I’m baaaack. MMM here – I am posting today, so that you don’t get accustomed to the quality of the superior guest posts as of late. Today for the Family Proclamation Celebration, we are featuring posts containing FHE ideas, or craft ideas. Craft ideas? Sorry, ain’t gonna happen. But for those of you who would like to join in the blog hop for either topic, check out the bottom of the post for instructions. Welcome aboard!
Family Home Evening. Now With Opie!
Happiness in family life is most likely to be achieved when founded upon the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ. Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities. (The Family: A Proclamation to the World.)
That’s a heap o’ principles for us to pay attention to. It is also a heap o’ principles to teach our children. It is also a heap o’ principles for our children to learn to recognize in the world around them.
As faithful readers of this blog know by now, I like stories. I also like finding meanings in stories that can be attached to gospel principles to make them more approachable and understandable. In our church, we have many opportunities where we might need to find a story that can be applicable to a particular subject for a talk or lesson. For all of these reasons, I came up with an FHE idea that proved to be one of my family’s all-time favorites.
Here’s what you need:
1) A television
2) A DVR, Apple TV, VCR, DVD player, or whatever
3) A program to watch.* (To be discussed later)
3) Paper
4) Pencils
5) Dessert (No popcorn or treats during the show.)
* If you think Monday Night Football counts as FHE, you are the worst parent alive, much like the parents in “The Glass Castle,” and should be ashamed of yourself. Stop it, and quickly apologize to your children – before it is everlastingly too late. (Possibly a bit dramatic..)
Here is what to do: Instruct the family that you are going to watch something on TV. As you are watching, everyone should write down as many gospel concepts as they can find that come up in during the show. Warn them that after the show, they might need to explain why they wrote down their ideas.
Then watch the show. I prefer Andy Griffith, mindful that some episodes work better than others. The cheesier, the better. Spongebob Squarepants is also quite good – and funny – if you get the right episode. If you don’t tell the kids in advance, they will be pleasantly surprised when it isn’t a “churchy” video. Just make sure you screen it in advance to make sure the principles are good principles!
As you are watching, you will notice oodles of principles that are woven throughout the storyline., You will be surprised. If one of the kids is too young to write, have them whisper in Mom or Dad’s ear what they should write down. If they are too young to do that, give them something chewy, and just have them watch the show.
The first time we did this was triggered by a $1.00 video we found at Walmart that contained 3 episodes of The Andy Griffith Show. Amazingly, I found a condensed version of the very same episode that our family watched. So, grab a pencil and a piece of paper, and sacrifice a measly 5 minutes of your life. You know, for the children!
Click to play. (The full 24 minute version of this video can be found on YouTube
here.)
Here are a quick 10 principles that I noticed in this video:
Peer pressure
Honesty
Importance of work
Obeying the law of the land (AofF 12)
Respect for authority
Respect for your parents
Temper (and tantrums)
Calm parenting
People vs. Things
Discipline
Some of my older kids found dozens. Even the youngest found a bunch. We went around the circle, and everyone read their list. Many were duplicated, but if someone had an original idea, we would dig in and ask them to explain. It was remarkable how much good can be drawn out of something like a TV show if you are paying attention. I would also suggest that you can do this same thing without kids at your empty-nest FHE.
Examples of gospel principles are all around us, all of the time. If we train ourselves, and our children to notice them in the context of our everyday lives, we will never be far away from a reminder of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Real life, plus gospel principles, yields strength and testimony.
If you give it a try, let me know how it goes!
Click on these links to read more Proclamation Celebration posts
BLOG HOP!
If you have an FHE idea, or a craft that helps teach the concepts of the Family Proclamation, please share your link with us!
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I am a new blogger. I inserted this on my LDS board on Pinterest. Thank you!
I’m a little late with my comment but I loved this. I have 7 children and I’m forwarding my link to them. Some of them are empty nesters but hopefully they’ll share with their children and the truths and blessings will just trickle down forever.
That is such a totally awesome idea. I will have to try it out some time. Thanks for sharing.
Are you sure you’re not my stake president? He uses “The Andy Griffith Show” as an example in at least half of this talks. Love your idea anyway!
I think we should be able to eat popcorn during the show. I love popcorn. Then we could sing Popcorn Popping as the opening AND closing song. (I’ve been a primary teacher for 2 long years now… It’s a bit like Siberia with peppy songs to boost moral).
Missy and Anonymous: You are both COMPLETELY missing the point. I will type this extra slow so you can understand…
The whole premise is based on the idea that you LOVE your kids, and want to help them learn. Not that you hate them and wish bad things upon them. I think making them watch Twilight or Suite Life would fall under the “abuse” clause of the very Proclamation we are discussing.
Sheesh.
I know that M3 is true!!
Ahh, MMM – would you be willing to do this with an episode of “The Suite Life of Zack and Codie”? Hmmmm. I think that would be a hard one for you to do.
A Happy Hubby
Watch Twilight and play this game, or if all of your kids have read the book then just discuss with the book…first thing I noticed when I read the series. Great post MMM! Thanks for sharing.
YESSSSSSSSSSSS. We pretty much do this every week for our FHE. Shh, don’t tell the Twelve. It works really well! Sometimes we’ll even pop in a Church movie to switch things up a bit, keep those kids on their toes…
Great idea . . . and I, too, love that it looks for the good instead of merely criticizing the bad . . .
I also loved “The Glass Castle” and “Half-Broke Horses” even more . . . ;o)
and after you draw out the gospel principles, and are desperate for a lesson in a few weeks… there have been about 80 lessons designed for Sunday School (non-denominational) at barneyfife.com
Great idea! I kniw what we are doing for our next FHE! : ) Thanks!
Brilliant! I have tried and faltered at having discussions during commercials. What is happening? What can we learn? What do you think X will do? What do you think X should do? What would you do? What do you think will happen next?
This sounds good!
I pretty much adore this idea!
Awesome fhe idea! My kids will love it.
Uh, don’t think there are ANY gospel principles in Glee! I’m gonna do it with Andy Griffith. I’m pretty sure my three teenagers haven’t ever seen an episode of it.
I’m gonna try that with Glee! Thanks!
You will burn in hell.
(That’s not cussing, it is a religious observation)
I thought she was going to try your idea happily and wondered why you told her she would burn in hell. Silly me…Glee is a TV show!!
“Glee” is a long-running discussion on the blog – and Mindi is just yanking my chain. She made that comment that because she knows that Glee is one of Satan’s favorite shows, because it normalizes and delights in immorality.
This may be my favorite comment/reply thread I’ve ever seen. “You will burn in hell.” *dies*
😉
Thanks for the great idea! My kids love watching television (a little too much) so this will be right up their alley.
I like the focus on each person identifying gospel principles. Not just the lesson-giver telling everyone else what principle to see in action. My children often make connections, even at their young ages, that I hadn’t thought of.
I LOVE the Andy Griffith Show! I’m thinking maybe we need a woodshed out back…oh, never mind.
I esspecialy love to watch Andy with my child. I like that I don’t have to worry about what she will see on it, but I also notice that there are parenting lessons and child lessons, I know its only a show on tv, but I would love to have a relationship with my daughter like he has with his son. Good Post!
I wonder if I could do this for seminary. Or will they throw me out?!!
Brings back my teaching seminary years. We often used video clips to help teach gospel principles in a way students could relate. I love this idea. Brilliant!
A quick clarification: The point of this idea is to show a video with the goal of causing viewers to think and draw out the concepts, wherein using a video clip in a classroom setting is usually done to reenforce a pre-determined concept we are trying to teach.
I try and do this with the movie Lion King because my daughter is obsessed with it (3yro) she would watch it every day if I let her. Yesterday during her scripture study I was telling her who Satan was and I used Scar as an example of what he is like.
One of our more successful family night “lessons/activities” was to play Boggle. After each round we chose one of the words on our list, related it to a gospel principle, and shared it with the rest of the family. You can learn some great gospel lessons while having fun. We’ll have to give it a try with a tv show sometime!
I knew I liked you. Boggle is on of my all-time favorite games. I am proud to say that in over 40 years I have never been beaten. Ever. Does that sound cocky? Oh well!
MMM, you should add “mad Boggle Skills” to your profile 🙂
This is great FHE for ALL ages! That is sometimes difficult with the wide age spread of our children.
I really like the way you look for the good instead of the bad.
Somewhat unrelated, but have you ever heard Jon Bytheway’s impersonation of Barney Fife feom the Andy Griffith Show? It is fantastic.
Yep. He’s great.
I love the idea… and I got an extra giggle out of “give them something chewy”. Our last two fhe nights have been spent taking turns reading out loud of the FSOY. My kids loved it. We’re going to have to try your idea next.
Proving again that the gospel can be found in many places if we are looking for them…especially in TV shows that are pre-1970! A subtle yet important principle to teach (and way to teach it!)