"Come Follow Me" September: Why do we Fast?

I made this Cause and Effect Flow Chart to help the YW visualize what they need to do to have a proper fast.  They can also see what effects or blessings they can have in their lives by participating in a proper fast.

This handout can be used with the "Come Follow Me" lesson: Why do we fast?

You can download the file HERE

You can find the "answers" for the boxes under the "prepare yourself spiritually" part of the Why do we fast? lesson on lds.org.  Just match the scriptures to the summary in the parenthesis.

"Come Follow Me" September: Tithing

This handout/worksheet for the lesson goes with:

• Draw three columns on the chalkboard with the following headings: Blessings, How Funds Are Used, and Attitude. Divide the class into small groups, and assign each group one of the topics to research in the section titled “Tithes and Offerings” in For the Strength of Youth. Ask the young women to write what they find in the appropriate column on the board. Invite a few of them to share their testimonies of the law of tithing.

 from the lesson from "Come Follow Me"' September: Tithing Lesson

I printed the above and below page back to back.  

Below, the pic is of the expert on Tithing found in the "For the Strength of Youth" book.

You can download both pages HERE in my dropbox.

Whenever I give a lesson on Tithing, I get pretty emotional.  And you will see why.  I will share with you my own personal experience I have had with Tithing.  While I attended college I had to pay every penny of my own education.  I worked hard to get scholarships when I was in High School because I knew my family didn't have the means to help with my education.  So, if I wanted a college degree, I was going to have to do it on my own.  So, while going through the Elementary Education program at ASU I worked full time as a Service Cashier at a car dealership.  I worked and went to school full time.  At one point I even took 18 credit units and worked full time.  It was tough.  Well, I was on the delayed payment program at ASU.  This allows you to make payments for your education.  Well, one year it came time to make my final payment for that semester of college.  I didn't have enough for both my tithing and the final amount that I needed to pay.  I was torn at what I should do.  Should I drop out of college and pay my tithing?  Or just pay college and owe on my tithing?  Well, of course I knew what was the correct thing to do.  So, I paid my tithing with faith that the Lord would provide a way for me to stay in school.  Well, not 2 days later.  My sweet Grandma called me to ask how I was doing.  She wanted to know how work and school was.  {I also had to move back home during this time to help with my family since my mom was battling breast cancer at the time}.  Then, she proceeded to tell me that she had $1,000 she wanted to give me to help towards my education.  I will never forget the feeling I got.  It was an overflow of warmth and love.  I knew that Heavenly Father was aware of me and my needs.  I knew this was a blessing being poured out to me from heaven.  

A blessing as a result of my faith.

(This story is very similar to this one Pres. Hinckley shared of a Brazil student.  This talk is one of the suggested material found in the lesson)

Play School: Fire Safety!

Fire Safety Week! 

This is what we did during Fire Safety week:

Firetruck Craft:

Welcome Activity:

Firehouse Sticker Scene

You can order these at Oriental Trading.  12 for $5.00.

Crawling Under the Smoke!

Kids loved practicing fire safety tips by crawling through my play tunnel! 

WATER ACTIVITIES:

 Then, on Day #2 of Playschool that week, I had the parents send their kiddos in a swimsuit to help put out "fire" in my backyard.  And we played with a "fire hose".  They LOVED it!

I bought these spray bottles at Wal-mart for like .96 cents a piece.  Then, I put up these "fires" in page protectors around the backyard.  The kids enjoyed going around spraying the fires with their "fire extinguishers" {spray bottles}

I put these foam flames in my water table for the kids to squirt with their "fire extinguishers".

Then, we played a relay race where the teams raced to put out the fires using these little buckets full of water.  They loved this!

Then, they all got a firefighter hat when they left!

Such a fun week!

YW/YM Combined Activity: Burn the House Down!

"Burn the House Down!"

This was SO FUN!  The youth did NOT want to stop playing, they were having that much fun!

The 1st Counselor in my ward plays this at her family reunions every year.

So... you have each person playing {leaders included!} come with a bag.  In the bag they need to put 3 good things and 3 bad things.  For example, Good: $1 bill, candy bar, pack of gum, soda, nail polish, etc... Bad: Little kid Valentine, Happy Meal Toy, wart cream,  white elephant type gifts.

Picture This: 

You walk into the cultural hall.  There are a ton of tables set up with four chairs at each table.  The tables are numbered 1 to whatever....  1 being the head table. On each table is- two pencils and pieces of paper. 2 dice. And the paper in the above pic.

As the youth show up they find a spot.  Doesn't matter if friends sit with friends because you will soon be moving, a lot.  And getting mixed around.  So no worries there.

How to Play:

Pretend you are sitting at a table.  You have someone sitting across from you.  And then the two other people are sitting across the table from each other.  The person across from you is your partner (for this round).  The other two people at your table are partners.  One partner draws.  One partner rolls.  After you determine this, the round starts.  One partner rolls the two dice.  If they roll a 1, then the partner of the roller draws a house frame.  Then, they roll again.  If they roll a 2, they get a window.  If you roll another 2, you get another window. They roll again, if they roll a 3, your house gets a door. etc... {see pic above}  But, let's say you are trying to get a 2 for a window.  But, you roll a 3 and 5.  Then, you pass the dice to the member rolling for the other team.  They try to roll what they need for their house.  If they don't get it they pass the dice back. So the dice is constantly going back and forth between the two team members that are rolling the dice.  Meanwhile, the drawer draws the items as they get it.  Make sense so far? :)  SO if at anytime your roller rolls two 5's.  It's "burn the house down!".  You have to cross out your house and start again!  {this happened to me and my partner at the end when we were trying to get the 6 kids! ugh!}  Anyways, once someone at ANY table gets the house and all 6 kids drawn, they yell "Full House!" and the round ends for EVERYONE!

So, now.... determine who had the house drawn the furthest.  For example Team 1 might have just had the frame and one window.  Team two's house had both windows, chimney, and smoke.  Then, team 2 would win that round at their table.  So, the winners -Team 2, gets to pick out ONE item out of the losers' bags.  Yeah, they grab the good stuff.  And then, the winners PICK something out of THEIR bag to GIVE to the losers.  :)  Now, the winners move to the next table up.  Losers stay at their table.  Now, to change the partners up.  One of the losing members moves seats so they are no longer across from their old partner at their table.  And when the winners come to the new table with the losers from the other round they sit in the empty chairs, which should not be across from each other.  So they are partnered with a loser from the other round.  Make sense?  That way the teams are always changing!

Some things you may be wondering:

Head Table?

There is really no point to the head table.  The kids just try to work their way up to it.  

What if a kid doesn't bring a bag?

The leaders were asked to bring a couple extra.  We had them sitting on the stage just in case a youth forgot.

Can you roll a 4 and 5 in one roll and get both a chimney and smoke?

Or roll a 1 and 2 in one roll and get the frame and window? etc...

Yes, as long as the house is still built in order!

Can you roll a 1 and a 4 and draw a frame and a chimney?

No, house has to be rolled in order.

This game was so much fun!  I want to change it up for a family Christmas Party game.  Burn the Christmas Tree Down!  Draw a Christmas Tree, Two Ornaments, Star, Popcorn String, Tree skirt, 6 Presents... then yell "O Christmas Tree!"  How fun would that be!?

Busy Bag Exchange

I was invited to a Busy Bag Exchange by one of the moms of one of my playschool students.  So fun! What is a "Busy Bag"?  It's a bag you can grab on the go to keep your little ones entertained.  For example, the doctor's office, soccer practice, church, restaurant, etc..  You can do toddler level bags, preschool level bags, etc... She had set a limit of $2-$3/bag.  And we had 12 moms coming so... around $24-$36 for 12 busy bags!  Nice!  AND you are only doing the labor for one type of bag! :)  She just asked that you make it the same quality of the bags you want to get in return.  If you look up "Busy Bags" on Pinterest, you will find TONS of ideas.  Or you can come up with your own!  The host had us all tell her ahead of time what we were making so she made sure there weren't duplicates. 

These are the bags I got:

Shapes!:

This is the one I made.  Found the idea on Pinterest.  However, I did change it a little.  I didn't like that they had a rectangle in here.  You have to use 6 sticks to make the rectangle (so it has a longer side).  So, they had written 6 on the sticks for rectangle.  Well..... the math teacher in me came out.  I don't want my kids thinking a rectangle has 6 sides. :)  So, I added the diamond/rhombus instead. :)

You can buy these colored sticks at Hobby Lobby.  I bought the strips of velcro (because it was cheaper) and cut and peeled each individual square- yeah, it was a lot of work.  And I hated Velcro for like a week afterwards.  So, for my own bag I used the circles that you just peel.  But, they are more expensive if you want to buy it for everyone's bag.  Then, I just used felt to cut the shapes.

Sponge Blocks:

 Color Sort & Shape Match:

You can put the foam shapes on the pic or color sort them on the larger shapes.

She had a color and B&W side to the paper.

 Handwriting, dot to dot, and dry Erase Board:

 Color Sort:

She found the little green thing with holes at Dollar Tree.

My son loves threading the pipe cleaner through the holes.

Beads!:

My kids' faces lit up when they saw this bag! Ooooh, beads!  This bag keeps them busy while I make dinner!

 Pizza Factory:

So cute!  They can free play or make a pizza to order.

 Gel Writing Pad:

She took gel and glitter.  Put it in a bag.  Taped it down on cardboard and Mod Podged a Alphabet/Number sheet on the back.

Spider Web Fun:

Perfect for Halloween!  My son loves this bag.  You can use the color yard to make a web or just the white.  If the yarn gets destroyed of knotted, you can just add new yarn!

 Another Pizza Factory... with a little extra:

 

Kind of the same as the one above.  BUT she added the kids name {yes! she personalized each bag for each family!} And she added a couple extra sheets where they had to match or count pepperonis etc..

 Button Snake:

Kids enhance their buttoning skills by putting on and off these felt shapes

 Popsicle Stick Puzzles:

Since I had so much fun and there are SO many ideas for busy bags out there, I decided I need to host one of these!!  I thought I would share in case one of these gals did something you've never seen before!

If I were to go out and buy all the supplies to make all of these or even take the time to make them all it would far exceed the time and money I spent making 12 of the same bag. 

 Busy Bag Exchange= great idea!

Playschool: Apples!!

Apples!

This was a fun week!  SO many idea online.

But, this is what we did:

Welcome Activity:

These 2 year olds just liked putting them in the tree.  If you can see there is a "4" on the tree, to only put 4 apples.  But... they need a little teacher help there.  These are on Oopsey Daisy.

Playdoh Mats!  Kids loved this!

 Math: Counting Apple Book

Shape was circle and we did these apple counting books that say "3 apples in the tree" and I would give them 3 circle stickers to stick in their trees.

You can print it as part of the packet on Oopsey Daisy.

I added the numbers to the page tho.

 Craft: Painting Apples

Thought they turned out cute!

 Circle Time Activity:

Kids loved this!

I found both the apple alphabet and prewriting practice on Oopsey Daisy.

Centers: Apple Picking

I just bought these apples from the teaching store.  Drew a couple trees on the the whiteboard.  And taped the apples to the tree. I had 3 baskets for the kids to color sort the yellow, red, and green apples.

 Snack/Apple Observations:

I made this sheet where they would taste a red, yellow, and green apple.  Then, give feedback on how they liked it. I will scan it a get it on here to download very soon!!

Oh... the awesome observations these 2 year olds made!