First 4 Lessons
Before starting a junior youth group, it is important to consolidate a group identity. These are 4 lesson plans that I will be go back to time and again for each group that I am involved in starting up.
The guiding text - Book 5, Unit 3, Section 30
It is essential that, in the first few meetings of the group, its purpose be fully discussed, together with a few of the collective goals its members hope to accomplish. The youth should also reach some conclusions about the nature of the activities they wish to undertake. The concepts of excellence and service need to be emphasized. Many experienced animators find that their conversations during the first four meetings are particularly significant. Subjects addressed in these meetings may well vary from group to group. Yet there are a number of ideas that generally run through all such meetings. The following points may assist you, then, in organizing the first conversations you will have with the members of each group you help to form.
- Often the first questions posed by the animator in the initial meeting are "what is the purpose of a junior youth group?" and "Why is it important to have groups in the community?" If the youth have difficulty answering such general questions, the animator may ask individual members more specific ones, for example, "Why do you like being part of this group?" or "What kinds of things do you think the group should do?" This line of questioning should gradually lead to a list of goals and activities.
- Several animators have found it useful to describe the goals identified by the group in terms of spiritual and intellectual excellence. TO strive for spiritual excellence, they have explained, we need to develop qualities that belong to our higher nature such as love, generosity, honesty and humility. TO strive for intellectual excellence, we need to acquire knowledge and practical skills that will help us improve our lives and the lives of others. Reflecting on quotations such as "Let each morn be better than its eve and each morrow richer than its yesterday" and committing them to memory have proved effective in enhancing the understanding of the concept of excellence.
- It is useful for animators to emphasize in the first few meetings that, for the group to strive for spiritual excellence the members need to develop strong bonds of friendship and achieve greater and greater unity. There are a number of quotations from the writings relate to this subject, and several can be selected for the youth to discuss an memorize. Animators find it particularly fruitful to help the youth express their own ideas on the themes of love, unity and harmony. The concept of friendship usually proves to be appropriate for an initial conversation of this kind.
Lesson 1
Name game:TIME BOMB
Invite the young people to sit (facing inwards) in a circle. You will need a small foam or tennis ball to be the ‘bomb’. A young person is selected to start with the ‘bomb’. He then has to call out someone’s name and throw the ‘bomb’ to them. That person has 2 seconds only to say someone else’s name and throw the ‘bomb’ to them.
You leave the game if you hold the ball for too long, don’t say someone’s name before you throw, or do such a poor throw it cannot be caught by the next person. A very simple game but it can get very fast and furious. Try it with 2 ‘bombs’!
**Re: friendships -
? acrostic poem about friendship
Brainstorm what makes a good friend...
Everyone's different - but welcome.
Play game: Who's line is it anyway type game where 3 people are hanging out, and one of the friends has a quirky quality everyone else has to guess.
Invite the young people to sit (facing inwards) in a circle. You will need a small foam or tennis ball to be the ‘bomb’. A young person is selected to start with the ‘bomb’. He then has to call out someone’s name and throw the ‘bomb’ to them. That person has 2 seconds only to say someone else’s name and throw the ‘bomb’ to them.
You leave the game if you hold the ball for too long, don’t say someone’s name before you throw, or do such a poor throw it cannot be caught by the next person. A very simple game but it can get very fast and furious. Try it with 2 ‘bombs’!
**Re: friendships -
? acrostic poem about friendship
Brainstorm what makes a good friend...
Everyone's different - but welcome.
Play game: Who's line is it anyway type game where 3 people are hanging out, and one of the friends has a quirky quality everyone else has to guess.
Lesson 2
Get to know each other with Never Have I ever.
TAKE THE TREASURE
Invite the young people to sit in a large circle. Place a chair in the middle. On the chair place the treasure. A set of keys works really well. Ask for a volunteer to guard the treasure from thieves and give them a rolled up newspaper. Unfortunately, they have to do this while being blindfolded!
Once the guard is in place beside the chair, a thief is quietly chosen from the circle. They must attempt to sneak up to the chair and without alerting the guard, snatch the treasure.
Meanwhile, the guard listens for the thief and trys to swat him with the newspaper baton. If the thief is swatted, he must return to the circle. If he succeeds in stealing the treasure and returning to the circle, his prize is to become the new guard.
Tall stories The leader starts a story with a sentence that ends in SUDDENLY. The next person then has to add to the story with his own sentence that ends in SUDDENLY. Continue the story until everyone has contributed. The story becomes crazier as each young person adds their sentence. Tape it and play it back. For example; 'Yesterday I went to the zoo and was passing the elephant enclosure when SUDDENLY.....'
Newspaper puzzle Divide into teams of five or six people and give each group a copy of the SAME newspaper. Ask them to spread the newspaper out in front of each team. Describe a particular advert, article, fact or picture from the paper and the group has to find it, rip it out and bring it to you. The first team to bring it gets a point. Continue calling out items and the winning team is the one with the most points. Watch the paper fly
TAKE THE TREASURE
Invite the young people to sit in a large circle. Place a chair in the middle. On the chair place the treasure. A set of keys works really well. Ask for a volunteer to guard the treasure from thieves and give them a rolled up newspaper. Unfortunately, they have to do this while being blindfolded!
Once the guard is in place beside the chair, a thief is quietly chosen from the circle. They must attempt to sneak up to the chair and without alerting the guard, snatch the treasure.
Meanwhile, the guard listens for the thief and trys to swat him with the newspaper baton. If the thief is swatted, he must return to the circle. If he succeeds in stealing the treasure and returning to the circle, his prize is to become the new guard.
Tall stories The leader starts a story with a sentence that ends in SUDDENLY. The next person then has to add to the story with his own sentence that ends in SUDDENLY. Continue the story until everyone has contributed. The story becomes crazier as each young person adds their sentence. Tape it and play it back. For example; 'Yesterday I went to the zoo and was passing the elephant enclosure when SUDDENLY.....'
Newspaper puzzle Divide into teams of five or six people and give each group a copy of the SAME newspaper. Ask them to spread the newspaper out in front of each team. Describe a particular advert, article, fact or picture from the paper and the group has to find it, rip it out and bring it to you. The first team to bring it gets a point. Continue calling out items and the winning team is the one with the most points. Watch the paper fly