I am ?LDS aka “Mormon”?and my “calling” or the position I hold in my church is Activity Day leader. This is a special program for girls ages 8-11 and we meet outside of our normal church activities twice a month and do a special lesson. I have been doing this calling for 2 years now and I absolutely love it!! I’m gonna seariously cry some major tears if I ever get released! I am in charge of the 8-9 year old Activity Day girls and its just such a fun age. The girls are so sweet but aren’t afraid to be themselves and have fun!
I suffer from a sever case of “Marry Pooppin’s Syndrome” aka the need to be practically perfect in every way, and without fail I way over do my lessons each month! I figured if I’m already putting this much thought and effort into it I might as well share it with the other Activity Day leaders out there to use as well!
This week we did a lesson about developing talents! I searched around on Pinterest and found this lesson from Sunshine and Melody?and used her lesson plan as a guide!
We meet at our local church in a “classroom like setting. And I began my lesson by putting this image on the Chalkboard:
I asked the girls to tell me what they thought a talent was. Then I went on to explain further. and then added this imgae to the chalkboard below the question
After we discussed the differences and similarities between these two types of talents we read aloud the Parable of the talents in the scriptures. I printed out each individual verse before the lesson and cut them out (see image below). I handed one slip to each of the girls before class began and numbered them. I try to keep them all interactive in our lessons so they all read a verse until we had finished the entire Parable from Mathew 25:14-29. I stopped a few times between verses to break things down a little simpler for the girls to understand.
We discussed the parable further after we finished and then I asked the girls to go around and tell us 2 talents that they had. ?I tried to help them out if they were unsure by highlighting talents I knew they had!
Next I picked 6 girls to come stand at the front of the class and gave them each one of the quotes below. They took turns reading them allowed and adding them to the chalkboard with
magnets
Activity:
I printed out each of these sheets below?for the number of girls in our class which is nearing close to 20 right now! I try really hard to “fill” every minuet of our lesson or the girls lose attention and get a little crazy. Which is totally understandable given the age range! I try to keep things hands-on if possible so we do a lot of coloring, crafting activities each night!
I cut the squares around each circle before hand so the girls still had to cut out each circle during our activity.?Once they were cut, we glued them together back to back and the girls put there talents on the back. The purpose of these necklaces were to help the girls understand the importance of their talents and “share them” around there necks!
Next they chose 3 different colors or yarn that they then braided into long chains for their necklaces, some girls did not know how to braid so this was a great way to “learn” a new talent and for other girls to lend a helping hand!
Once the chains were completed the girls tied them off and we hole punched the front of the necklace medallion. The girls who were really working on their necklaces finished them in the Hour we had for the lesson and we didn’t have any dead time at the end of the activity which is something I try to avoid! I would suggest pre cutting the string’s of yarn in advance because the time I spent cutting yarn I could have been more helpful with the girls who could not braid.
Lastly I always prepare a “back up story” incase we finish early! We didnt get to it but you could certianly use it for your lesson!
I hope you enjoyed this lesson! if you would like to add any feedback please message me either privately or in the comments! You can also save this lesson or share it by pinning it to Pinterest ?with the image below.
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Thank You! These are beautiful.These will be perfect for our next FHE lesson and then decor for my daughters room.
I am so glad that you enjoyed this!!! I appreciate you taking the time to comment! have a wonderful evening!! I’d love to see if you use them in your girls room!!
Thank you so much. I can’t wait to do this for our activity girls we have 16. I do have a question though. Which activity did you sign off for this one?
Thanks so much Linda! I like to just do they "make up your own" activities most the time! this would fall under Developing talents!
How do I get the copy of the printables? I also tried to download the farmhouse animals and it didn’t work. Thank you so much for sharing. I am doing my lesson on this same subject. If you could email the printables to me at gelswood@aol.com thank you
Hey Gloria I’m glad you found this lesson useful! For the activity day printables just click on each image and print them individually within the post. For the farmhouse printables make sure you don’t have pop ups blocked when you go to open them!
Thank you, this will be awesome for our activity days.
I believe whom you were trying to quote is Erma Bombeck, not Emma.
I’m not very techno … is there a way to print these cute patterns so I can use them?
Hello Haley!! I realize this is an old post. I would love to use this for my activity day girls this afternoon! Is there a way to still download the images? I’m not sure if it’s even still available. Thanks for posting this!! You are the example of sharing your talents!! My email is jill@interform.net – if needed. Thanks again!
***Also I would be happy to pay you for them as well!!
I really love your lesson idea. It is not showing me the pictures that go with it. Is there any way I can get them from you? Thank you so so much for being willing to share!
I also understand this is an old post but would love to get these images. Is there any chance?