Inspiration causes Perspiration

I was gearing up to teach a 5th Sunday lesson, taking the first lesson from September since we will be losing a day due to the dedication of the Ogden Temple.  This way we would be right on track.  However, after not having a chorister for a month and a half, we are so excited to finally have one, and want to do all we can to help her get on track.  We tried to teach the kids the songs during the time of no official chorister, it was just hard for them to actually learn them when there were so many different teaching styles.  Because of that, we decided it would probably be best to let our wonderful new chorister have the whole time to go over all the songs and find out which songs they know, and which need work.

We are so excited to have our chorister!

An idea I have been toying with is that of a third counselor.  Actually, I was initially calling it Less Active Specialist, but after counseling with my counselors, we decided it would be better to call it a third counselor because we will need to work closely with her anyway, and it will sound a lot less overwhelming to the one being called.  Firstly, we need this position because we have 60% of our Primary is less active.  When I was first called, I was initially told it was less than 20% activity, but having gone over the roles and learning about the families and kids more, I have learned that it is actually more like 40% activity.  Which is a huge difference!  That said, the majority of the less actives are in one class.  The teachers are amazing.  It is a couple, and the husband is a former bishop, the wife a former Relief Society president.  They are wonderful with trying to contact all of their less actives each week, on birthdays, etc.  But they are older, have health problems, and expecting them to contact 20 kids on their own each week is just not fair.  In thinking about that, I was trying to figure out a way to help them.  I realized releasing them would not fix the problem, it would just shift the burden from them onto someone else.  And we don't want to lose them!  Which is how I came up with the idea of Less Active Specialist.

The Less Active Specialist would help and encourage teachers to contact the kids not coming to their classes each week, and try to help them find new ways to help those kids be more comfortable.  Also, with the humongous classes (there are actually 2), they could help the teachers with that responsibility of contacting the kids.  That way it doesn't rest on the shoulders of one teacher.

As a third counselor, she could help us out exponentially!  My second counselor is very nearly having a baby and so will be out caring for the baby often.  As it stands right now, we don't have enough hands to be able to do all the things that need to be taken care of on Sundays.  We have the person conducting, who the bishop has requested sit behind the pulpit as the one presiding over the meeting.  We have the person who does the Sharing Time, and then there is the floater who is the one who breaks up chatty/fighting kids sitting in the Primary congregation, monitors the halls for straying children, and reminds the kids who are playing in the bathroom that they need to get back to class.  She also checks on the nursery periodically, and watches the doors for a picture of Jesus which tells us that there is a problem in a class that we need to step in and help out with.  We are also supposed to be visiting classes, but that is not feasible right now.  We really don't have enough hands.  Our Secretary, well, I don't know exactly what she does, but I know she is very busy and I am just grateful I don't have her job.  She is our life float and without her, we would be so lost on Sundays!  If we had that third counselor, we would be able to rotate and do classroom visits, which would, I think, help us be more in tune with the needs of both the teachers and the children.

I'm going to be honest, I don't envy the Sister who receives this call.  It will be a lot of hard work.  A lot.  But as they say, 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration.

Now to convince the Bishop that this is a genuine need, and have him call the person whose name we submitted.

It's a waiting game.

But at least I have more time this week, not having to plan a Sharing Time!

Keeping the Sabbath Holy

Sunday is right around the corner, and with that comes Sharing Time.  I haven't been slacking this week, I have honestly been praying and thinking, trying to come up with a way to teach the children this week's lesson.  The truth is, I have been having a hard time hitting on the right thing. However, last night we had a Presidency Meeting, and in that meeting we talked about the behavior of some of the children during Sacrament meeting.

Before I go on, I have to say, I know that they are little kids, and sitting still for a little kid can be incredibly difficult.  I get that.  I have a four year old who never runs out of energy and I always go into Sacrament meeting with a secret dread, because I never know how she will act or what she will do.  So I understand the difficulty of getting the kids to behave during that meeting.  I am not using this as a platform to judge or to preach.

We are counseled to follow the Spirit, and to prepare a Sharing Time that is beneficial to the needs of the children in our own particular wards.  While there are many fun ideas out there for keeping the Sabbath day holy, I think I am going to focus our Sharing Time on being reverent during Sacrament meeting.  At least for the older kids.

I am going to try to have either our Bishopric counselor or the Bishop come in and talk to the children.  We will begin by singing To Think About Jesus (CS 71). The Bishop or whoever is there will then talk. I want him to talk about why we have the sacrament, how it relates to the Atonement, and how it relates to us. I want it to be a discussion, not a lecture, and I really want the children to learn the importance of this sacred ordinance of which they participate each week.  Once they understand the importance of it, I think it will be easy to talk about how to behave during the sacrament.  And then, of course, I want to tie it all in with something along the lines of "partaking of the sacrament is one of the ways we can keep the Sabbath day holy."

I am praying that the Spirit will be there, and that the children will be able to feel the importance of how their behavior effects not only how they view the sacrament, but how it disrupts or encourages others.

For the Junior Primary, we will do something much more fun.  I am borrowing an idea that I found from a lady named Stephanie Perrin.  I am going to have my husband draw a picture of a child. I am going to cut out little dots from colored paper, and have activities written on the dots.  If the activity is not keeping the Sabbath day holy, I will have them place the dot on the child.  There may be a few songs thrown in there for variety.  We will then talk about keeping ourselves "unspotted" from the world, followed by testimony. I think they will have a lot of fun with that one, and it should go fairly smoothly as there are a lot of kids in Junior Primary.

Finally, I will pass out a coloring page I found on Melonheadz LDS Illustrations blog for the kids to work on during Sacrament meeting because we have Primary first and Sacrament last.

Presidency Meetings

Last week's Sharing Time was a phenomenal success!  I have been told by several parents that their kids have been talking non-stop about Scripture Power, and even pretending to be the Super Hero.  That makes me so happy!  Most importantly, though, even though we were able to have fun with it, the Spirit was still there when I testified of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon and the power of the scriptures.

To be honest, I am struggling a bit with this week's topic, Keeping the Sabbath Day Holy.  I have had a lot going on this week, though.  I found out that my second counselor is being moved to another calling, and so I have had the added stress and worry of finding a new counselor.  When I was called in May, we had only lived in the ward a few months, so it was very easy to rely on the inspiration given me from the Spirit.  I had the ward list, prayed about finding the names, and then went through and stopped on the names I was impressed to.  It was very easy to do it that way and I wish I could do that again.  I know, it is a silly problem, and I know that I will find a counselor soon, I just wish it were easier.

We have been in the Primary presidency for three months is all, really.  I know that every presidency works differently, and so finding an agenda that worked for us took a lot of trial and error.  Last night we had a presidency meeting, and I am pleased to say, I think we may have finally hit on an agenda that will work for everyone of us!  I have never shared a document online before, so I really hope this works, but here is our agenda that was pieced together from many that I found online.  It seems to be the perfect outline for us to follow.

Primary Presidency Agenda

Hope this can be of some use to you and your primary!

Scripture Power

Image found here

I am so excited for this week's Sharing Time!  The theme for this week is Scripture Power.

I want to rush into the Primary room with my son's cape on, that I will put a giant SP on the back.  I am debating the whole mask around the eyes but that might be a bit Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtley for me.

Good morning, boys and girls.  I am the new super hero in town!  My super power is the most powerful one of all, and with it, I am able to thwart the most evil of all evils.  My muscles are so big, my sleeves can scarce contain them (flex here).  What?  You don't believe me?  Gasp!  Well, I will just have to prove it to you!  My super power is Scripture Power!  With my scriptures, with just the words written inside this leather, I can change the very course of a man's life!  You don't believe me?  Let me tell you a story of a man.

A few years ago, I met a man named Tony.  He was a mess.  He smoked a lot, drank a lot, didn't ever have any money, and was living with his girlfriend.  He was miserable!  One day, he found a box outside of his apartment door.  The box was filled with books.  Books that the next door neighbor had accidentally left when he moved out and the landlord was getting ready to throw them away.  Tony glanced at the box of books, picked up the small blue book with the gold lettering on it, tucked it into his back pack and walked away.  He forgot about the book.

A few months went by, and Tony found the book in his backpack again.  He was selling doughnuts in the park and it was a slow day.  He was tired and bored, so he sat down in the shade of a tree and began reading.

He read, and read, and read that book.  While he was reading, he decided he probably shouldn't be smoking.  It didn't feel right to be smoking while reading that book.  So he quit.  Right then and there, Tony quit smoking, and he continued reading.  A few days later he decided he should't be drinking alcohol.  So he quit.  He went into his kitchen, took out all of his alcohol and dumped it down the drain.  A week or two later, he was nearly finished with the book and decided he needed to move out of his girlfriend's apartment and he needed to break up with her.  He felt like what he was doing was wrong, so he tried to change it.  He finished reading the book, and decided he liked it so much, he would start over.

One day, while he was reading, a man approached him and asked to buy 5 dozen doughnuts, but they needed to be delivered to his house the next day.  Tony was happy to comply, and the next day showed up at the address the man had given him with 5 dozen doughnuts.  The man opened the door, and took the doughnuts, and invited Tony inside.  On the wall was a picture of a man, the same picture that was inside his book.  Tony got really excited and asked the man who the picture was of.  The man smiled, and invited Tony to sit down.  He introduced him to two men who had the same first name, Elder, and told him the picture was of a man named Joseph Smith, and the two Elders could tell him all about it.

Tony was baptized shortly after that.  He still sells doughnuts, but now, he uses the superpower that he gained from that little blue book to try to help other's change their lives.

I am Scripture Power, and unlike other Super Heros, I share my power with all who want it.  Who wants scripture power (holds scriptures high in the air)? What do you have to do to get it?

Now, Scripture Power is incredible, because it can even fight off the evilest of the evil.  The Devil himself.  A long time ago, when Jesus was on the earth, he was communing with God, and the devil thought he would be able to trick Jesus into worshiping him.  But Jesus had Scripture Power.

Have Sr. Primary read Matthew 4:1-11.  Have leaders of Jr. Primary read the same.

Anytime the devil tried to tempt him, Jesus said "it is written..." and then quoted a scripture to him.  What gave Jesus strength?  How?  Jesus knew his scriptures very well, and so wasn't able to be tricked.

Discuss how first we must obtain the word.  Next we have to understand, believe and internalize it, and then, after we do those things, we will have the strength of Scripture Power, able to fight off all kinds of evil!

Share the Books of Mormon the Elders bring by.  We are going to share our Scripture Power so that more people can have the great spiritual strength to resist temptation, like Jesus did, like Tony did, and like we can do.  Ask the kids to write their testimonies in the scriptures, and we will give them back to the Elders.  We need to pray for the missionaries, that they will find people who will appreciate and be touched by the testimonies and want to learn more.  The Elders will come back in about a month to share with us what happened to all those scriptures.

Bear testimony on the power of the scriptures, and how they can help us in our lives. Pass out Scripture Power handout.

Reading chart found at ds4bs.blogspot.com 

*** When I went in to the primary room, wearing my SP cape, I had the pianist playing A Young Man Prepared from the Children's Songbook.  It is the most super hero-y song I know of in the church music.  It went really well, and the music gave the perfect touch! ***

August 2014 Week 2: Family Home Evening

I figured the best way to teach about FHE was to have FHE with the kids.  After Singing Time, I had the kids stand up and follow me to the side of the room.  The Senior Primary got to sit on chairs in a semi-circle around me because there were only 6 there today.  Junior Primary had to sit on the ground around me.  I borrowed a FHE board from one of my counselors, made little name tags to hang from her board and intended to write the kids' names on the name tags and hang them on their assignments.  But I forgot where I put the tags, so we just used our imagination.  

I assigned a child to do one of the parts of FHE:  

Opening song: Families Can Be Together Forever (someone led the music)

Opening prayer

Scripture: I taught them how to use the topical guide to look up a scripture on the topic being taught

Lesson: I had that

Activity

Treat: they got to pass out the treats, but when doing this at home for a regular FHE, the child would get to help make it

Closing Prayer

The opening song and opening prayer are fairly self explanatory.  For the scripture, we looked up Family in the Index of the Book of Mormon.  We found a scripture (3 Ne 18:21 Pray in your families unto the Father, always in my name, that your wives and your children may be blessed.)  I asked them how they did on their challenge to help their families have family prayer every day went, and then we segued into other things that protect us besides family prayer.  I told them about The Family: A Proclamation to the World.  We talked about what a proclamation is.  It is something that you announce, boldly and with conviction, for all to hear. How important the Prophet and the General Authorities must have felt this information was for us.  Nearly 100 years ago, in 1915, the prophet of that day Joseph F. Smith began FHE.  He said, "If the Saints obey this counsel, we promise that great blessings will result.  Love at home and obedience to parents will increase.  Faith will be developed in the hearts of the youth of Israel, and they will gain power to combat the evil influence and temptations which beset them."  We discussed how just like family prayer, FHE can give us the added protection we need in our lives.  I don't know how to make a pdf (I will learn this week, though, so I don't run into this problem anymore) so I will just copy and paste, but I made a letter to the parents regarding FHE.  It had an outline on how to have a successful FHE which I learned as a missionary, and it also had a lot of links to sites that could help them plan and prepare for FHE: 

Dear Parents,

Today in Primary we learned about the importance of holding a weekly Family Home Evening. We have been promised by the prophets that if we do, we will have more love at home, the children will be more obedient, faith will increase and children will gain the power to combat the evil influences and temptations in their lives. (Joseph F. Smith in Messages of the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 6 vols. [1965–75], 4:339).

In an effort to help you in your endeavor to hold a weekly Family Home Evening, we are providing a few resources to make it as easy as possible. As we know, it is sometimes difficult to engage children in a weekly FHE, an example of a good schedule which will help retain their attention is:

Opening song:

Opening prayer:

5 minute gospel lesson

15 minute activity

Closing song:

Closing prayer:

Treat

There are many resources to help you with this wonderful program. Some are:

• The Family Home Evening Resource book which can be purchased at the Distribution Center, or accessed online at https://www.lds.org/manual/family-home-evening-resource-book.
• Family Home Evening Charts and Ideas found at https://www.lds.org/children/resources/type/fhe-ideas.
• The Family Home Evening web page at https://www.lds.org/topics/family-home-evening which has links to lots of resources including videos, music, the Gospel Art Kit, teaching tips and much more.
• To make a rotating wheel to keep track of who has done what, one can be found at https://www.lds.org/friend/2013/07/family-home-evening-wheel.
• Some more cheap or free sites to make FHE charts are: http://confessionsofaslackermom.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Chart.pdf and http://confessionsofaslackermom.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Chart.pdf

We hope this list and the attached lesson plan help you and your family!

Happy Family Home Evening!

The Primary Presidency

And then it was time for the activity.  The boy who had the activity came up and helped me.  I had him stand next to me and then explained that I would represent the temptations and evil influences, and I would try to beset him. (I then explained that beset meant to try to trip him up, make him fall).  It was very easy to put my arm around him and pull him a few steps away from where he was standing.  I then had him chose 3 helpers who linked arms with him, and together they tried to withstand the "Evil influences and Temptations."  They did a little better, but I was still able to move them.  And then he had all of the kids come up and link arms in a circle around the small group that already had their arms linked.  I showed them that there is strength in numbers and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get to the original boy who I had tried to move.  I explained that FHE is kind of like that group of linked arms.  We have extra protection and strength when we spend time together as a family and learn the gospel together.  I challenged them all to have FHE weekly with their families, to set aside a night that worked for them (Monday nights possibly) and spend time getting to know their families so that they could have that protection around them.

Next I had the treat helper come up and pass around a box of cookies.  I think that was the kids' favorite part, though they did have a lot of fun with the activity.  

Finally, a child said the closing prayer, and they all went back to their seats to be reverently dismissed for classes, or to wait for the other classes coming in for Closing Exercises.

I think it went really well for both Junior and Senior!  I love being able to share my testimony with so many children every week.  I hope this helps someone at some point in time!  I know it is late for this month's, but lessons do tend to recycle.

In the beginning, I was called

My name is Amy. I was called as the Primary President in May 2014.  I was sustained on Mother's Day.  I have to admit, I was completely shocked when I received the call.  I fully expected to be called to be a Primary teacher when I was called into the Bishop's office, just 4 months after we moved into the ward.  Because that is how it seemed to always happen.  We arrive in a ward, I get put in the Primary for a year or two, thus making it difficult for me to get to know any of the adults.  It was a pattern, and I found comfort in it.  I love teaching Primary. The kids are delightful and usually leave me laughing.  If not laughing, then learning something.  It is a nice cooshy job for me.  President was the last thing from my mind.  I have never even been in a presidency.  Not since I was in Young Womens, anyway.  Somehow being the Laurel Class President didn't seem to count.  And so, with much trepidation and fear, I began on this little journey as Primary President.

Once I received the call, I immediately felt the mantle on my shoulders.  It is very real.  I was surprised how real it is.  As I walked through the grocery store, I could feel it.  As I cleaned my house, I could feel it.  As I went about my life in the usual way, everything somehow seemed altered.  The children in my ward became very important to me, although I had not met most of them.  I learned that my Primary has less than 20% activity, and so, with my new counselors, we decided that would be our focus.  To assist the teachers in their endeavors to bring all the children under their care to church and into the fold.  We decided activation would be our motivation, and so, we figuratively rolled up our sleeves and set to work.

The first thing we noticed was the lack of reverence in the primary.  Now, I need to emphasize, I think the previous presidency did a fantastic job.  I will never ever say anything bad about how they ran the Primary, or how things worked with them.  They were valiant, and faithful, and honestly, had their hands full.  Because less than 20% activity, remember?  It is daunting and overwhelming to look at the less active list.  But the kids who were attending were learning, and the Spirit was there, and they were just fabulous!  I really admire them and hope to live up to their legacy.

That said, we decided to gut the primary and change everything.

My first week, we learned that there were four classes.  The Sunbeams, the Ctr 4-5, Ctr 6-7s, and the Valiants (8-12).  Also, all the children were meeting together.  Because there were only about 20 kids in attendance total.  So I can see why they did that.  It makes things easier to have all the kids together.  And the presidency before that did the same thing, back a couple of generations of presidencies.  It had just always been combined like that as far back as anyone could remember, and so everyone just passed it down like that and didn't change anything.  Also, it is very hard to find people in the ward who will accept a calling to serve in the Primary.  Which is another reason things were done that way.

After our first Sunday, my counselors and I decided it was too hard for the teachers that way.  They seemed to be doing a lot of crowd control, and rather worn out by the end of Primary.  So we decided to split the classes into each individual age group minus the Valiant class.  Although the Valiants are the biggest class, only about 5 kids show up.  On a good week.  It took a long time, and lots and lots of reminding the Bishopric that we needed new teachers, but we eventually got them all.  And then, beginning last week, we decided to split the Primary into Junior and Senior.  I was the lucky one who got to teach Sharing Time this week, so I was sort of the guinea pig.  But it was amazing!  The older kids, who previously had sat in the back and looked bored out of their minds were actually participating and joining in the discussion!  Since we usually only get 6 Senior Primary kids, I make them all sit in the front row and their teachers sit behind them. They grumbled at first, but now they seem to really like it, and I can see that they are learning, and the Spirit is there, because there aren't little wiggly kids sitting in front whispering and distracting.  It was glorious. And Junior Primary!  That was also wonderful.  I was able to better teach on their level, and engage them completely, rather than trying to teach to both and not engaging anyone.  The Junior Primary was as interactive as ever (because little kids don't care if it isn't "cool" to raise their hands) but it somehow seemed to flow a lot better.  I love the split.  It is such a difference.

Now that we have things split up, we are working on going out on visits with our teachers.  We have each been assigned to a teacher or two (depending on the amount of less actives in the class) and are going to go out this week to hand out invitations to the Ogden Temple Open house to the less active children.  The ones who haven't been coming to church and so might not know about it.  I am excited to meet them and hopefully be able to discern who is ready to come to church.  The next step after that is to set up a car pool system with members of the ward so that if the parents aren't ready to come to church, at least the kids will still be able to go.

I am trying to work with the local missionaries.  I asked them if they were teaching any families with Primary aged children.  They are not teaching families, but they are teaching a primary aged girl right now and so I am trying to set up a time when I can go with them to the lesson.  She has a baptism date set, and so I am going to try to get as many Primary kids to her baptism as I can.  For fellowshipping, yo.  I want to work closely with the missionaries because I feel they will be key to our plan of filling the empty seats in our Primary.  I will update as I go.

I had the idea tonight to call the ward missionaries and see if they are working with anyone, and if they are, to see if they have Primary aged children, and to see if they need fellowshipping as well.  I have high hopes that this will be another way to help those children come to Primary and learn and be loved.

I am excited to have this calling, overwhelming though it may be, and be able to get to know all these wonderful giant Spirits that are in our ward.  What a unique blessing and privilege I hold, and I have absolutely seen the Lord's hand in this work so many times!  I am humbled and thrilled to have the Lord's trust in this calling, and know, with His help, we can work miracles!

On this blog I plan to share any ideas I come up with.  I will be posting my Sharing Time ideas (hopefully far enough in advance that anyone can use them for their Sharing Time), our goals, and anything else I think is pertinent to Primary.  I hope that this little blog of mine can help other presidencies out there in teaching these wonderful children the gospel of Jesus Christ!