Use this tool to solve common problems you'll find in your gospel classroom. Select from the options below to find teaching techniques that will help you solve some of the most common problems in LDS gospel classrooms:
Use a respected adult to help you teach the class. Separate into groups and have the other adult teach one group while you teach another. Give the students a few minutes at the end of class to share what they learned.
EXAMPLE: When teaching Ruth, I asked my husband to take the boys while I took the girls. We wrote down the qualities that Ruth and Boaz had that would make them good spouses. The boys analyzed Boaz, and the girls took Ruth. I had written down some points from my reading to help us guide the discussion with our respective groups. During the discussion, as the kids would raise a point, I would point them to these verses (as did my husband). The kids were impressed enough with these two Bible personalities to mark several verses without being prompted. Yes! The objective was to identify positive characteristics in Ruth and Boaz the students want to include in their lives or find in a spouse.
When a weasel finds an egg, he punctures it and sucks the life out of the shell. In a similar way, some words in the scriptures suck the life out of a story or verse.
Look For: Look for words that seem to deflate everything that was said before or after.
Example: Jeremiah 6:14 "They (the priests) have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly . . ." What good is it to only be healed slightly? That's like trying to kiss someone's broken leg to make it better.
Jeremiah 2:3 "Israel was holiness to the LORD . . ." This word just sucks the life out of the statement. It should be "is" or "will," but "was" makes the statement sad.
(Adapted from Panning for Gold: Various Methods to Understand and Apply the Scriptures to Ourselves by Eric Bacon, Northwest Area Seminaries)
Great for: Helping students find meaning in the scriptures, Lesson preparation
Class size: Any class size
Helps Students: SEARCH the scriptures or text
Prep Time:
Student Age: Any age
Equipment needed:
Many scriptures make promises and conditions by putting them in a formula, usually stated as a "If [this happens], then [that will happen]."
Look For: Watch for the words like "If..." and "then..." CAUTION: many times the "then" part is implied and the word "then" word is left out.
Example: 1 Nephi 2:20 "Inasmuch as ye shall keep my commandments, (there is no "THEN" but it is implied!) ye shall prosper." This promise to Nephi is a central promise in the book of Mormon and is still maintained for those who continue to inhabit the Promise Land (Ether 2:8-10).
Many If ... Then statements are "principles with promise." Help you students identify principles and promises as they read the scriptures.
(Adapted from Panning for Gold: Various Methods to Understand and Apply the Scriptures to Ourselves by Eric Bacon, Northwest Area Seminaries)
Look for ways to help students share those ideas that they have in common. For example, all of your students have had experiences with prayer, church attendance, hurt feelings, etc.
EXAMPLE: I asked the students to tell me what they had learned about the benefits of scripture study. Going around the room, each student told the class what they learned about the benefits of scripture study. They came up with a really fantastic list. I filled up a sheet on the easel, plus wrote sideways to add the last few ideas in.
This method allows students to testify to each other and get to know each other better. Refer to the list during your lesson -- we are all in this together. This is why we need this lesson today.
These words say a lot without a lot of letters. And they are meant to draw our attention in a hurry--just like a billboard--and usually there is a message just after them that we were intended to focus on. Look for "Wo"(especially double or triple Wos), "O," "Thus," "And Thus we see," "Behold," "Nevertheless," "Therefore," "Yea"," "Now," "Likewise," "Let us," "Finally," etc.
Today, we use superlatives such as: "good, better, best" to relate the growing superiority of things. Anciently to transmit the same idea, authors would use repeated words to show the varying degrees.
Look For: Look for the words listed above. See if what follows has a lesson for modern application. Also Look for words that are often repeated like "wo" or "Verily". To same them once was to draw the readers attention to them. Repeating it twice meant that this information is better than the information just shared (as in the Sermon on the Mount). And repeating something 3 times was the strongest a prophetic author would get. In terms of "wos," it would be like saying: 1 wo = destruction is coming but if you repent you can avoid the destruction; 2 wos = destruction is coming and you can repent but you there will still be consequences; and 3 wos = destruction is coming and you are too hard to repent or not likely to have everyone repent to subside the destruction.
Example: There are only 4 times the triple wo {"wo, wo, wo . . .") is used. Those places are Revelation 8:13, D&C 38:6, 2 Nephi 28:15, and 3 Nephi 9:2. Obviously these are things we should avoid like the plague!
2 Nephi 9 Look for all the statements that include "O's," "Wo," and "Remember."
The Book of Mormon is especially replete with examples, especially from Mormon, but they can be found elsewhere. A good example is Alma 30:60 where after telling the story of the rise and downfall of the antichrist Korihor, Mormon tells us that "thus we see that the devil will not support his children at the last day, but doth speedily drag them down to hell." What a message for us to day! Why would we follow any temptation or worldly allurement if we realized that no matter how much power, fame, enjoyment, pleasure, etc we are promised and may enjoy in the beginning, the end will prophetically result in our downfall and the devil dragging us to hell.
(Adapted from Panning for Gold: Various Methods to Understand and Apply the Scriptures to Ourselves by Eric Bacon, Northwest Area Seminaries)
Great for: Helping students find meaning in the scriptures, Lesson preparation
Class size: Any class size
Helps Students: SEARCH the scriptures or text
Prep Time:
Student Age: Any age
Equipment needed:
The Student Study guide is full of great definitions for scripture terms and symbols. When you hit a difficult passage, look at the student guide for help. If that doesn't work, keep a good dictionary nearby that gives the root meaning of words as well as definitions that you can understand. See what this does by looking up words--even common words--and see how the definitions give deeper meaning to the scriptures. You might even replace the word and see how it deepens the meaning of the scriptures.
Look For: Look for words that you think are important or don't understand and then look them up in the dictionary.
Example: 1 Nephi 11:22. This verse talks about the fruit of the Tree of Life representing love of God which "sheddeth itself abroad in the hearts of the children of men." This is an interesting way to describe God's love. In a dictionary I have (Merriam Webster Desk Dictionary), there are four definitions and each gives added light to the way God's light is shed for us. The first and second definitions refer to the shedding of blood and remind us of Christ's atonement and the blood that he spilled for us. The third definition refers to the shedding light on something, which also reminds us of how the Love of God gives us insight and intelligence. Finally the fourth definition refers to the shedding of clothes, for example. And though this definition seems unrelated to the verse, we can think that as we shed our sins--our bad habits--and clothe ourselves in the covering of the atonement, the Love of God becomes more apparent for us. Some people think that when they are in sin that God does not love them anymore. But when they repent--shed their sins--they realize how much God really does love them.
(Adapted from Panning for Gold: Various Methods to Understand and Apply the Scriptures to Ourselves by Eric Bacon, Northwest Area Seminaries)
Assign students to make a movie about a gospel topic. You may want to have students plan their script so that a Primary child can understand it.
My students happen to love anything dramatic, so this is very easy for us. I have a big box of dress up clothes and wigs that they use to make movies. They write short scripts based on gospel topics or they just read out a passage and act it out. It's always fun and helps reinforce the stories along with getting lots of participation. Be sure to discuss the people's motivation and results of their actions either before or after the movie is done.
Great for: Lesson preparation, Giving every person a turn, Helping shy students participate, Reviewing a scripture story, Getting the attention of uninterested students
Class size: Any class size
Helps Students: SEE a gospel principle in action, SHARE feelings, thoughts, or personal experiences, SEARCH the scriptures or text
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Student Age: Any age
Equipment needed: movie recorder
What are things in the scripture block that you could actually see, touch, smell, visualize?. Picture these in your mind or better find the actually object and see what it teaches you about the way it is used in the verses you are reading.
Look For: Look for objects in the scriptures--things that you could see, hold, touch, etc.
Example: Isaiah 5:18 describes people that carry their sins like beasts of burden tugging their loads. Imagine what it would look like if we could see the sins that people carry and won't let go by repenting. How silly they would look! How would YOU look if we could all see the sins that you carry around? The image teaches us that it is never worth carting around our sins and transgressions but we should give them up.
Consider objectifying the objects by displaying any common physical objects during your lesson or a picture of an item.
(Adapted from Panning for Gold: Various Methods to Understand and Apply the Scriptures to Ourselves by Eric Bacon, Northwest Area Seminaries)
Great for: Helping students find meaning in the scriptures, Lesson preparation, Getting the attention of uninterested students
Class size: Any class size
Helps Students: SEARCH the scriptures or text
Prep Time:
Student Age: Any age
Equipment needed:
This exercise requires a good imagination. After reading the verses silently (perhaps a few times), invite your class to close their eyes and take a few minutes trying to visualize the scene depicted in the scriptures in your mind. Try to imagine every detail, see how people walked, talked, and acted. What is the scenery? The elevation? The weather?
(Adapted from Panning for Gold: Various Methods to Understand and Apply the Scriptures to Ourselves by Eric Bacon, Northwest Area Seminaries)
This is a simple tip that will help you leverage media in the classroom and get better discussion.
Determine before class what the main discussion points are in the material you will cover. Instruct students before you watch or listen to your media which main points to watch for as the media plays.
You might say "wait for when Jesus jumps over the fence and think about what this tells us about his personality" or "watch Jesus's 'violent' behavior and be ready to talk about how important it is to keep the temple/ourselves clean" when showing the video of the cleansing of the temple:
"Wait for it" helps prepare students to participate in discussions and make relevant comments. It also helps movies or music used in class become learning opportunities instead of mere entertainment. I was trained at Seminary inservice to use this technique (or something similar) each time we watch a movie or listen to a song during class. It also helps when Reading a long passage of scripture or story.
For example, when I showed a film about the prodigal son this week in Seminary, I invited students to pay attention as they watched the movie to see which of the characters they considered to be most like themselves. This prepared the class for our discussion after the movie, which was intended to point out that at different times in our lives, we are all like each of the characters in the parable.
Another time I told students to watch for a 'd' word that might surprise them during our reading of the entry BD, Mark. The word was "deserted".
