No. God loves me for being me. Do you think God needs you to wear fluffy dresses, and superhero capes to love you? Well God doesn’t need us to do that. God probably loves getting to see us all fancy, but God already thinks we’re wonderful just the way we are. Do you know that when God made all of the earth, God made people too? God made a boy and a girl and you know what God said about that boy and girl? God said that they were very good, just the way they were. God thinks we are we are very good just the way we are too. Isn’t it great that we have a God that loves us so much that he thinks we are already princes and princesses without having to change who we are? So the next time you are playing dress up, I want you to remember that God loves you just as you are. Can you do that for me?

Let’s say a prayer. Dear Loving Creator, thank you for making us Your princes and princesses. Amen.

Disney Scene It
We played the Disney Scene It DVD on the screens in our CLC while we played our other games. This allowed those who were waiting something to do, and it also was a great thing to have playing while people sat and ate or colored or built puzzles.

Treasure Hunt
The Treasure Hunt was a great thing we did to encourage our families to find the important Sunday morning things we wanted them to know. They used their cell phones to take pictures of what the clues led to. We had them find where they check-in, where they find the children’s worship books, the fun playhouse the kids play in on Sunday, and the Watchorn Chapel – which is a chapel set up to stream in the current worship service so families with upset children can still be in a worship space.

My Favorite Is…
http://www.tlsbooks.com/favoritethings.pdf

Costume Relay
The first players from each team put all the dress-up clothes on. They walk or run down and back. The players take off the dress-up clothes and pass them on to the next players.

What If?
Take turns answering these hypothetical questions and then invent some of your own. If you were king or queen of a country, how would you use your power? If you could be the best on your block at something, what would it be? If you could live any place in the world, where would you live and why? Describe your perfect vacation. Where would you visit and who would you want to travel with you? If you were stranded on a deserted island and could eat only one kind of food for the rest of your life, what would it be? If Spider Man and Batman fought, who would win and why? If you could make up a holiday, what would it be and how would you celebrate it?

Tell Your Own Fairytale
Someone starts a story and, after a couple of sentences, points to someone else to continue the story. It’s more fun if you go fast. The crazier the story, the better.

Find the Prince/Princess
In this contest, blindfolded mothers (or fathers) race to find their children, who are calling to them from across a designated distance.
WHAT YOU NEED: A blindfold for each mom (or dad)
WHAT YOU DO: Line up the mothers side by side. After they’ve been blindfolded, the children also line up side by side across an open expanse, with siblings grouped together. At the signal, the kids start calling for their mothers; the mothers can move, but the kids must remain stationary. Whoever touches her own children first is the winner.

Castle Tower Competition: Building Together
No benchwarmers are allowed in this building game where family members use a hair-tie lasso to stack towers of cans and boxes.
What You Need:1 large ponytail holder, 12-inch lengths of string or yarn (one per player), Small cans or boxes
Instructions

1. To make your lasso, tie 12-inch lengths of string or yarn, one per player, to a single large ponytail holder.
2. Players sit in a circle, each holding their string taut, then work together to stretch the holder so that it encircles a small can or box. They then lift the object and stack it on top of another, trying to create the highest tower they can. Our testers liked stacking cat food cans, small boxes, and even stuffed animals — nothing too heavy!

We had a wonderful day with our preschoolers and their families at Prince and Princess Day a few weeks back. Read the letter I sent out to the parents below that explains just what we planned to do:

We are so excited that you all will be coming to Prince and Princess Day Saturday, July 9^th from 2-4pm. It will be such a wonderful family experience. We invite your whole family to the fun, including any older or younger siblings. Our goals for Prince and Princess Day are to:

1. Create a fun family experience where we enter into the play of our children.
2. Create a fun and safe environment for the kids to play with their peers.
3. To give our parents the opportunity to make friends with other parents.

In order to accomplish our first goal, we recommend everyone wearing a fun costume based on what your kids are wearing. The costumes don’t need to be extravagant. For example, your child wants to go as Nemo. They could wear an orange shirt and white shorts, while you could wear blue and yellow and come as Dory. It will be so much fun for all of us to play pretend, and we will call you the names of your character to help us all really get into the worlds of our children. We would also suggest thinking of ideas for a team name based on the characters your family chooses. We will be making pinnacle flags for each family to carry with them to the games to encourage team spirit.

We are so excited to spend the afternoon with all of God’s Princes and Princesses. The games (Get excited for our scavenger hunt and the costume relay!), the fellowship, the food, and the message of God’s amazing Love, will make for a great time together!

We had a day just like that! There were 12 tables, each with their own theme. Each table had a centerpiece, tablecloth, coloring sheets, puzzle, and Disney Scene It game cards to play with our ongoing Disney Scene It DVD that played on the screens in our space.  The kids loved getting to choose their favorite movie/character/show and celebrate with their families at these fun tables.

There were games, a crown craft, and we even had real Disney Princesses! It was so much fun! My favorite part was the children’s moment I had with the kids, where we talked about how special God created us to be – God made us to be Princes and Princesses after all!

I will be posting the games and the children’s moment in the next few days, so come back to see all of the details!

There is another fabulous job opportunity in OKC! Westminster Presbyterian Church is hiring for a full-time Children’s Minister position.

Click this link to read the job description: http://www.wpcokc.org/files/Resources/307fileURL.pdf

Click this link to see their church home page: http://www.wpcokc.org/cgi-bin/index.cgi

“The Story” by Zondervan is a new Bible translation written to help readers understand the story of God’s love better. It is ordered chronologically and there are five versions of the story, one for each developmental stage. Here is what their website says about their books.

• “There’s a new story unfolding. People in churches and in homes everywhere are experiencing God’s Word in a whole new way. The Story Church Campaign Kit provides all the tools you need to draw your congregation, your small group, and your family into the grand, unfolding story of the Bible as one sweeping narrative, arranged chronologically from Genesis to Revelation.”
• “The Story is helping people in churches everywhere experience Scripture like never before. Carefully selected verses from the Bible are organized chronologically. From Genesis to Revelation, your church members will come to understand God’s story and how their stories intersect with it.”

I was given to opportunity to look over the little one’s book, the early elementary children’s book, the story for kid’s book (older elementary), and the teen’s book, as well as the curriculum for the older children. The story for little ones is done with beautiful illustrations, easy to understand language, the stories in the Bible that are important foundations for our young children, and a question to help spur on discussion for parents and their young children, and help the young children apply the story to their lives. The story for children has beautifully detailed illustrations, easy language with more details than the little ones book, foundational stories as well as a few more that our older children can understand, and at the end of each story is something called God’s message with important points to each story to help children apply the story to their lives and to make discussion easier for parents. The story for kids book is written like a chapter book for older elementary and early middle school children. It has 31 stories all written for older elementary students to read like a novel. At the end of each story are three discussion questions to help them think more deeply about the story and their lives. The teen version of The Story is written like a novel combined with a text book. There is a timeline that runs throughout the book at the bottom of the page, as well as a flipbook in the corner of each page. This version has lots more detail in the writing and their are more discussion questions (which are at the end of the book) than the other books. At the very back is a list of important characters from the Bible and a scripture reference page.

I haven’t had a chance to review all of the curriculum yet, but in the next post I will look at the lessons that go along with the story for kids book.  I am anxious to see what all they teach, because so far I am impressed with the fluidity of each book as well as the details put in to make them all developmentally sound. Check out The Story’s webpage for more information about all of their books and curriculum, including things for adults.

This past week the Oklahoma Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church met here in OKC. It consisted of reports, fellowship, voting, awards, and worship. One of my favorite things about the United Methodist Church is the array of theologies that we all cling to and claim. We are taught to use the Wesleyan Quadrilateral (scripture, tradition, reason, and experience) to understand God, and who we are called to be and believe. Because we all have our own unique experiences with God it creates a large array of where we all stand on certain “issues”, if you will.

My friend, Adam Shahan, gave a sermon about all of this at the conference. My favorite quote is this, “If we are to rest our certainty in anything this day, let us rest it not in ourselves, or our extra denominational roots. Let us rest it in the fact that the Spirit of the Lord is in this place.” Find your favorite quote in his sermon below.

There are many times in our lives when things do not go as planned, or as the way we want them. Many times those moments can bring frustration, anger, disappointment, confusion, sadness, and an overwhelming sense of lost control. It’s very hard to see the good things that come from these unplanned moments in our lives. These moments are actually blessings in disguise if we look for God in the midst of it all.

Each week I get the opportunity to have chapel with the St. Luke’s Children’s Center kids. During our service we have a time where I draw a cross on the hands of each child using a flavored/colored chapstick as I remind the kids of God’s blessings. The smell is supposed to remind us throughout the day that God is always with us, and that we should be looking for the day’s blessings. Too many times though it turns into a moment of sadness because someone’s favorite color is not the color of the chapstick that day. The meaning of the blessing is lost. The child does not understand that it isn’t the color of the blessing that makes it great, it’s the fact that we get to celebrate and share in all of God’s blessings. Sometimes our blessings come in colors that we don’t know we like yet.

Your child is going to face lots of blessings they don’t know they like yet throughout their lives. It may be the role they wanted wasn’t the one they fit. It may be that they really wanted to play baseball and they didn’t make the team. It may be that they want to go to a college that doesn’t accept them. These can all be blessings if we encourage them to look for God in the midst of the pain. The role your child actually receives may display their talent for dance. Your child may be freed up to take the art class they really wanted to take since they didn’t make the baseball team. Your child may find the best friends they never had at the college that did accept them. None of those things would have been possible if they received what they had planned.

It isn’t always the shape, color, smell, size, opportunity we wanted. That doesn’t make it any less of a blessing or an opportunity for God to work in our lives. God is always present persuading us to do good, and to look for good in the world. We must encourage our children to look for God in all people, places, and situations. God is always with us, we just have to look.Say this prayer together: Dear God, in all that happens, help me see the good things You have waiting for me. Amen.

Some things you can do with your child:

• Talk through their feelings. Ask them to think about what good things can come from the results. Example: If they got the role of an ensemble member they get to participate in show, make new friends, learn more about theater, and work as a team to make the show the best it can be.
• Read this Bible verse: We know that in everything God works for the good. Romans 8:28. What does that mean for us?
• Remind them that whatever happens, events do not define who you are or how much you are worth. God created all of us, and it says in Genesis that God saw all of creation and declared it good. We are all good, special, and unique. Just because we don’t get what we planned it does not mean we are not beautiful, smart, and wonderful. It just means that this time we will be finding God’s blessings through something else.
• Do a breath prayer together. When you breathe in think of a blessing in your life. When you breathe out let go of anything upsetting you, or hindering you from being in the midst of God’s blessings.

Teaching your child how to be in service, to think of others, and to share the things they have with others  really begins very early in life.  At a very young age our children are formed by the adult influences in their lives. If they see their families sharing, they will share. If they see their parents locking their car doors when someone needy is standing on the corner, they grow up believing they too should lock their doors.

One of the best things you can do to insure your child is learning how to give to others is to model that behavior for them. If you think back to your childhood, a lot of your time was probably spent in imaginative play. You were pretending to be someone else. For me, I spent a lot of my time pretending to be a mom. I pretended to clean, to cook, to rock my babies, to grocery shop, and to play with my babies at the park. I did all of that because that’s what my mom did. Our kids learn so much just by watching and mimicking the adults in their lives.

As they grow older, especially around the age of 9 or 10, our children will start depending on peer evaluations. They will want to do what their friends do. It is very important that we give our children the traits they need to make good decisions before they reach that age. If you have older children and they do not like sharing, or giving, one of the things you can do is to have them pick an organization that does something they like. If your child likes to surf, there are organizations based in surfing that actually travel the world helping people in need. They will have a sense of ownership in that, which will span positive feelings, and encourage them to continue to give.

The following are a few tips I think would be great to keep in mind as your children grow.

• Children learn from modeling the behaviors of adults in their lives. If you  model the behaviors of a charitable giver, they will mimic that behavior.
• Talk with your children about why you like to give to others. Ask them if they have a hard time sharing with their friends or if it is easy. Ask them why. There are no right or wrong answer, this just opens up the communication lines so your children feel comfortable talking about giving to those in need.
• Include your children in the decision process of choosing who will be receiving your gifts, money, talents, and time. If they help make the decision they will be more likely to take ownership of that decision and feel the positive emotions that come with giving.
• If you begin teaching your children about sharing at an early age, they will learn to share their resources as they get older. Sharing can be a hard thing to learn, especially as a toddler because at that age they are learning how to be an individual and to be an individual means that you can have your own things, but if you positively reinforce them each time they share they will begin to feel the positive feelings you get from sharing.
• Practice sharing. Ask them to let you give their favorite toy a hug. When they pass it to you, say, “Thank you so much for sharing with me. I love getting to play with your toys with you.” That will positively reinforce sharing and with practice, it will be easier for them to share with others.
• Don’t punish stinginess. If you tell your child that they are selfish, discipline them when they don’t share, or force them to hand over a prized possession, you’ll foster resentment, not generosity. Positive reinforcement is key. As your children mature, they will learn that sharing with friends — who become increasingly important — is more fun than keeping things to themselves.

The Wesleyan Quadrilateral is a methodology for theological reflection that is credited to John Wesley, leader of the Methodist movement in the late 18th Century. The term itself was coined by 20th century American Methodist Albert C. Outler in his introduction to the 1964 collection John Wesley (ISBN 0-19-502810-4)

Upon examination of Wesley’s work, Outler theorized that Wesley used four different sources in coming to theological conclusions. The four sources are:

1. Scripture – the Holy Bible (Old and New Testaments)
2. Tradition – the two millennia history of the Christian Church, including our current influences like our upbringing and our current values
3. Reason – rational thinking and sensible interpretation
4. Experience – a Christian’s personal and communal journey in Christ

“Wesley believed that the living core of the Christian faith was revealed in Scripture, illumined by tradition, vivified in personal experience, and confirmed by reason.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wesleyan_Quadrilateral)

Using the Quadrilateral to Discuss Lessons

What do our Bibles say about it? Look up in the back the topics you are discussing. For example, if you were studying Creation look up the two creation stories in Genesis. Read some of the verses and decide what our Bible says about the topic.

What does Tradition teach us? What have we traditionally taught about the topic? For example, what does the church think about Creation? Have we always felt that way? What did the medieval church believe about Creation?

What does Reasoning tell us? What does logic say? For example, since the Bible was written down, science has told us more information about planet earth, the plants, and animals we have here. What does that mean for us?

What do our own Experiences say? What have we witness, lived, or felt about the subject? For example, what do you think about the Creation story? We have all experienced life on earth. What do we think?

In Conclusion: After going through each of these pieces, what are our conclusions? Example: For me, the world is so complex, beautiful and so detailed. I think God did make creation, and that it took billions of years based on my reasoning skills. I think the Bible story helps explain how the world came to be, but it doesn’t have to be historically accurate to be a truth story about what happened. I came to this conclusion by studying my Bible, viewing that tradition has many stances on Creation, using reason to develop my answer, and drawing on my own experiences.

We can use these steps to help us interpret all aspects of our lives. We can use it to develop a better understanding of God, of our relationship to others, and helps us determine who we should be as believers.