Lesson 27: We can Pray as a Family

OK, so when I first looked at this lesson, I was strongly reminded of the lesson we did earlier in the year on prayer (lesson 4).  Although I recognize the importance of repetition, especially with little kids, each lesson in this manual presents new material.  They aren't simply repeating themselves.  They are building upon prior lessons and ideas, but each lesson offers something unique.  So I pondered, how is "I can pray to Heavenly Father" different than "we can pray as a family"?  

Something I've learned about teaching, especially when it comes to the gospel, is that the teacher really needs to understand what the lesson is in order to teach it effectively.  I trust that those who wrote this lesson manual were inspired.  So, what is the primary purpose about this lesson?  Is it really about prayer?  Or is it about the role of prayer in strengthening families, with the added benefit of reinforcing how to pray?

See... as the teacher, it is my responsibility to have a clear understanding before I teach, to make sure that I am addressing the real purpose.  If I'm not clear, I could certainly teach something, but I may miss the intended point.  To do that, I am missing the purpose of my calling.  Teaching in the gospel is not like teaching school.  Yes, they both involve teaching.  But in teaching the gospel, the curriculum comes from the highest authority possible.  I need to make sure I understand what God would have me teach, what He wants His little ones to learn in this lesson.  Only then can I teach it.

In looking through the ideas on Sugardoodle... there isn't much there.  Basically everything focuses on how to pray, not on family prayer, which goes with reinforcing the earlier lesson.

I also found nothing useful on Etsy or Teachers Pay Teachers.  I did find one activity on Finch Family Games that I liked and will use - I can pray all day.  But it is still aligned with the earlier lesson on prayer in general.  So I turned to the lesson to study it in depth.

The lesson itself does include considerable repetition regarding how to pray.  So, some ideas from the earlier lesson could be revisited.  But there's not much substantive (or concrete, in particular) that focuses on family prayer.  So, it's time to get creative in teaching the role of prayer in strengthening families.

Here's what I ended up with...

We started with snack and story time.  I used the same story I used in the earlier lesson (4) on prayer:  "This Little Prayer of Mine" by Anthony DeStefano.  It is a cute book, though not LDS.  I only used it to re-introduce the focus of prayer, because the book itself doesn't use the right language or order.  But it does set a nice mood!

We then reviewed how to pray (both the physical act and the verbal components of prayer) using the file folder game created by Kimberly Bourne, found on Etsy (for $2.50).  (I used this in the earlier lesson, too.)  I had printed it on card stock, laminated it, and used Velcro for the pieces.  I placed the laminated pieces on the table in front of the children.  As we reviewed, they took turns picking out the correct pieces for the file folder game.  

We also reviewed the story of Daniel in the lion's den, to reinforce the importance and specific blessings that can come from prayer.  I know it's not in this lesson, but I wanted to utilize the "take-home" I had made for lesson 4. The children absolutely loved it with lesson 4, and using something they'd loved, and taken home, allowed greater chance that they would remember it, and be able to recall and build on those earlier ideas.  I've copied the "take-home" idea from lesson 4 below.

Take-home:  Thank you to Katie Evans on Sugardoodle, for finding this activity on LDS.org.  I loved the general idea, but wanted something more specific to what we had covered in class.  So I found a clip art image of a lion that would work, and I put together my own handout reviewing how to pray.  I used a brass fastener to connect the pieces.























Moving beyond prayer, in general, to prayer as a family... we quickly discussed that, just as we should pray individually morning and night, we should pray as a family morning and night.  We discussed things that matter to our whole families that we could talk about in family prayers.  I asked each child to name something, and they came up with some good ideas... that a specific loved one would get well, that a baby sister would learn what she needs to learn, that grandma could come visit...  We talked briefly about each idea, and I tried to generalize the ideas so that each child could see how he/she could ask for the same blessing for his/her own family.

But, most of the rest of the lesson, I wanted to put into a concrete form.  This past week, I was speaking with one of the mothers of the children in my class, and the mother told me how much she liked the story that I had put together for last week's lesson.  And I thought, that's what I could do... make another story.  Something that would be really personal, that hopefully the children would use at home.  I started putting a story together for family prayer based on the rest of the lesson.  Unfortunately, I didn't finish it in time for church, but, here it is for future use.

Print them out 2-sided, 2 pages per sheet of paper, cut and assemble the pages, and staple the books together.  You can read the story to touch on those aspects of the lesson, then let the children color the black and white drawings.

I used the black and white poster from Sunday Savers to finish off the lesson.


Please leave your comments and suggestions!