MISSIONARIES – “One of our Primary Activity Days was on Every member a
missionary. We extended each primary age child a mission call. (They looked
and read much like the original) When each child arrived they received a
Nametag like the real ones and we had then find on a world map where they
were going to serve their mission. Washington, Utah, Germany, Soviet Union
etc. Then they were taken into the MTC, where we had real missionaries teach
them the first new member discussion. From there they were given a BOM and
went door to door like real missionaries do. (In several classrooms we had
teachers pretending that they were at home waiting for the “missionaries”)
As the children knocked on the doors the teachers responded. Some were happy
to see the missionaries and some were not. Much like what the missionaries
really experience. Then the kids went into another room where they wrote to
the missionaries in our Ward and wrote their testimonies and we pasted them
in the covers of BOM for the “real” missionaries to give out. After a tough
morning of tracking all the children were hungry, so we met in the cultural
hall for a typical missionary lunch. PB & J’s and milk. It was a wonderful
experience, all the kids really enjoyed being a missionary. By the time
lunch was over most of them said they wanted to go on a mission when they
were old enough.” STACIE GRAHAM, PUYALLUP SOUTH STAKE
CALLED TO SERVE: A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A MISSIONARY – “I was inspired by news
coverage of reporters following missionaries around for a day and thought we
could try to simulate the experience for the children. We invited the
full-time missionaries to lead us through a brief scripture study and
calisthenics, after which we divided into groups to rotate between the
following areas:
1)Cooking: Assembling a potato salad with ingredients from various food
groups in order to create a one-dish meal (accompanied by a discussion of
the food pyramid);
2) Ambassador Presentation: Shoe shining, ironing, folding laundry, and
sewing a button;
3) Service: Set up chairs for Sunday meetings (our activity was on a
Saturday);
4) Teaching the Gospel: Role-play teaching the gospel & tracting. We
reconvened for a brief clip of the video, Called to Serve, and ended with a
testimony and closing prayer. It was fun as well as inspiring.” —CINDY
NAKEA
MISSIONARY – We sent in the mail a “Mission Call” to each Primary child
inviting them to serve in the Primary Activity Day Mission. They were asked
to dress in their Sunday clothes and bring their scriptures. When they
arrived, they received a missionary nametag and entered the MTC (chapel)
where they received instructions on what is expected of them while serving a
mission and were asked to share ideas of what they are doing now to prepare
a mission in the future. We had the nursery room set up like an airplane
with carpet making an aisle down the center of 10 rows of chairs. Our
full-time Elders played the pilots and the Primary President was the Flight
Attendant. She pointed out on a large map the areas that we would be
visiting and gave a demonstration similar to a real flight. The children
received color-coded passports that divided them into 4 groups. They
departed the plane one group at a time and visited a room in which a
Returned Missionary made a presentation on the country or state in which
he/she/they served. (We had an Elder representing Japan; an Elder
representing Georgia, USA; a Sister representing Chile; and a Couple
representing Russia.) In each room they were told about the country and its
people and saw special items or videos, and tasted food unique to that area.
After 10 minutes each group rotated to the next country and they had their
passports stamped at each area with different rubber-stamp pictures. At the
end we reboarded the plane and the children were served popcorn and soda
while the “in-flight” movie, CALLED TO SERVE, was shown while the parents
arrived. It was a great success! One thing I would do differently is have
the treat be whatever the tasting food was from the countries or give them
something as their parents picked them up. It was very chaotic on the
“flight home” and no one really watched the video.”
MISSIONARY TRAINING ACTIVITY – “Our small ward (17 children typically attend
activities) had a very successful activity day May 16. As the children
arrived, they entered the MTC where there were stations set up for them to
learn: tie a tie, polish shoes, separate laundry, approach people, look them
in the eyes, smile, firm hand shake. They left the MTC to get on their
airplane (upstairs) with their passports. There was a pilot, seat belts, and
flight attendants who passed out peanuts and drinks for in flight
refreshments. The children (teamed as Jr./SR companions) then went to
Australia, Mexico, Ireland, and Taiwan. While there (in decorated
classrooms) the adult that served a mission in that country told a story,
played a game and shared a traditional food with the visiting children.
Their passport was stamped as they left each country. This activity day was
so successful with no messes, no bored children, and no confusion. The best
part for me was my 1st counselor did it all so smoothly. It was
great.” —DONNA
MISSIONARY ACTIVITY – “We’ve done this activity twice in our Primary and we
sure loved it! We can have 2 or 3 different groups for this activity. You’ll
need to:
(1) Call the full-time missionaries serving in your area and invite them.
Tell them three groups of children will come and ask them questions about
the missionary life, Christmas spent in the mission field, their families,
their feelings about the mission, etc.
(2) Call two people from your ward who have served missions. They will bring
things from their missions, such as pictures, books, dolls, etc., and will
set them up in separate rooms. They will talk to the children about their
time serving the Lord while as missionaries.
(3) Prepare a flier for the children’s families announcing the activity and
asking each child to bring to the missionaries, wrapped as a Christmas gift,
items they can consume quick. These include items such as pens, pencils,
envelopes, notepads, stamps, canned soups, canned food, candy bars,
breakfast cereal, dried fruits and nuts, peanut butter, jelly, jam,
crackers, flavored oatmeal, napkins, toilet paper, soap bars, microwave
popcorn, fruit drinks, soda pop, etc.
(4) A few weeks before this activity, bring to Primary a basket with some of
those items to show to the children. Explain to them how each item will
benefit and bless the missionaries. Bring one of the items also wrapped as a
Christmas gift.
(5) Decorate a fake small Christmas tree with yellow paper stars. Each star
will have names of the children and teachers on them. We also prepared a
paper chain to put around the tree. Each circle of the chain has one of the
children’s names. (We’ve asked each class to sign the star and the chain a
few weeks before.)
At the activity:
The children will be welcomed at the door by one of us and will receive
colored small stickers with the Primary colors. Each group will have an
assigned color, an adult leader and together they will rotate from one group
to the other. One of us will ring the bell every 15 minutes for the rotation
to happen. As they arrive, they will put their presents at the Christmas
tree. After the 3 groups were able to visit the 3 presentations, we all
meet again, sing some Primary Christmas songs and tell the missionaries all
those presents are for them. We invite them to open some, and it’s just
wonderful to see the joy on their faces! We provide them with boxes or big
plastic bags to take home all the presents and the small Christmas tree. We
call this activity also a “Service Project” from the children to the
missionaries. We all have such a great time as we prepare and participate in
this activity! Since we have different missionaries every year, this is
still a new experience to all of us, every December.
MISSIONARY – “We enjoyed a successful activity centered around the
missionaries. We called it our Mighty Missionary Day. The children were able
to see and hear a little bit about each missionary from our ward (pictures,
hobbies, and where they were serving) There was stationary for pictures and
letters and mailbags for each missionary. The children then experienced with
the help of our ward missionaries a Day in the Life of a missionary (door
approaches and an alarm clock etc.) Next they wrapped a small item that they
brought from home to put in a care package (candy, Kool-Aid, pens, stamps,
etc.) . Then they told a little bit about themselves on a taped interview
and gave words of encouragement. Last they helped make large Mighty
Missionary Cookies (M&M’s). Before eating we recorded about 8 of our
favorite primary songs to be included on the tapes. The children loved this
activity and so do the Elders and Sisters serving from our ward when they
received their surprise care package of love.” —KIM HICKMAN
You wanted ideas– these are some I have saved from other posts in the
ast —Alayne
“I HOPE THEY CALL ME ON A MISSION”
Each child will receive an “official” missionary “call” signed by the Bishop
and PP that read much like the real ones, about a week before the activity.
We will have already sent home flyers announcing the activity and telling
them to watch the mail for their call.
When they come they will each get a personalized nametag just like the real
missionaries wear! (I make these on my computer and laminate them and then
hot glue gun a pin on the back. Authentic-looking missionary tags can be
found at: http://www.davejennings.freeserve.co.uk/clipart/Cbadgpg1.html
This site, with free LDS clipart, has missionary badges that say “Member
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” and “Future Missionary Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints” They look a lot like the real ones.)
They each will have been told in their letter what country they are being
called to, so they look it up on a big world map and put a pin with a little
flag that has their name on it, on their spot. They will convene in the MTC
(primary room) and watch a short part of the “Called to Serve” video while
everyone is still getting there.
Then, we sang “I Hope They Call Me on a Mission” and split the kids into
“zones”. We chose the oldest kids to be “zone leaders” and divided the
younger ones into these four zones. Then each zone rotated through four
different areas that lasted 25 minutes each. They will also be paired up in
companionships.
1. Talk about how you have to be prepared to be a missionary. Bring out a
16yr old or so male, dressed in shorts etc, and have the kids say what he
needed to do physically. The boy’s mother gave him a hair cut in front of
the children, and he put on a suit etc. It was really fun
2. The MTC where they asked two elders serving in our ward questions and
sang songs with them (they drew these out of a basket).
3. Prep day where the children can write a letter, exercise, and maybe wash
a shirt with a washboard (if we decide to send them to a third world
country) or learn how to sew on a button. Even the Sunbeams could do it.
4. Each group will be given copies of the B of M. We will have about 8-10
classrooms with teachers in there so the kids can go “door to door” to teach
the gospel. Some teachers will not be very friendly, others will be eager,
etc. The kids go tracting with the 2 Elders in our ward and knocked on the
doors where the members responded to the messages. We even had some doors
empty so they wouldn’t get an answer (Nobody home!). Some people will not
be interested in the discussions, but one or two will welcome them in.
Since the theme of the year is baptism, we thought maybe they could learn a
simplified version of the baptism discussion. This seemed to be the kids’
favorite area. All of them said that it was fun.
5. Make Missionary food- have the kids make Top Ramen, PBJ Sandwiches, or
Tracting Mix and eat it
The best thing for us was to make the oldest kids “zone leaders” over the
little ones. They seemed to feel important and it made the day WONDERFUL for
all of us. We even had them dress like a missionary and gave them missionary
tags that they got stickers on at each area. We had a wonderful spirit there
and feel like the kids learned a lot from the activity about missionaries.
Other Ideas for stations
1. Write or “color” their testimonies and paste them into the fronts of the
B of M’s we gave them so the real missionaries can give them out.
2. Write letters to the missionaries in the ward. Include questions so the
missionaries can respond with the questions in mind. Read a letter from a
missionary in your ward that wrote to the Primary kids.
3. Make a missionary care package. Sing songs for missionaries on tape,
Send stationery, stamps, toiletries, treats, pictures, testimonies, letters,
pictures. Parents of missionaries can come talk to kids about likes and
dislikes and read parts of their letters
3. Have RM’s come and talk about the countries they went to and their
mission experiences.
4. Make Missionary T Shirts
I bought the “Tulip” brand of paint. The bottle says: “Tulip Slick 3d Paint.
Great on all craft surfaces.” I purchased Red, Yellow, and Blue for the
thumbprints (Our “Primary” colors) like someone on the list had suggested.
We used a black paint pen for the children’s name next to their thumbprint.
Paint pen is by “Decocolor” Extra fine point opaque Paint Marker.
“Permanently covers nearly any surface – weatherproof”. Try to have the
children use each color and stagger on T-shirt so it doesn’t have a bunch of
blue or one color next to each other. It turns out so colorful and pretty
this way. I purchased T-shirts with a front pocket on them and put the
Elders/Sisters name at the top of the pocket and underneath their name I put
Greenwood Ward Primary (In Green Paint). We put the “Thumbody Loves You” on
the back of the T-shirt at the top.
The pocket looked something like this:
– ——————–|
| Elder Smith |
|——————–| <—— This was a stitched line on the pocket
