Activity Days Starter Kit

I don't know why I didn't think of putting this together before now! The very first thing I did when I got called as an Activity Days leader was go to Staples and I got a binder for all my stuff.

Whether you have just been called or you want a little help getting organized, this starter kit is perfect!

FOR THE LEADERS:

1. Binder Cover Sheet

2. Roster (Parent's Name, Girl's Name, Birthday, Phone Number, Text?, Email, Address)

3. Achievement Record 

4. Attendance Record

5. Calendars ( First one is January - June, the second is July-December)

When I was the leader, I would fill out these calenders and then give them to the girls every 6 months. Please refer to the picture I posted to see how I fill in the blanks (there's a spot for the date, activity name and which achievement category it falls under)

6. Birthday Record

7. Planning Form ( Idea Name, Achievement Category, Budget Estimate, Details

 FOR THE GIRLS:

*All of these are sized 5x7 so the leader (or the girls) can cut them down and fit them in scriptures. 

1. Faith In God &  My Gospel Standards

2. Articles of Faith & Achievement Record 

**** UPDATE ****

I've added a couple more pages to this packet!

"Welcome Page"
This is especially great if you are in the Primary Presidency to give to anyone who is newly called as an Activity Days leader. "Welcome to Activity DAYS! We hope that you enjoy this calling very much. Here is an introduction that will hopefully give you a better idea of what this calling entails..." It has information from both the Faith In God book and lds.org.

"Faith in God Award Certificate"

There's already is a Faith In God Award certificate in the Faith in God book, but just in case any leaders don't have access to the one in the book or for whatever reason this could come in handy, I included it :)

Activity Days Faith in God Worksheets

Make completing activities from the Faith in God book easy with worksheets!

As I was going through the book there are quite a few activities where you have to write something down, explain something or make lists. I thought it would be really great for the girls to have a place to write all these things down. Having them on the same template can bring consistency and even help the girls get quite a few activities done quickly (I thought of naming these worksheets "Faith In God for the procrastinator").  The girls are asked to complete 2 activities each year for Learning and Living the Gospel, Serving Other and Developing Talents. There are at least three worksheets below for each of those sections.

Listed below are the section and activity from the Faith in God book:

Learning and Living the Gospel

1. THE SACRAMENT

Explain how taking the sacrament helps you renew your baptismal covenant. In a family home evening, teach others about things we can do to remain faithful.

2. THE FIRST VISION

Give a family home evening lesson on Joseph Smith’s First Vision (see Joseph Smith—History 1:1–20). Discuss how Heavenly Father answers our sincere prayers.

3. THE HOLY GHOST

Mark these verses about the Holy Ghost in your scriptures: John 14:16–17, 2 Nephi 32:5, and Moroni 10:5. Discuss ways the Holy Ghost helps you.

4. FOLLOW THE PROPHET

Read a recent conference address given by the prophet. Decide what you can do to follow the prophet, and do it.

5. PRAYER

Give an opening and a closing prayer in family home evening or at Primary. Share your feelings about how prayer protects us and helps us to stay close to Heavenly Father and the Savior.

6. FAITH IN JESUS CHRIST

Tell a story from the Book of Mormon that teaches about faith inJesus Christ. Share your testimony of the Savior.

 7. THE WORD OF WISDOM

Read D&C 89. Discuss how Heavenly Father blesses us when we faithfully live the Word of Wisdom. Help plan and conduct an activity to teach the Word of Wisdom to others.

8. AGENCY

Learn to sing “Choose the Right” (Hymns, no. 239). Explain what agency is and what it means to be responsible for your choices. Discuss how making good choices has helped you develop greater faith.

Serving Others

9. LETTER

Write a letter to a teacher, your parents, or your grandparents telling them what you appreciate and respect about them.

10. QUALITIES

Make a list of the qualities you like in a person. Choose one quality to develop in yourself. Discuss how showing respect and kindness strengthens you, your family, and others.

11. GOOD CITIZEN

Read the twelfth article of faith. Discuss what it means to be a good citizen and how your actions can affect others.

Developing Talents

12. TITHING

Learn how to budget and save money. Discuss why it is important to faithfully pay our tithing and how Heavenly Father blesses us when we do (see 3 Nephi 24:10–11). Pay your tithing and begin saving for a mission.

13.PREPARE FOR SERVICE

Learn to sing, play, or lead a song from the Children’s Songbook.Teach or share the song in a family home evening or at Primary. Discuss how developing talents helps prepare us for service to Heavenly Father and others.

14. PRINCIPLES OF THE GOSPEL

Write a poem, story, or short play that teaches a principle of the gospel or is about Heavenly Father’s creations.

15. SEEK LEARNING

Read D&C 88:118. Discuss what it means to “seek learning, even by study and also by faith.” Improve your personal study habits by doing such things as learning how to choose and read good books or being prepared for school each day.

16. LEARN TO WORK

List five things you can do to help around your home. Discuss the importance of obeying and honoring your parents and learning how to work.

 Preparing for Young Women

17. SEEKING VIRTUE

After studying the thirteenth article of faith, make a list of things that are uplifting and virtuous. Discuss with a parent or leader how you can seek after these things.

18. TRUTH AND RIGHTEOUSNESS

Write in your journal how you can serve the Lord as you stand for truth and righteousness.

19. GOOD EDUCATION

Read D&C 88:77–80, 118 and D&C 130:19. Discuss with a parent or Primary leader how important a good education is and how it can help strengthen your home and family and in the Church.

20. PROCLAMATION

Read “The Family: A Proclamation to the World.” Make a list of things you can do to help strengthen your family and make a happy home. Share the list with your parents or Primary leader.

Shape Game - Serving Others

In the Faith in God book under "Serving Others", the following activity is recommended:

• Entertain young children with songs or games you have learned or made yourself. Show that you know how to care for and protect a young child.

I came across this game as a sunbeam teacher that we called "The Shape Game". I decided to make it for my son and HE LOVES IT! And I love it too cause Easton knows all his shapes now! As I was going over the Faith in God requirements, I thought this would be perfect for completing this activity. First let me tell you about the game... I used my son as the guinea pig :) 

First you lay out an "example" of each shape. We use the white shapes for this:

Then I give Easton another shape. He needs to tell me what color the shape is, what the shape name is, and then he has to put it where it goes with the other similar shapes.  In the one I made, I have stars, hearts, rectangles, triangles, cirlces, pentagons and hexagons. I used the colors blue, red, yellow, green and black. Easton LOVES stars.

 Once all the shapes are sorted, the game is over :).

My little guy liked this game so much I decided to make it with letters and numbers too. He just turned two and he knows how to count to ten thanks to this game... I think that's good?

SO... depending on if the girls in your program have younger siblings or not may change how you want to do this activity. I figured they could spend an activity days hour making this game, then take it home and be in charge of playing it with their younger siblings. If they don't have younger siblings, maybe they can still make it and then donate it to the nursery, spending a few minutes at the beginning of nursery or Sunbeams on a Sunday teaching the kids how to play? 

What you need for each girl:

1. A shape template as shown above. Or if you already have dicuts or shape punches, that would work great too. 

2. A pair of scissors

3. Foam or paper. 1 sheet of each color (or enough for each girl to make each shape once). I used foam because I wanted it to last a long time. I bought it at hobby lobby with a 40% off coupon and it came to 3.84 for 12 pieces (12" x 18"). I think a good idea for activity days would be buying the 8.5 x 5.5 size shown here. They have this at Micheal's too. The shapes would be pretty small, but would still make a fun game. Then you would want to print two templates (shown above) per 8.5 x 11 page. 

4. Bag for the shapes when they are done. A ziploc bag would work fine. 

So for each color (or piece of foam/paper) you'll want to cut out each shape once. When you are finished, it should look like this: 

My older nieces LOVED playing this with the younger kids and as a bonus they all learned their shapes :)

Faith In God Award Requirements

 The Faith In God Award Requirements sized to fit standard scriptures! This would be great to give new girls as they enter Activity Days or even older girls who need to focus on what the requirements are. You can include this when you give them their Faith In God book and go over the Activity Days program. This is even a good reminder for the leaders!

"The box below is just under 7x5… the same size as scriptures! Cut this out and put in your scriptures, so you can be reminded of what you are working toward each night when you read your scriptures."

SnapShotPlace @ Etsy

Random Activity Days Ideas

Today I was looking for something in my e-mail and I came across this list I made for a planning session. Some of these we used, but not all of them so I thought I would share all these ideas in case they work for you :)

Activity Days Ideas

* A manners activity where we learn to set a table correctly and other etiquette.

* teach them how to plant a flower (starting with a pot, soil, seeds, ect)

* time capsule activity- have them write goals for the next 5-10-15 years. Have them draw pictures where they want to be

* make an apron – one week we can go to the store and let them pick out their fabric (maybe the $1 section at walmart), the next we can sew them.

* Make a necklace with fabric and large wooden beads (I did this with my friends…. It was really easy)

* Father-daughter dinner- we can maybe make spaghetti… something easy the girls can do themselves. We could do this at the church and have the girls come 1 hour before their fathers. We can divide the girls up and give them each a different responsibility like:

o Boil the noodles

o Warm up the sauce

o Make rolls

o Set the table (using their manners and etiquette knowledge)

o Make the dessert

* Homemade personal pizzas with rhodes rolls and pie pan. This is a super easy dinner… casey and I do it all the time. Maybe while the pizzas are in the oven, we can have them watch a church movie.

* For valentines day: have the girls frost and decorate sugar cookies for a few families of their choice in the ward or maybe the bishopric, then drop them off.

You can also visit my Etsy to see if anything will spark an idea :)

Bowling - Developing Talents

The other day I asked my 10 year old niece what her favorite activity has been in her activity days so far. She said without hesitation "BOWLING". She said they did a daddy-daughter bowling activity and she had a ton of fun. I think that's a great idea... or even just going bowling with just the girls and using the down-time between turns to work on memorizing their Articles of Faith :)

Family History, I am doing it! Learning and Living the Gospel

I have had the song "Family History - I Am Doing It" stuck in my head all week! I am taking this as a sign to finally post this family history chart (notice I did not say tree) that I have been meaning to post for a long time now.

One of the activities I did when I was a leader was teaching the girls about the online resources there are to do family history. One of the requirements under Learning and Living the Gospel says "Prepare a pedigree chart with your name and your parents' and grandparents' names. Prepare a family group record for your family and share a family story. Discuss how performing temple work blesses families".

For the activity, we had the girls look up their own family history and write it down, and browse familysearch.org. We had each girl share a family story and we talked about how performing temple work blesses families. It would have been great to have somewhere cute they could write down their family history.

OR

SnapShotPlace @ Etsy

 I also want to share that my very talented friend Hayley designed a really great Family Tree that she will customize, print and mail to you! I think it is a PERFECT gift - thoughtful, personal and timeless!

Family Tree - customizable print 

Articles of Faith Tournament - Super fun Primary Activity ready in 20 minutes!

UPDATE!!

I have updated these files and now this activity looks just a bit different, but should be even BETTER!!

OLDER FILES:

A few years ago I did a tournament with the girls and I am finally re-creating it since I hadn't saved what I made. An "Articles of Faith Tournament" is a great way to learn the articles, and a good way for the girls to plan on passing them off with leaders. I made my tournament with six stations:

1. Pass Off (this station is with the leaders)
2.Word Search
3. Flashcards
4. Matching Game
5. Cross Word
6. Quiz

I would have the girls pair off and each start at a different station. Depending on how many girls you have, you may need more than just two girls at one station.  One of the great things about this is that it frees up the leaders to be at one of the stations while the girls are busy with the other stations to have one on one time with the girls for them to pass off memorized articles.

SnapShotPlace @ Etsy