New Calling????

[Brian]

...

[il Padrino Ute]

Done.

You want me to write a letter of recommendation to your new bishop as well?

[UtahDan]

I have had that calling for the last year and never want to be release. But this last week I lost my mind and agreed to teach seminary. I'm not sure I will get to keep GD but I hope so.

[FMCoug]

GD is my favorite calling too. I have had it twice.

Any suggestions on how to best go about getting it in my new ward?

[UtahDan]

Sem. is the most rewarding thing I've ever done.
Especially during year 2 when I had a good handle on what I could actually cover in class, and avoided preparing too much for the week.

Enjoy.

Give me some advice then, please. What kind of prep did you do? I just taught BOM in GD so I'm feeling like I won't need that much prep but will still need a lesson plan of course. Did you prepare each night or sort of just do the whole week on Sunday. Also, was yours early morning? Mine will be 6:30-7:20. That is going to be then hardest part. I'm not an early riser.

[smokymountainrain]

GD is my favorite calling too. I have had it twice.

Any suggestions on how to best go about getting it in my new ward?

Make it be known to the B-ric that you enjoy doing it. Obviously that doesn't guarantee anything, but they will most likely take your name into consideration when the calling opens up.

[beelzebabette]

GD is my favorite calling too. I have had it twice.

I've had it twice as well, but with mixed results. Loved it the first time, and I attribute a lot of that to having a good team teacher that made it fun to try to maintain the level of discussion when it was my turn to teach. My last experience wasn't as positive, but it left me with a great appreciation for those that enjoy the calling and work hard at it so all was not lost.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

We got a new bishopric on Sunday and my friend who teaches GD was just called as a counsellor. He travels a lot and so I have been his sub when he's out of town.
Sunday he handed me the book and asked me to sub for a while.
GD teacher is one calling I covet. I enjoy teaching and the impetus for extra study is a nice bonus.

But, since I want it, I probably wont get it.....
But, if you all could excercise your faith as the new Bishop selects a GD teacher... (c:

My last calling in my last singles ward was GD teacher. I think my 4-5 year old primary kids are more engaged in the subject matter than the people in that ward. There's a real dryspell that occurs in the D&C year in the form of an entire lesson devoted to the Willie Handcart Company. Trying to teach a bunch of 18-24 year olds about the Willie Handcart Company for an hour is torture. It's great if you have a bunch of Daughters of the Pioneers (or whatever they're called) in the class, not so great when you're dealing with college-aged kids most of whom have little concept of sacrafice.

I also decided early on that the manual was mostly useless beyond getting more than what the lesson is supposed to be on. I really like how the manual for every lesson literally has a question like "Have members of the class talk about how specific instances where obedience to the commandments strengthened their testimony."

[Brian]

Give me some advice then, please. What kind of prep did you do? I just taught BOM in GD so I'm feeling like I won't need that much prep but will still need a lesson plan of course. Did you prepare each night or sort of just do the whole week on Sunday. Also, was yours early morning? Mine will be 6:30-7:20. That is going to be then hardest part. I'm not an early riser.

This is an unorganized brain dump.....


I had the same time period.
We were able to use classrooms in the high school. I don't know how the stake swung that deal. But it was very nice. Lots of chalkboards, an overhead projector, etc.

The biggest thing, in my experience, make it fun, interesting and mix it up. And never, ever go over time. Kids check out when class is over. So do adults.

I did all my preparation on Sunday. I took my lesson material for the week to church and read through the manuals during church and started to put together an outline. After dinner and a nap, I would spend 2-3 hours or so putting together an outline for the week. There are quite a few internet resources. A lot of them have lame stuff, but some of it is good.
http://latter-dayvillage.com/ is one I used. I think it's $20 a year, and worth it. There are complete lesson outlines available that people have submitted. These can help quite a bit when life gets hectic.
That said, life happens, and sometimes I'd show up with no plans. The Lord really digs these kids because things would come together.
Once I had my complete week planned out I only had to make minor tweaks during the week. I kept all my lesson plans on google docs, so I could access them anywhere whenever I had an idea.

The stake runs the program. I had a rather mullah-ish SP who demanded kids be on time and make up missed classes. I ignored him and never marked anyone down for attendance. I gave everyone an A, every year. The kids who got something out of class got something a lot more important than a grade. Some of the other teachers were really strict and the kids hated it. It's an optional early morning program. I say give them a break.

I had two class officers. We called the President "The Roy" and the VP the "The Viceroy". The Roy conducted and the Viceroy took roll. I switched it off enough that everyone in the class got to be something once.

First day of class I had them fill out a page long info sheet. bday, favorite food, fav candy, tv show, movie, book, opera, color, number, mathematical operator, holiday, pets, family contents, several other random things. everyone got their favorite candy bar and a gift on their bday. The library had a free book pile. And they got the lamest book I could find. Everyone really looked forward to getting their birthday book.

Movies. The seminary video collection has some good stuff and some pretty lame stuff. Regardless, they liked watching them. And laughing at the lame stuff. Anne of Green Gables has *a lot* of 5 minute clips with good lessons. They also loved Mr. Bean (the BBC 30 minute show, not the movies). I made up some reading logs and made them a deal that if the class read X minutes and each person read at least Z minutes, we would have a party class session. donuts, chocolate milk and Nacho Libre. The more they read, the more often we would have a party.

Every morning we would do scripture mastery for 5 or 10 minutes. I never made them memorize them, just get the key concepts. But we did read over them together. I made up some off the wall pictures to go along with each one that had a theme. All the 2Ne had a dude with 2 socks (2 knee highs). I put these on transparencies that I could show on the projector. Through the year I would put up previous ones to referesh their memories. Each Friday we played games that had a scripture mastery (SM) theme. The websites have a lot of games as examples. They game they all loved the most was the dinosaur game. Two teams. Each team got a package of plastic dinosaurs and a corner of the room. By answering questions, they could win protective barricades (hym books, blocks, etc). Then, they put up their barriers to protect their dinosaurs. Each team got a chance to roll a racquet ball across the room and try to knock over dinosaurs. One point per dinosaur knocked over. Stupid game. They loved it. Also, we'd watch a movie, Rocket Man, Nacho Libre, MST 3000 and every SM reference they could pick from the movie, they would get a point. (EX: A song plays, 'hymn is a prayer to god', etc).

Mix up activies w/ lessons. I had a lot of chalk boards, so board activities were easy. I'd have them come up with an abstract piece of art that describes a passage of scripture. Or give them a random set of words and have them draw a story using the words that explains a principle. One day I gave them some poster board, had them read the revleation on the dimensions of the kirtland temple, then make a kirtland temple and present to the class.
One year we made a class movie. Class project. They picked the story, characters, etc. It was based on Ether. Everyone had a part. We spent a couple of days a week the last 2 months of class writing the script, making cardboard swords, filming etc.

Try to get the stake to call a sub, if you need one. I travel a fair bit and it was hard to get parents to fill in sometimes. One year we had a sub called and that helped a lot.

Hope that helps a little. Feel free to ask for more info....
It's a lot of work, but very rewarding. My fondest church memories are of the time with those kids.

[UtahDan]

That gives me a ton to think about. Thanks so much.

[Surfah]

Brian, sounds like you were an awesome teacher.

My mom taught early morning seminary for awhile. I have some good memories of it. Ours was also held at the high school after a deal was worked out. Prior to that we had it at the stake center which was 10-15 minutes away so seminary began at 6:00 am which sucked.

One of my favorite memories was one of my best friends (he later ended up being a college roommate) coloring the scripture mastery flash card for Hebrews. He colored HE one color and the spent most of his time emphasizing the BREW part (and as a roommate I can attest that he still emphasized the brew years later). As fate would have it, that was the only scripture he knew which came in to play at a critical time during the stake scripture chase at the end of the year.

[Brian]

Exec. Sec called earlier today. Appt on Wed.
IPU, your letter may have done it. Or perhaps I'll be counseled for hanging with shady characters.

[Hazzard]

Daughters of the Pioneers (or whatever they're called)

That would be Daughters of Utah Pioneers, or D.U.P., as its members commonly refer to it. My grandma is a proud member. I think she tried to get me into the male equivalent -- Sons of Utah Pioneers. Although I thought it would be cool to belong to an organization called SUP, I passed because I couldn't think of a nerdier organization (other than the MUSS).

[il Padrino Ute]

Exec. Sec called earlier today. Appt on Wed.
IPU, your letter may have done it. Or perhaps I'll be counseled for hanging with shady characters.

Glad to help, but the less you know, the better it is for you.

[il Padrino Ute]

That would be Daughters of Utah Pioneers, or D.U.P., as its members commonly refer to it. My grandma is a proud member. I think she tried to get me into the male equivalent -- Sons of Utah Pioneers. Although I thought it would be cool to belong to an organization called SUP, I passed because I couldn't think of a nerdier organization (other than the MUSS).

Hey now, my dad is a proud member of SUP. I'm not a member, but I have done some cool things for them, like take photos of monuments along the Mormon trail for their website.