FHE Lesson {Prayer}

I've written a few lessons about prayer and have decided to put all the ideas in one spot here.
Pick and choose from below what elements you want to teach.
Alternatively teach about prayer as a topic for a month?

Opening Song: We Bow our Heads #25

Opening Prayer:


Lesson:

We used this segment on Prayer to start our lesson.

New Testament Stories chapter 20 - Jesus teaches about prayer

After watching the short video we talked about prayer.

We said this poem

We fold our arms
Close our eyes
Bow our heads
When the prayer is said

Then we talked about the elements of prayer by asking questions

What do we start a prayer with? (addressing Heavenly Father)
What is next?  (giving thanks for the many things we have)
Then we can... (ask for things - safety, health, good dreams, bless food, )
And we end with  (in Jesus Name)

We asked how many times a day can you pray? (whenever you like, but the girls came up with the rough answer of we pray 6 times a day - food prayers, family prayers, individual prayers)

We discussed why we should kneel in prayer
(respect, humble, people kneel to kings and dignitaries, so the Lord would be even more important, so we concentrate on only the prayer and not slouching on the couch or laying in our bed )

We reminded the children to continue trying hard in their personal prayers morning and night

***

 

 

For this lesson I prepared some strips of paper and made two groups.

One group was "I should pray" the other group was "I shouldn't pray"

I prepared strips of paper that said things like:

When someone is sick
When I am lost or alone
Over my food
For safety and protection
Night and morning
When I am thankful
If I need calming
To ask Questions


 Or

For lots of money
To ask for a pony or lots of toys
When I want another team to lose
To wish harm upon another person

I read out the strips and each child got a turn at choosing which side the item belonged to. Things that are suitable to pray for, or things that aren't really suitable to pray for. It worked really well and the girls enjoyed guessing and got most of answers right. I then asked them to think of some extra things we could add to our lists.

I originally had 'when I am angry' on the when not to pray side as I meant it in a 'I shouldn't say an angry prayer about how much I hate my sisters and I wish God would do something to show them' way. My girls all said you SHOULD pray when you are angry and it will help you calm down mum! ... so I changed it to 'If I need calming' !

This was a easy simple lesson that worked out well for our family. Any other things you could add to the list of times to pray?

***

 

(For some reason my children prefer me to say their night prayers for them, and always tell me they don't know what to say and want me to do it! Even though I've taught them several times and they can all say food and family morning prayer with no problems! I felt it was time to give them a little push into saying their own personal prayers) I printed a copy of this chart for each child. We talked about the importance of reading our scriptures everyday even if its just a few verses and to say our individual morning and night prayers.

I chose a simple yet interesting scripture that we all read. I then said they could now colour in one of the scriptures on the chart under Monday. Later when you go to bed you can colour the girl when you say your night prayers. When they have a certain amount coloured I said they would get a small reward.


Activity:

Draw, cut out pictures or write words  on a big piece of paper of the things we can pray for

Practice kneeling, folding arms and saying prayers

 

***

 

Handouts for any lesson:

My Prayer Reminder Printable

Did you think to Pray? Daily colouring Chart

Little girl praying colouring in page

{all found in Sept 2008 Ensign. Lots of stuff on prayer in there}



Closing Song:  Search Ponder and Pray #109

Closing Prayer:

Treat: