Free Sunday School Lessons for Children

The following Sunday School lesson for children is a free sample Sunday School lesson.
There are many more Sunday School lessons available on The Resource Room.

Go Fish
Written by Carolyn Warvel

Memory Verse:  ". . . Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men."—Matthew 4:19.

Bible story reference: Luke 5:1-11 and Matthew 4:17-22

Printable Bible phrase cards:  Print out onto card stock, cut apart, and send home with each child. (Available to members only.)

Teaching concepts: Children learn what it means to be a "fisher of men" and are given examples of how to "fish for men".

Early Arrivers Activity

1. Color the "Fish Talk" color sheet. Have children color the fish with crayons and then use watered down blue paint to paint over top of the fish and the rest of the picture. (Pattern available to members only.)

2. Work on a "Fishers of Men" bulletin board display. Before class print out the "fish kids" pattern and cut them out. Prepare your bulletin by placing blue paper for the background and drawing a net pattern on top. Or find net material and staple it onto the board. In class have the children color the "fish kids" and staple or clip them to the net. Cut out some extra fish and write the memory verse on the fish or use the ones in the game below. (Pattern available to members only.)

3. Study night crawlers - Bring in worms for the children to observe. You can buy these at bait shops or go outside at night with a flashlight after watering the yard. You can also make a worm habitat by placing garden soil in a glass jar. Add a free worms and cover the entire jar with black construction paper. After a few days take the construction paper off the jar. You should see how the worms have made tunnels down through the dirt along the sides of the jars.

4. Practice printing and writing - This lesson was designed to go along with ABC worksheets using the Bible verse. Children practice writing the letter A in print or cursive or write the complete verse in cursive. (Available to members only.)

Copyright Notice - Even though this is a free lesson it is still copyrighted. It is for personal use only. It may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, except for local church, school, or home use. It is illegal to copy this material and publish it on another web site even if you include the copyright notice. You must have permission to copy the material. To request permission to copy this material for any other use contact me by email.

The Lesson

How many of you have ever gone fishing? What did you use as bait? Did you use nightcrawlers like these? Did you catch any fish? (Give each child a chance to tell about their fishing experience.) Fishing can be fun, can't it? It can also be kind of disgusting. You have to pull the worm apart and squish it onto the hook. Or do your parents do that part? Then if you catch a fish, you have to cut it open and take the guts out. Yuk. I don't like that part.

Our story today is about some men who were fishermen. They didn't just fish for fun. Fishing was their job. They fished just about every day and they were probably pretty good at it. They didn't use bait to catch their fish. They used a net and would scoop up lots of fish all at one time.

This one night, though, they weren't having much luck. All night long they sailed their boats from one side of the lake to the other trying to catch some fish. They threw their nets in the water and pulled them back out many times, but there just didn't seem to be any fish. They fished all night and all they got were some dirty nets.

As they were cleaning their nets the next morning Jesus came up to Simon Peter, who was one of the fishermen and told him to take his boat back out into the lake and throw out his net again.

Simon Peter and his friends were very tired and hungry but they did what Jesus said and went back out into lake again and threw out their nets just where Jesus told them to throw it. And when they pulled up their nets this time, they were so heavy with fish the nets started to rip. Simon Peter called to his friends in the other boat to come and help him. Soon they caught so many fish that their boats were beginning to sink. The fishermen were amazed. How did Jesus know where the fish were? They had looked all night long and couldn't find them. They thought that there had to be something very special about this man Jesus. They were really excited to meet him.

Then Jesus did something else really amazing. He told the fishermen that if they followed him, he would make them fishers of men. This sounded really exciting to the fishermen. They knew how to catch fish, but men? How could they not follow a man who seemed to know everything. The fishermen left their boats and everything they had and followed Jesus. They became Jesus' disciples and learned from Jesus how to become "fishers of men".

When we follow Jesus we also learn how to be "fishers of men".

What does it mean to be a "fisher of men?" Instead of catching fish we catch men. We tell people about Jesus so that they too want to follow him too.

What do you need to catch fish? (Let the children respond.) You need a net or a fishing pole. If you use a fishing pole, you have to have bait. What kind of bait can you use to catch fish? night crawlers, lures, bugs, caterpillars, etc.

But what kind of bait do you use to catch men? God's words.

Fishing can be fun, but it can be a little messy and smelly. But when we catch men for Jesus we don't have to clean them; Jesus takes care of that part.

Activity

1. Fish for Men - In this game children pull on a string to see if they can catch a fish. If the string has a fish at the end the children answer a question.

Before class print out the "fish kids" and cut them out. Make enough so that you have one for each child. Punch a hole at the top of each "fish kids" and tie some yarn through the hole. Cut some extra pieces of yarn. Hang the "fish kids" and the extra pieces of yarn over a box so that the ends with the "fish kids" are inside the box so that the children can not see them. Make sure the aren't overlapping because a child may pull out more than one by mistake. Let the children take turns pulling on a string to see if they can catch a "fish kid". If they "catch one" read one of the following scenarios and have the children tell how they can be a "fisher of men".

1. Amy - Amy is new in school and is very shy. She doesn't have any friends and stands by herself most of the time. How can you be a fisher of men to Amy? You can ask Amy to join in when you are playing a game. You can talk to her and introduce her to your friends. You can ask her to come to church with you and meet more people.

2. Mike - Mike is your neighbor. His parents work on Sunday and don't take him to church. What can you do to be a "fisher of men" to Mike? You can tell Mike about Jesus. You can invite him to church and offer to pick him up and take him.

3. John - John is your neighbor. He is a big boy and picks on the little kids in your neighborhood, calling them names and hitting them. What can you do to be a "fisher of men" to John and the kids in your neighborhood? Talk to John about Jesus. Tell him that he doesn't want us to treat others that way. Everyone is special no matter how big they are or small or what they look like.

4. Rachel - Rachel loves to sing and is very good at it. You asked her to come to Sunday School with you several times but she said she didn't like school and she didn't want to get up that early. How can you be a "fisher of men" (talk to her about Jesus) to Rachel? Invite her to join your kid's choir at church which meets on a Tuesday night or introduce her to some good Christian music.

Copyright Notice - Even though this is a free lesson it is still copyrighted. It is for personal use only. It may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, except for local church, school, or home use. It is illegal to copy this material and publish it on another web site even if you include the copyright notice. You must have permission to copy the material. To request permission to copy this material for any other use contact me by email.

Prayer

Father, Help us to become good fishers of men. Help us to be good examples by the way we act and what we say. Help us to tell others about you and to invite them to church so that they will know you and follow you.

Songs

Sing "I will Make you Fishers of Men."

Activities

1. Play "Go Fish" game - Before class print out the net pattern and the fish patterns onto computer paper. Write the memory verse on the fish patterns, one word per fish. Tape the fish onto the back of the net patterns. Leave some papers blank. Spread out the papers on the floor with the net side up. Before the game, go over the memory verse. Write it on the board if you have children that can't read. (Available to members only.)

Before starting remind the children that the fishermen in our story didn't have much luck fishing until Jesus told them where to find the fish. Let's see if you can catch some fish today. Have the children stand in a circle around the papers (nets) on the floor. Have them take turns picking up the nets and seeing if they caught any fish. If they turn over a paper with a fish taped to the back, ask them if they know what the word is on the fish and to find the matching word on the board. Give them a piece of tape to hang up the paper underneath the matching word. Or you can hang a string or net up in the room and have the children clip the fish to the net with clothes pins in the correct order.

2. Make dirt pudding with worms - Print out the recipe In class have the children help prepare the dessert. (Available to members only.)

Copyright Notice - Even though this is a free lesson it is still copyrighted. It is for personal use only. It may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, except for local church, school, or home use. It is illegal to copy this material and publish it on another web site even if you include the copyright notice. You must have permission to copy the material. To request permission to copy this material for any other use contact me by email.

Craft

1. Make "Fisher of Men" pictures.

What you will need: Card stock, paper, crayons, sticks, yarn, tape, and small bobbers (optional)

What to do:

1. Before class print out the fish kids pattern and cut them out and print out the "Follow Me" background pattern. (Available to members only.)
2. In class have the children color the "fish kids", punch a hole at the top, tie a length of yarn to the hole and place a bobber onto the yarn. Give them a stick and help them tie the yarn to the string. Tape the fishing pole stick to the background paper with the Bible verse.

Caution: Do not use pointy sticks with young children. Make sure that they tape their fishing poles onto the paper. If you don't want to use sticks because you are afraid someone might get hurt. Draw a fishing pole on the paper and then tape the string to the end of the fishing pole drawing. Make sure you let the children know that the bobbers are not toys. You could also draw a paper bobber instead of using a real one. They should not play with them. They are only for looking at and reminding them of the lesson. Also let their parents know.

(I am doing the Fishers of Men lesson and I love the paper with the bobber! But I am not able to use the bobbers so I dipped small styrofoam balls 1/2 way into red paint and then dipped some toothpicks or you can use skewers into white paint. I cut these so they could be placed in the top of my make believe bobber and then glued it onto your memory verse sheet with the boy or girl. I let the kids dip the bobbers into the paint but if you don't want to do that you can do this ahead of ime. This was very inexpensive. Thanks, Nancy )

2. Make a pail with memory verse night crawlers - First make pails using typing paper. Go to http://www.wipapercouncil.org/origami.htm for directions on how to make these pails. If you can't find the directions on this site, Microsoft Publishers has the pattern under "publications" and "wizards" and "origami". If you have older children, you can have them make their own pails. If you have younger children, make them ahead of time and have them decorate them. Write the memory verse on the pail. Glue in a pipe cleaner for a handle. Older children can cut out their own worms from pink construction paper. Cut them out yourself if you have younger children and let them make faces on the worms. Write one word of the memory verse on each worm.

Children can use their pail of worms to review the Bible verse by putting the worms in order to spell out the verse.

You can also use this craft to hold a snack of gummy worms. Children might enjoy making a pail of worms for their friends. They can include a Bible verse with the snack also or write something on the outside. Remind them that fishermen use worms as bait to catch a fish. We are using Gods' words as bait to catch people for Jesus.

Copyright Notice - Even though this is a free lesson it is still copyrighted. It is for personal use only. It may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, except for local church, school, or home use. It is illegal to copy this material and publish it on another web site even if you include the copyright notice. You must have permission to copy the material. To request permission to copy this material for any other use contact me by email.

Learning Activities for Home school children - If you would like even more ant related learning activities in math, phonics, spelling, and reading go to the Night Crawlers Learning Activities Page. (Available to members only.)

Copyright 2000, Carolyn Warvel, Digital by Design
Danielle's Place of Crafts and Activities
http://www.daniellesplace.com

All rights reserved.   No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information or storage retrieval system, except for local church or school use only.  This copyright notice must be included on all copies. Requests for permission to copy this material for any other uses should be addressed to Carolyn Warvel, 588 Duran Street, Henderson, NV  89015 or e-mail me at care@daniellesplace.com

Comments

We would love to hear your comments about this lesson. If you have done this lesson with your class we would love to hear how it went, if you changed anything, added anything, what age you taught and was it appropriate. Any comments that would help other teachers would be greatly appreciated and posted here for everyone to read.

This week we are doing the miraculous catch of fish so I am using your Fish Kids poster craft idea and also using the fish kids to write questions on, putting magnetic tape on the back and letting the children fish" for questions to review the story. Sherry Winter, Carmel, Indiana

I did the fishers of men lesson with my Sunbeams and it went really well. I use the wall tacky a lot to stick lesson parts on the wall. I put the words across the wall for them to match on. When we did the "Go Fish" Game each time a child matched a word on the wall we all said the verse together, very repetitious and they loved it. Not only did they learn their memory verse but a week later they still knew it! With the activity we made up more scenarios so each child would have a chance to answer one. I did make the mistake of using crochet twine so they kept tangling on the edge of the box. I think Macramé or twine would be better. You could also make the fish and boys and girls out of foam sheets and decorate for a more permanent game or send one home with each child to remind them to be fisher of men. When we were done, I divided the fish evenly among the children, the class had only 5 that night and tied the strings together like a string of fish caught and wrote heir memory verse on one for them to take home. I also ran the fish off on the copier on bright wall paper with all kinds of designs. Made them pretty, fun and cheap to make! I did find two really neat snacks to make to go with the lesson: They were on http://childfun.com/themes/fish.shtml#food which has a lot of neat 'fish' ideas someone might want to use. I used the first snack - fish crackers on a blue napkin and Jell-O aquariums.

We did the Fishers of Men lesson last night, and it was well received by the kids (preschool through 5th grade). I added a snack that was a hit ... I made berry blue Jell-O in a trifle bowl, let it partially set, and then added gummy fish, gummy octopuses (octopi?) and gummy worms and served goldfish crackers on the side. They enjoyed the link to the theme. If I'd taken more time, I might have done it as gigglers with fish cutouts. Thanks!! Cheryl Gross

I really love your site. We use it almost every Wednesday night for our preschool children. The last lesson we did was "Go Fish". My children had a wonderful time especially making the fisher man . They really enjoyed listening to the story about the fishermen and then really enjoyed making fishers of men on there papers. The real bobbers done it for them. They were hooked. Thank you so much. Christina

I did this lesson with my preschool class. Instead of using sticks and bobbers , I just drew the fishing pole on the pre- printed follow me background paper and took a yarn needle, threaded it with a 6 inch piece of yarn and poked it through the paper at the top of the fishing pole and tied a knot in it on the back of the paper so it wouldn't go all the way through, then I let the children color their boy or girl and tied it on the end of the line. It was a lot more economical and easier and you didn't have to worry about the children getting hurt on anything. They loved it.

My husband and I work with the two and three year olds in our church on Wednesday night. Since they are too young to be in AWANA, we started the "Lambs" class. I absolutely love your craft ideas. To be honest, we don't usually use a lot of the lesson ideas, but usually because it's too old for our audience. I did use the Go Fish game, but changed it into a craft for our little ones. I enlarged the net so it covered a piece of blue stock paper, then made orange fish with the words of the memory verse on them. I had each child glue the fish onto the net (making sure I emphasized that the fishermen caught lots of fish!) then gave them some stickers of shiny fish to also put on their papers. It turned out really cute and the kids love anything with animals on it. They are so excited to show their parents something they make themselves. As a treat, I took little Ziploc snack bags and drew lines on them to resemble a "net" on either side then filled them with Goldfish, so the kids could take home their own net full of fish! The kids loved it and it was easy and cheap for me to make! Thanks for all your hard work, Rachel O'Dell

In my 2-6 year old Sunday school class this week, I did the "Fishers of Men" lesson. It turned out very well. My children really enjoyed it!

Instead of making a craft this week, we did an activity for the children to put together to take home. Before the lesson, I printed the fish patterns, with a few words of the scripture verse printed on each of them, onto different colors of construction paper (Red--Jesus said,--Orange--"Follow Me--Yellow--and I will make--Green--you become--Blue--fishers of men--Purple--Mark 1:17). I cut out the fish and attached a paper clip to the mouth. For the lake, I set up a small wading pool with blue Easter grass as water and placed the fish inside. I made fishing poles using wooden dowels, string and magnets. When we finished our lesson, the children got to fish out the scripture verse by catching one of each color fish. After they each caught their fish, I gave them a piece of yarn to use as a "stringer" and they returned to the sanctuary carrying their "catch" proudly. I have used this lesson two times before, but this was one of my better ideas for the take home item. Thank you for such wonderful lessons. Theresa Bostick

I did this lesson with a few twists. I made fishing poles from those super large pixie sticks and I laminated the fish which I had the memory verse written on them, and put magnets on the back of them. I had the children get into the refrigerator box that I had painted up as a boat with blue plastic table clothes around it and seaweed made from green and orange paper. I had the children fishing for a while and I didn't put the fish into the water. The children pretended to sail back to land and "check out" Jesus. Then, I had them put Jesus in the boat and sail back out so that He could teach from the water. I told them that Jesus would forgive all of our sins and God would meet the desires of our hearts. I told them that we all need to follow Jesus. Then, I asked the children what did they desire at that moment...they shouted out FISH. So, I threw the fish into the water. I had made a hugh rainbow fish from paper and this fish actually went home with the winner. This lesson was taught to all children from age 3-8. They loved it. A four year old little boy caught his fish. I had him step out of the boat and gave him the rainbow fish. I took their pictures with him in the front of the boat. There was an impatient 8 year old in the boat screaming that she couldn't catch the fish. I told her that we all wait on Jesus with patience and in his time all things will come. This lesson was so worth doing just to see how the children had patience to actually do the activity. They were so interested in catching the fish that they didn't even notice that their fishing poles were candy. I also had a review questions on the door of the classroom. The children were able to answer All of the questions. They remembered both scriptures that I added to the lesson, Psalms 37:33 &34. I also made sugar cookies that had Tteddy Grahams fishing in the water. I used Hershey bars for a boat, thin licorice for the poles and licorice fish. All were attached to the water, which was a sugar cookie with blue icing. The children were so excited that they didn't even realize that their fishing poles were candy. You can buy these pixie sticks 4 for $1.00 at Marcs or local YWCA's in the candy counters. This was the best active lesson I have done. Thank you. Ann

We just did a month of making fisher of men. I wish I had had your lessons then, anyway we had a man come to class and teach the children how to throw a cast net, which is how the disciples fished instead of with poles and hooks. The children were really impressed to learn about the nets and how they were used long ago.
Becky Collins

I used the "Go Fish" lesson with my 4 years through 1st grade class. As an opener/interest getter, I put a bunch of rubber nightcrawlers into the bottom of a bag. I let the children reach in to feel and guess what was in the bag before the lesson. For a craft, we made the "Fishers of Men" picture; they loved the pole (stick) and bobber. I made a larger pattern of the "pail with memory verse," and filled it with gummy worms for the kids. (Address labels are great for printing out the verses and they are ready to stick on.) For a reveiw, I let the children get into a cardboard box "boat" and catch (paper clipped) fish that had questions written on them using a magnet tied to a string and pole. The whole lesson was great, but I think their favorite part was the fishing review.

Hello, I loved this project! We were talking about Fishers of Men in our Sunday School class (3rd and 4th graders) and we made the pail with the memory verse on it. The kids loved the project! For a game I used the net pattern you have and shrunk them to 4 on a page. I found a clipart tire, flashlight, boot and a small fish net, also all four of your "fish kids" and 4 plain fish and I left four of the nets blank and the other 8 I mixed up their memory verse (so it took all 8 to complete it), and I explained that in Bible times that they would have used nets for fishing. I mixed up all of the 24 nets (net side face up) I had glued the pictures and verses to the blank side. I had the kids reach into a shallow plastic bucket and see what they "caught". If they caught a "fish kid" we used your ideas to talk about how they could be fishers of men. It was GREAT! Thanks again. Diana

For more free lessons go to the Free Sunday School Lessons for Children Page.