Here are the ideas and resources you need for a jungle-themed day in your Kid’s Church.  Use them for a focus on missions or as part of a holiday program.  

YouTube Song Suggestions:

• We’re on a Jungle Adventure
• Who Is the King of the Jungle?
• Higher Higher (Cast your Burden)
• I Am the Way, the Truth and the Life (traditional Sunday School song)
• I Am the Way (VBS version)

Story Time:  Jungle Doctor Videos

Australian Paul White committed his life to Christ as a sixteen-year-old schoolboy and studied medicine as the next step towards missionary work in Africa. Paul and his family left for Tanganyika in 1938.  Returning to Sydney due to his wife’s ill health, Paul was invited to begin a weekly radio broadcast that spread throughout Australia as the Jungle Doctor Broadcasts – the last of these was aired in 1985. The weekly scripts for these programmes became the raw material for the Jungle Doctor Hospital stories – a series of twenty books. Although Dr. White’s plan to work in Africa was cut short, he was able to reach more people by coming home than by staying. Because of his books, he enjoyed meeting people who told him they were on their way overseas to work in missions. He died in 1992 but the stories and fables continue to attract an enthusiastic readership of all ages.  These stories have an uncompromising gospel message that warns of the dangers of sin and how to be saved from its consequences.  Visit the Cooee Kid’s Ministry YouTube channel to select a video.  You’ll find the links below.

Now is the Time!  Fire threatens the animals on the African plain.  They run to the Great Rock.  It is the only place that is calm and secure.  But Sticky the monkey is waylaid when he finds delicious honeycomb in a tree trunk.  The jungle animals beg Sticky to leave the honey and run to the rock for safety.  But Sticky thinks he has plenty of time to escape.  This video includes the Parable of the Rich Farmer from Luke 12:13-21

Visit:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0ikqCf4lB0

Donkey Wisdom!  Donkey is not happy with the way he looks and wants to change.  He thinks visiting the Cave of Wishes will give him what he is looking for.  But an indecisive donkey is a dangerous thing!  It’s important to make up your mind to follow Jesus!

Visit:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35D416wMmi4

The Great Wall!  A great wall appears in the middle of the jungle.  The animals gather to work out a way to get to the other side of the wall.  Rhino thinks he can ram it over.  Snake thinks he can dig under it.  Monkey thinks if he climbs Giraffe’s neck he can get over it.  Hyena is convinced he can get around it.  But nothing works.  This fable explains a wall of sin is between God and man and the only way past it is through Jesus!  God made a way. 

Visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ufgqNBL3vY

Safe as Poison!  Nzoka the snake has a secret source of food…stealing eggs from the farm.  Stealing feels good and fills Nzoka’s belly.  He thinks he can steal eggs forever.  But sooner or later sins are revealed!  Numbers 32:23b ‘…and you may be sure that your sin will find you out.’

Visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDrbjhpHwyA

Memory Verse:  John 14:6

Jesus answered, ‘I am the way the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.’

(You can choose a different verse and still use the game below to teach it.)

Memory Verse Game:  Monkey Business

Cut out banana shapes from yellow cardboard. You will need one banana per word of the Memory Verse, and extra bananas with pictures of jungle animals on them including multiple bananas with pictures of a monkey.   The leader keeps the words but the bananas with the pictures of a monkey and the rest of the jungle animals are placed in a safari hat.  Seat the children in a circle.  They take turns passing the safari hat as music plays. When the music stops they must pick a banana out of the hat. If a child chooses an animal other than the monkey, they must run around the circle imitating that animal. But when a player chooses the monkey banana they are awarded a word of the Memory Verse.​ (Using a monkey puppet to hand them out is extra fun!)  When all the words have been awarded, children assemble the banana words of the Memory Verse in the correct order and recite them aloud together. 

Morning Tea:

• WARNING: Check for allergies before serving food to children!
• Fruit Platters
• Jungle Jelly – green jelly in a cup (with snakes and frog lollies set in it)

Games:

Pin the Tail on the Monkey:  A variation on the party favourite Pin the Tail on the Donkey. 

Crocodile Crossing:  An obstacle course where the children cannot touch the floor because it is infested with crocodiles.

Monkey, Monkey, Lion:  Duck, Duck, Goose chasing game but with jungle animals.

Ten Pin Bowling:  Set up the ten pins, but bowl using a real coconut.

Jungle Fruit Bop:  A variety of balloons of all shapes and sizes is in the middle of a circle.  Every child’s name is put into a safari hat.  Children dance to jungle music, and when it stops a name is pulled out of the hat.  The child whose name was picked must pop the balloon and do whatever is instructed inside…act like a monkey, roar like a lion etc.

Lily Pad Relay:  Four large lily pads are made out of green cardboard.  The children are organised into two teams.  The teams are divided into halves at either end of the room.  A team member must get to the other side of the river by stepping onto a lily pad and taking the other lily pad from behind and putting it in front to take another step until they reach the river bank for the next team player to go back to the other side.

Monkey See, Monkey Do:  The game of Simon Says but jungle monkey style.

Snake Tails:  You’ll need one handkerchief per team.  Form ‘snake’ teams of 6 – 10 players.  The snakes form by players holding the waist of the person in front (except the first person).  The tail person of the ‘snake’ tucks the handkerchief under his belt or in the waist at the back to form a tail.  On the signal to start, each snake attempts to grab the tails from the other snakes without losing its own. Only the head of each snake can make the grab.  The more snakes, the more hilarious the ‘pile up’ result.

Quicksand:  You will need a mat or blanket.  Players join hands in a circle around a mat.  Then by pulling, pushing, and tugging each player tries to make someone else step onto the mat, without doing so himself.  Players drop out of the game once they touch the mat.  If the circle breaks, the two players who ‘let go’ must drop out.

Sleeping Lions:  Have all of the children (except one or two spotters) lie down on the floor in sleeping positions.  Once they are settled, they are not allowed to move.  The spotters walk through the room and try to make the sleeping lions move by making them laugh, by telling jokes, and pulling funny faces and so on.  However, the spotters are not allowed to touch the lions.  Once any lion moves they are tapped and get up and join the spotters.  The last child still on the floor wins!

Jungle Obstacle Course:  Make it through the jungle obstacle course to save the baby animals (soft toys).

• Running through hula hoops
• Jumping on a pile of cushions or bean bags
• Feed the hippo (throw balls into a basket with a hippo face on it)
• Stepping stones across lava or quicksand
• Climb through a hollow log (play tunnel)
• Swing from vines (ropes)

Craft:  Paddle Pop Stick Crocodile

You will need:

• Green paddle pop sticks (one per child)
• Zig-sag scissors to cut out teeth
• White paper (for the teeth)
• Green pipe cleaners (2 per child)
• Googly eyes (small)
• Black marker pen (draw on nostrils)
• Glue

What to do:

Take a green pipe cleaner and place it across the middle of the paddle pop stick.  Start wrapping the pipe cleaner around the paddle pop stick, working towards one end.  Once you wrap it so that a quarter of the stick is still ‘unwrapped’ stop.   Fold the leftover pipe cleaner into the legs. Repeat the whole process on the other end of the stick.  Use the zig-zag scissors to cut a small rectangle from the white paper.  These are the crocodile’s teeth.  Glue them on the underside of the paddle pop stick. Stick two small googly eyes on the top. Draw nostrils with the black marker.