Character teaching and helping others develop the skills of a good citizen can be challenging. However, Little Pot, the main character in the lesson and a fruit-bearing vessel created by the potter brings clarity and simplicity to the task. Additionally, in these seven FREE lessons, children learn the fruit-bearing cycle and how the Holy Spirit can produce love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control through them. Likewise, the activities perfectly blend fun and learning with understanding. The seventh lesson in this series is the final lesson and covers the fruit itself. So, let’s join Little Pot as it continues character teaching.

Read more: Transform your character teaching with these 7 FREE lessons.

Why you should use Little Pot in character teaching.

First, let’s discuss why Little Pot is the perfect tool for teaching character traits. The seven lessons illustrate complex concepts in a way that’s easy to understand. Little Pot’s fruit-growing cycle can teach character traits such as identity, humility, integrity, relationships, and knowledge. Moreover, Little Pot is a tangible reminder of the creator’s love and care for us. Likewise, it symbolizes how God nurtures us, wants a relationship with us, and helps us grow into the people He wants us to be.

When you use Little Pot’s method of fruit growing, you’re helping others understand that character is not fixed or innate but something God cultivates and develops over time. Therefore, using this character education curriculum as a teaching tool develops the skills and attitudes needed to become the vessels God designed us to be. Each week, we will discuss one of the following lesson plans.

• Lesson Plan 1: Identity
• Lesson Plan 2: Humility and How to Contain It
• Lesson Plan 3: Planting the Right Seeds
• Lesson Plan 4: Strong and Upright Integrity
• Lesson Plan 5: Fostering Healthy Relationships
• Lesson Plan 6: Blooming Knowledge
• Lesson Plan 7: Fruit of the Spirit

If you prefer to buy the entire curriculum with all the lesson plans, worksheets, posters, and activities included. Click the green button.

Review the previous lessons on Character Teaching.

Review the information in the first through sixth lessons. Before fruit forms, a flower blooms, and leaves follow photosynthesis. Likewise, the stem supported the plant as it sprouted from the seed planted in the soil. Additionally, the entire process required a vessel made by a potter. Therefore, we began with our identity. Then, we filled ourselves with humility (humus soil). Next, we planted the right seed (the Word of God). Fourthly, a strong and upright stem grew, representing our integrity. That stem supports strong healthy relationships. Finally, those relationships lead to new knowledge and information that blooms, and now we see the fruit of the Spirit produced.

Lesson Plan 7: The Fruit of the Spirit

In this lesson, Students will understand the function of the fruit is to protect and spread the plant’s seed. They will identify the characteristics within the fruit of the Spirit.

But the (Fruit of the) Spirit gives love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. There is no law that says these things are wrong. -Galatians 5:22-23

He is strong, like a tree planted by a river. It produces fruit in season. Its leaves don’t die. Everything he does will succeed. -Psalm 1:3

Understanding fruit and strawberries.

Fruit is defined as a fleshy product that contains a seed. We have learned that in a plant’s reproductive process, seeds form inside the ovary, where they are pollinated. The membrane around the seed grows into the fruit. The fruit protects the seed and carries it to a new location to grow again. It is a cycle that continually repeats itself.

It appears that strawberries carry their seeds on the outside of the fruit. However, that is technically not the case. The strawberry is deceptive. Those tiny yellow specks are not the seeds; the sweet flesh we love is not the fruit. The fertilized ovaries in the flower form separate, small, dry fruits. Those “seeds” outside a strawberry are fruits, each containing a single seed.

Strawberries, Character Teaching & the Fruit of the Spirit

Think of the fruit of the Spirit as a strawberry. The qualities that the Holy Spirit produces are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control. They are different traits that together make one product. You cannot show patience without love or gentleness without goodness. The fruit of the Spirit is all the qualities listed in Galatians 5:22-23 and more.

A fruit protects and spreads the seed. The fruit of the Spirit that we can bear is to protect God’s Word and spread it to others. It will reproduce itself too. When you allow God to grow love through you, and you show that love to someone else, they will receive God’s Word and will, in turn, have what is needed to grow fruit. The more fruit we grow, the more seeds of God’s Word are planted in others. Share ways we can grow love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control today.

Color a strawberry and read the Bible verses below. Then, describe how a friend has shown you love, joy, peace, etc. Write their name on the strawberry. Consider a different friend and situation for each trait in the list below.

Bible Verses for the Fruit of the Spirit

• Love: John 15:9, 1 Corinthians 13, 1 John 4:19.
• Joy: Psalm 71:23, John 16:22-24.
• Peace: Romans 12:18; 14:9, 1 Corinthians 14:33, Philippians 4:6-7.
• Patience: Proverbs 14:21; 15:18; 28:11, 1 Thes. 5:14, James 5:8-9.
• Kindness: Proverbs 11:16-17, Jeremiah 9:23-24, Luke 6:31, Job 6:14.
• Goodness: Psalm 23:6, Ephesians 5:8-10, Galatians 6:9-10
• Faithfulness: Proverbs 3:3, Matthew 23:23, Revelation 2:10b
• Gentleness: Proverbs 15:1, Colossians 3:12, Philippians 4:5, 1 Peter 3:15.
• Self-Control: Proverbs 25:28; 29:11, Titus 2:11-12, 1 Peter 4:7

The complete curriculum comes with illustrations to complete this activity.

Conclusion

In conclusion, have students create the cycle with a paper wheel and a Brad fastener. The wheel should be divided into six even sections. In each section, they can write about a time when they contained humility, planted the seed of God’s Word, stemmed integrity, grew a relationship (leaf), bloomed knowledge, and saw the Holy Spirit produce His fruit through them.

The disc is already created and available in the complete curriculum. Purchase it here for just $10.25.

In the meantime, I hope you will sign up for the Fruitful Friday emails and Little Pot’s seven fruit-bearing steps below.

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