FHE: Work

We had a fun FHE lesson this last week on Work, and I thought I'd post about. First of all, the reason I chose this as the topic was I have been struggling getting Noah to do his jobs everyday. They're not big jobs in the slightest, but I might as well have been asking him to eat slugs. He acted absolutely tortured, as I'm sure most kids do when their parents make them do jobs. So, I wanted to use FHE as an opportunity to teach him why we work and why it's so important.

I didn't have any fabulous ideas for a lesson, so I checked out a good resource for FHE lessons: LDS Splash! to see if they had anything, and they did! They had two versions: one for younger kids and another for teens. The main part of the lesson was teaching the hymn "Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel," and it had fun visual aids to help kids learn the song. Click here so you can see the full lesson and print out the visual aids. I made the lesson to fit our family, as I'm sure you would too. Here's what I did:

Opening song: "When we're helping we're happy"
Prayer:------

What is work? Dad and I talked to Noah about work. We asked questions like, Does Daddy work? What does he do? Does he work hard? Why does he work? (at the end of the discussion I had him tell Daddy "Thank you" for working so hard). We asked the same questions about me. Then we talked about when Noah works by obeying Mom and Dad, helping them, etc.

Why do we work? We talked about how Heavenly Father has commanded us to work, and that when we work we feel good, especially when our work blesses others.

We all have work. We talked about how we all have work to do, and that it is important for each of us to do our work. If one of us doesn't do our work it affects everyone else. For example, if Noah doesn't do his jobs and help Mommy, then Mommy has to do it on top of everything else she does, so she'll get very tired. This idea seemed to turn a light bulb on in his head.

Song: "Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel"
This was really fun. Noah participated better than I thought he would. I think he liked the pictures provided on LDS Splash!

Noah's Job Chart
In preparation for the lesson, I made a very simple job chart for Noah. It's basically a calendar with empty squares. Every day that he does his jobs, he gets a sticker and a fish point (something I'll explain later). At the end of the week, if he's done his jobs everyday, he'll get a quarter for his money jar.

Activity: Noah's Jobs
Noah has 5 jobs everyday: Put dishes in the sink after meals, brush teeth, make bed, get dressed, and help Mom. They're pretty basic, but he still feels like he's accomplishing something when he does them. He knows that's what his jobs are already, but I wanted to get them more ingrained in his head. *To reinforce them, I did some Google searches on coloring pages for each of the jobs. I was able to find something for all of them. So, for our activity Noah colored each of the coloring pages that went along with his jobs. Not only did he have fun, but I think it helped him really understand what his daily responsibilities are.

Prayer:------

Treat: ice cream (of course!)


Every time I have FHE (we're still not as consistent as I'd like, but we're working on it!) I am amazed at the almost immediate difference it makes. So far, Noah really seems to enjoy FHE, and he participates very well. I can see that he's learning things and is excited about learning. He seems excited to practice the things he has just been taught. For example, this weekend we spent the night at my parent's house. Noah was so excited to get to help Grandpa work in the yard pulling weeds. He felt so proud of himself for "working" so hard (I put that in quotations because, as you can imagine, his version of work is a lot different than ours, but in his mind he was working and that's what counts). I'm so glad he could feel the sense of accomplishment from working hard, and I'm grateful that our words aren't going in one ear and out the other. Our efforts aren't for nothing. Even when we think he hasn't heard a word we've said, he always surprises us. He's learning from us all the time, which is not always a good thing. Some things he's learned from me I wish he hadn't. Anyway, I'm rambling. I just wanted to say how much I am seeing that FHE truly is an inspired thing and that our families will be blessed if we strive to have them each week. Okay, my soap box is done.

*I found a cute coloring pages website. It's called funny coloring. There are oodles of other websites with cute free coloring pages, and they're not hard to find. Just type in what you're looking for and I can almost guarantee you'll find something. Do any of you have a favorite website with coloring pages?

Also, is there anything you would add to this FHE lesson? Let me know. Thanks!