Faith poster

          The song I picked for May, is "Faith". I know MOST of you did NOT pick this song, but I think this idea could work for many songs. This song worked particularly well, because there were 4 main ideas presented. (Please forgive my photography skills. They are very lacking...)

I started by showing them this poster: 

I asked them what Faith is. After I got a few answers, I told them to listen to this song about Faith.

As I sang the song, I used the string behind the poster, to pull up the pictures out of their "boxes"

When I was finished, it looked like this.

Then, I pulled the pictures back down into their "boxes" and asked the kids what was in each "box". I was thrilled with their answers (and listening skills) when they used words and phrases from the song!

Then I called up volunteers to help pull the pictures out of the boxes as we sang the song. I love activities like this, that even the littlest kids can do. 

Here is another poster I helped my mother-in-law make. 

I love the blue!

TIP: use eyelets to help reinforce the holes, so they wouldn't rip

TIP: Put a piece of cardboard on the back of the poster, in between your string holes. This helps to keep the poster board from bending when you pul the string. 

I made my boxes from a 6x6 square of scrapbook paper. Then I scored a line 1/2" inch on three sides, and then another 3/8" of an inch towards the outside of the box.

Cut out the two bottom corners, fold them over each other and glue. 

This is what the "inside" of the box looks like. 

Funny side note:

When I started this blog, my sister was just called as primary chorister.

Then, my Mother-in-law.

Then, my mom 

(well, she's Stake Primary music leader, but ya know...same field..).

Then, My sister got released.

but now...

 my other sister has just been called as primary chorister. 

YAY! 

More ideas!

My eternal family, verse 2

I had some requests to do verse 2, even though I am not planning on teaching it.

I've actually seen lots of great flip-charts for this verse, so if you don't like this one, I'm sure you can find one you do like. Carrie has a great one here too.

You can download my version of the flip- chart to verse 2 here. I did not include the chorus, since it was on the last visual file.


We have stake conference this week, so I get a break! But as for the following week, I don't really have any great ideas. I didn't get as far as I'd like with the song last week, so we'll just be playing games to review the phrases, like turning over pictures, or mixing them up and having the kids put them in the correct order by the time we finish singing the verse.

However, because there are 5 sundays this month, the presidency is giving me the entire singing/sharing time for music, so I'll have to come up with something really awesome. :) If your primary doesn't have something special to do on 5th Sunday's, you might ask if you can have the time, especially since it's really hard to teach these songs with just 10 minutes each week!

My Eternal Family: visuals and plan

UPDATE: For safety reasons (Just trying to be extra cautious and to prevent spam) If you have left your e-mail address in the comments, I'll delete the comment after I send the e-mail. If your comment is deleted and you did NOT get an e-mail of the PDF, please let me know.


TIP: Sugardoodle has an AWESOME collection of clipart and pictures to make your own flipcharts!!but you probably already knew that...


So, I'm going to be honest, and say that this song is NOT my most favorite. And luckily for me, my presidency feels the same way, so we plan on only doing the first verse. I had a hard time finding visuals that I liked for this song, but found one that came close on Sugardoodle (click here) Like Carrie, my pictures came from the sugardoodle clipart file and MSN clipart, and also the one image (the construction man) by Valerie Gardner.

I wanted more pictures than the one on Sugardoodle, because I have lots of kids in Junior primary that would learn better from lots of pictures, than words. This is my version of the 1st verse for a flip chart HERE to download the file. This is my first attempt at the shared file thing, so let me know if it doesn't work for you, or if you'd rather have the file e-mailed. Here is what they look like.
I think I got this idea from the primusic group, but I can't remember. I'll show them this picture and ask them to tell me what this man does for a job. After they tell me he is a "builder" I'll tell them that this "builder" is also my Dad! (He's so awesome and took this picture for me on Saturday night!)

I'll describe the things he has built, i.e. most of the homes I lived in as a child, other buildings, and now oversees the building of LDS churches and temples in the Texas area.

But that is not all he has built. He helped to build a righteous family. (I'll have the latest picture of all my siblings and their families from out last reunion, and tell them that by being a righteous priesthood holder, having family scripture study and prayer, and being a great example to us, he helped build a firm foundation for each of us to start building our own righteous families. Then I will tell them that we will learn a song about how we can be our own builders of a righteous family.

I will then show them the blackboard with the same visuals from the flipchart, only bigger, separated (only one picture per half sheet of paper) and without words scattered on the board. I'll tell them we need to build this song. We have all the right pieces, but we have to put them together to make our song. I'll sing it through a few times to help them hear the melody, while they look at the pictures and try to figure out the correct order.
(the scattered visuals)

Then, one at a time, I'll call up a "builder" (I'll probably bring my son's toy construction hat) let them wear it, and find the correct picture for each phrase. As we find the pictures to complete each phrase, we'll sing through that phrase a few times. If they get stuck, I'll sing the entire verse to them. If time allows (I'm very lucky to usually have 20+ minutes for singing time) we'll turn over the pictures to help them memorize the verse.

If you want the plain PDF file for my "scattered" visuals, let me know in the comments so I can e-mail it to you. This is NOT the flipchart. Just the pictures without words that my kids will listen to to the song to put them in the correct order. The flipchart is in the link above.

visual story book

I bought a book at a church bookstore, that contained visuals for all of the 2009 program songs. I colored them, cut them out, and laminated them. We played games with them as we learned the song, so I liked having them seaparated. However, I'm done with them now, and since the kids pretty much know the song, I didn't know what to do with them.





I got the idea of putting together a book from this site, to put them in a book, along with the lyrics. This way, if we're singing the song as opening or closing, or a quick review, I don't have to fumble through a bunch of pictures. I plan on doing this with all of the "program" songs, to keep them in one book. The pictures are laminated, so I can just pull them off of the paper and use them without the book again. I LOVE LAMINATING! :)