How Firm a Foundation

This week was an introduction to How Firm a Foundation. I've fretted about this song for a week or two because they are challenging words. So, here's what I settled on. Sort of a hodge-podge of ideas gathered through the week. It worked great with senior primary, but other than a few it was a failure in junior primary. Oh well, that's why they give us 4 weeks to teach it, right?!?

I started out with a jenga game, some cotton balls, and a box on a table. I called a child up and asked them to build a tower on the cotton balls. The little girl in junior primary that I called up is new to our ward (she affectionately goes by babe) and she was so cute!! She kept telling me that "the cotton balls are escaping me!!" It was adorable. Anyway, we sang the foolish man verse of "Wise Man and Foolish Man" while she gave it her best shot. Obviously she had difficulty and we talked about why that would be. The funny thing was that in Senior primary the girl I called up actually managed a little tower...so I had to be the mighty winds and knock it down! Then I had another child building on the sturdy box and sang the other verse to "Wise man". We talked about which foundation was firm. Then I read Helaman 5:12. We talked about what foundation we should build on and I went through the words of the song. I was careful to point out key phrases like "faith in His excellent word"

As I talked about this phrase I asked where we could find His excellent word. No one answered. So I had a child come up and I began to pile His word into the child's arms. Starting with the scriptures, then the ensign, then the friend, then the Hymnbook...etc. We talked about how this was a lot of words and then led into "What more can He say than to you He hath said".

This was as far as I got with Junior. With Senior I had them close their eyes and picture a mother duck with her ducklings. When they get started, the mother duck opens her wings and the babies all run under her wings for safety. "For refuge have fled". Then we sang the song and I was most impressed by how quickly Senior primary picked it up. Now to work on Junior...keep listening to those cds!!