Lucky You

Thought I'd take advantage of St. Patrick's Day while presenting the theme last week as they seemed to go hand in hand in a strange sort of way. :)

The theme for Week 3: God’s prophets and apostles speak to us in general conference.

Intro:

I first introduced Lucky the Leprechaun and explained that Lucky is trying to find his pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

I then explained that while we aren't trying to find an actual pot of gold, we are seeking a different, much more valuable "pot of gold".  Our pot of gold is to return to live with our Heavenly Father someday.  While we don't follow a rainbow to obtain our "pot of gold", if we follow the prophet and our church leaders-whom we will get to hear in conference in a few short days- and if we hold to the iron rod, we will be able to reach our "pot of gold" as well. 

Activity:

I had a child come up and pick a shamrock.  Each shamrock had a song on it that corresponded with a gospel principle that we will be hearing about in conference next week that can help us return to live with our Heavenly Father (or at least I assume we will hear about all of these topics)

Follow the Prophet-110
Choose the Right-
As a Child of God
Faith-96
I hope they call me on a mission-169
I believe in Being Honest-149
Do as I’m doing (following the prophet-s example)-276
A happy Family (loving our family)-198

After they'd picked the song, I had a child come up and move Lucky across the rainbow (he's on a large clothes pin that just moved right along the top of the rainbow). 

 

Depending on how the kids sang on each of the songs, Lucky could try and reach his pot of gold each time.  If they sang really well, they'd move him all the way across.  The kids loved this for about the first 4 songs but then we changed it up and played Hot/Cold with one of the songs while a child tried to find the hidden Lucky. Turned out to be a fun, effective singing time.  Hopefully the kids have a greater desire to listen to conference next week so that they can reach their "pot of gold" someday.

 clipart (right click to save to your computer)

Weather Wheel music time

If you don't want to read my life history and what inspired me to do this particular activity for singing time, and you want to get right to the point, just scroll past the italics. 

So last Friday was the most scared I have ever been (weather wise) living here in Georgia.  The weather here can be so unpredictable.  One day it's 70 and sunny, next it 35.  Don't get me wrong, I am NOT complaining.  I grew up in Idaho so I'll take this kind of weather in March any day. :)  We knew that last Friday was going to be a rough night after watching all of the news footage from the devastation in Alabama-and that's what was headed our way.  However, I usually take weather forecasts with a grain of salt because USUALLY nothing happens like they predict-or so it seems.


So at about 9 p.m., the storm started rolling in pretty hard.  I turned on the weather to see what to expect.  There was a tornado watch and a tornado warning.  I kept a close eye on it but things didn't get too scary until about 9:30 when the weatherman started talking about a tornado on the ground that was within a few miles from us.  He started naming the streets within it's path and then I knew that we should be very worried.  The sirens started going off and it was time to take cover.  I sent my two munchkins that were home down to the basement.  I had one daughter off at a friend's for the night and a son off with some buddies.  I called my daughter's friend to make sure they had headed to the basement. All was well at their home so I just needed to track down my 13-year old son.  Before he'd headed off for the night, we had him write down the phone numbers of the friends he was with.  Unfortunately he has some penmanship issues (putting it nicely) :) and every phone number he'd written down for his friends was so illegible that I just kept calling wrong numbers.  If that's not motivation for me to want to get him his own cell phone, I don't know what is.  SO stressful when you can't find your child-and there's a tornado headed right for them!

The hubby decided that he'd head out to find him.  I was so upset and in tears.  I didn't want him to go, and yet I did. Didn't matter what I said, he got in his car and was heading right into the thick of it.  I just sat at my computer, watching to make sure there was not a shift in the direction of the twister.  About 15 minutes later I got a call from the hubby that my son was alive and well.  They hadn't even known there was a storm out.  Crazy boys!

They headed home just as the tornado headed east and we were in the clear of that particular twister.  The sirens went off a couple more times over the course of the next few hours but fortunately there was nothing but rain and hail to be too concerned about during the night.  Definitely made me want to take the weatherman a little more serious next time.  I swear they are always wrong but it just takes one time when they are actually right to earn my trust back. :)  

Anyhow, this whole experience got me thinking...all night long the weather man had been warning that it was going to be a bad night and yet I still sent my kiddos off.  How often do the prophets warn us and ask us to prepare ourselves, and yet we just don't listen-sometimes we think we know better, sometimes we think their counsel doesn't apply to us.   Take Noah for example.  The people didn't heed his counsel and thought he was a foolish man.  We know how that turned out for them all.  Or there's Joseph in Egypt.  Had the people not listened to him and prepared for the famine, they would not have survived.  This month we are focusing on Listening to the Prophet, as the Prophet is the mouth piece for our Heavenly Father.

I started the activity by briefly telling the kids about the above scary incident.  I then explained that had I listened to the weatherman earlier, it could have saved me a lot of grief.  I would never have let my kiddos head off for the evening had I taken the weatherman seriously. The result was that I was frantically trying to find my family when there was no time left to prepare.  The prophets work the same way, and if we heed their counsel, we will be kept safe from physical and spiritual storms of life.

I then called on kids to come up and spin our weather wheel (I didn't use my kisses jar because it was Fast Sunday).  I used a "Twister" game board spinner.  I covered the whole thing with white paper and then divided the spinner into 8 sections.  I attached one clip art to each of the sections.

We've already polished the song for March so I thought I'd just make this a fun day.  Here's the songs I did...

Sunny-Jesus wants me for a Sunbeam (this is a great one to engage the little Sunbeams as I made each of them a big sunbeam that fits on their head). They come to the front and wear them every time we do that song.  They are some busy little bodies so it's nice to break the music time up a little bit for them.  

Gloomy- If you chance to meet a frown.  I was surprised that a ton of the kids didn't know this song.  It was one of my favorites when I was in primary.  I think it will be a new favorite for these kids as well.

? (I told them it had a ? because sometimes the weather is so unpredictable, you never know what you are going to get- The child up front got to pick the song.

Windy- I let the child pick the song but we sang it really fast, since the wind blows really fast 

Snow- Once there was a snowman-that was a given, right? :)


Rain- The Wise Man and the Foolish Man- This is one of the songs for the program this year and I had no idea whether the kids had ever even heard it before.  Most of Senior Primary already knew it.  That made me so happy as it will make for a much easier month of teaching it down the road.

Calm and Clear- Search, Ponder, and Pray- we talked about how the scriptures and prayer can help us to feel calm, peaceful, and clear minded as we use them in our lives.

All in all, I think this ended up being a very effective lesson. I think the kids really understood the importance of listening to the Prophet and heeding their warnings. 

 

I do now know how to add documents into the blog (thank you Iheartprimary), but I've got to head off right now. If you want me to email you a PDF of the clip art, just let me know.  You can even just save the clip art  (just right click on the image and choose "Save as").  That way you can save it right to your computer.  I'm not sure if it will be a little bit pixelated that way though.

Anyway, hope you have a nice, SUNNY day (the forecast is calling for sunny and 70 this week in Georgia so I'm quite certain that I will)!  :)

Traffic light singing aid

(click to enlarge image for directions)

A friend of mine had told me about this idea and I thought it'd be a fun addition to our singing time.

Where we'd polished our February song, I thought it would be fun to use to review January's song.  Is anyone else having a hard time with that song? I love it but it seems like I can't get a  lot back from the kids on that song.  I know it's in a pretty high key for me, which makes it hard for me to sing with much power, but that shouldn't be a problem for the kids where their voices are high.  Anyway, I wasn't sure if it's that they don't remember the words or just aren't putting a lot into it.  I thought this would be a fun way to keep reviewing it.

To preface the activity, I explained to the kids that just like choosing the right and keeping the commandments keep us safe from many things, traffic lights keep us safe from harm as well.  Just like the commandments,  they protect us.  

To use the traffic light for singing time, I brought a flashlight that would illuminate each of the colors.  I picked a name out of my singing jar and had that child come up to work the flashlight.  When they wanted the kids to sing, they'd flash the flashlight behind the "green"; "red" to stop-obviously.  At first we'd decided that "Yellow" would be teachers sing but the teachers were apparently feeling a little shy so we decided that "yellow" would be to hum.  That worked MUCH better! :)

I think in the end that we spent more time on the "yellow" and "red" but that's okay.  It was a fun way to change it up a little bit.  The kids seemed to really enjoy it. 

And BTW, I realized AFTER I took the picture that the stop light is upside down.  Yet another blonde moment. :)

Stand for the Right

 I made this chart this morning.  Apparently I did it way too early and wasn't fully awake yet since I left the last line off...sheesh!  I figure for the last line "Stand for the Right", I will just have the kids stand up for the action.  That way it will seem like it wasn't an accident that the line is missing off the poster. :)

(I did the words as a word bubble coming from President Monson's mouth)

Our Prophet has some words for you,

And these are the words: "Be True".  "Be True".

At work, at play, In darkness or light

Be True, Be True, and Stand for the Right.

If anyone wants the clip art collage I did, just leave a comment and I will send them your way a.s.a.p.  (One of these days I will figure out how to add PDF files on here).

I love it when songs are short and sweet like this!  Everyone enjoy a much easier month of teaching the new song! :)

Meet "Max" conducting dog

When I was first called as Chorister I browsed the web for fun ideas for Singing time.  I came across a cute idea on Sugardoodle for a Conducting Elephant. I liked the idea a lot but I didn't really want to make an elephant so I kind of put the idea in the back of my mind.

Last week I was trying to come up with a fun way to make the monotony of learning a new song a little more enjoyable for the kids.  That's where Max came into play.  We have a dog named Max who LOVES music.  If I sit down to play the piano, he climbs right under the piano and lays on my feet-literally.  Music sends his tail wagging.  That gave me the idea of making a "Max" conducting dog.  He was pretty simple to make and made such a huge impact on the kids.  We probably sang Choose the Right 5 times today until we had it polished and the kids just kept singing their heart out because Max wagged his tail even harder when they sang their best.  I just had a different child come up and wag his tail each time we sang it. The kids were very cute!

I had debated even pulling Max out for the Sr. Primary because I thought they'd think he was silly.  I decided to give it a try anyway.  Many of the older kids know my dog Max so they thought it was awesome that he'd made his way to Primary to hear them sing. :)  

This is the best singing time I've had in a long time with the Sr. Primary, surprisingly enough. Max will definitely be paying a visit again!

Max was feeling a little shy with all of the kids so he turned around while they sang (this way the kids could see him wagging his tail).  It's kind of hard to tell from the pictures how Max works but the kids just stuck their hand through the hole and into the sock to wag the tail).  Clear as mud?  No?  Sorry.  Hard to explain.  If you have any questions, let me know.

 

Love Letters from Heaven

I probably should have done this post BEFORE now since it's more Valentine themed and Valentine's is TODAY.  I figure February is a month of Love though so this activity could work all month long.  Right? :)

Typically I use sticks (with the names of all the kiddos written on them) to choose my helpers for the day.  Unfortunately my sticks have been out of date since we had all of the new sunbeams come in, and many kids move up to Sr. primary at the first of the year.  

In the meantime I have just been calling on kids, trying to choose kids I hadn't picked before.  It's so hard to keep track of who I've called on and I could tell a few kids weren't super happy about that fact.  It was stressing me out. I finally tracked down a new roll this week and decided to do something fun for the month of February, instead of going back to the sticks.

I bought a big bag of Hershey's kisses and wrote each one of the kid's names on the bottom.  Tried it out this past Sunday and it worked like a charm.  I picked a kiss out each time I needed a helper.   After that child helped me, I gave them their "kiss".  Once their kiss is gone from the jar, they won't get called on again until every child has had their kiss pulled as well.  That way, everyone will get chosen to be my helper this month.  This will make my life so much easier. I threw a couple blank ones in there as well in case we have visitors.

here's a copy of the label I made (if anyone wants to use it).  I had a different one for Sr. but I cannot find it on my computer anywhere.

For our singing time, I'd seen a really cute letters from Heaven idea here .  While I didn't have a big mailbox to use for the activity, I did have a bunch of smaller mailboxes that our family uses to give each other "Love" notes during the month of February.  I put one letter in each mailbox.  I used my "Super Singers" jar to call the kiddos up to pick a letter.  There was a "love" related song in each of the mailboxes with exception to one.  In one of the notes from heaven, it said "sometimes Heavenly Father wants to bless us just because he loves us".  Instead of singing a song for that letter, I gave them each a little conversation candy heart.

label for the Letters from Heaven if anyone wants it.

"Choose the Right" Football Game

I am in a zombified state so I don't know if this whole idea will pan out like it's playing out in my head. Things always seem better in my head than they play out in reality. :)

Anyway, I'd found a cute idea on a blog that used Choose the Right symbols.

Using her idea of holding up the symbols, I made multiple symbols for the key words in the song "Choose the Right". I will pass out a symbol to each one of the kids (I was able to fit 12 symbols on each page).  Every time their word/phrase is said in the song, they will quickly stand and hold up their symbol.  If by chance that gets a little rowdy, I will just have them sit and hold up the symbol instead.  I am hoping this will break up the monotony as we learn the song but also to help them focus on the words that are being learned.

"Choose the Right"

 

"Light"

 

"Heart"

"Wisdom"

Once we've gotten the words down on the song pretty well, I will pull out the football field poster I made (because hey, it's the Super Bowl, and the boys will get a kick out of it).  :) 
I got the football field idea here.

I have a ref shirt that I will have one of the teachers put on.  Each time we sing the song, the ref will move the football up the field, depending on how well the kids sing it.  We will keep singing it until we get a touchdown.  I did two footballs just in case I decide to break the kids into two teams-the "Army of Helaman Harmonics" and "Moroni's Musettes". :)