High Chairs

When I first got called into Primary, my Mom had just been released as Primary President. Since she didn't need any of her Primary Sharing Time books anymore, she let me use them. One of the books she let me borrow is one that I remember her using when I still lived at home. It's called 'Fun For Family Night' by Allan K. Burgess and Max H. Molgard. This is a wonderful book. She only had the Book of Mormon Edition, so I looked online and found the Church History edition and the New Testament Edition, I haven't been able to find the Old Testament. They no longer publish these books, but if you can find them I recommend them. I found mine at http://www.alibris.com/ for a really good price. Anyway, I am going somewhere with this story... The game that I am going to share with you actually came from this book. This is another really fun game that the children enjoyed (I only played this with Senior Primary). Enough talking, here's how to play:

1. Write 20 questions that have to do with your lesson. They should have no more than one- to three-word answers.

2. Write or type the answers on slips of paper (each answer on their own slip of paper), one complete set of answers per team.

3. Divide the children into teams (the book says 4, but I only had 2 teams) and give a set of answers to each team.

4. Each team divides its answers evenly among the team members, or they can set them on the ground and circle around the answers.

5. Place 3 or 4 chairs in the front of the room. Write the numbers 1,2,3, and 4 on seperate pieces of paper and then tape a number to each chair (on the backrests). Make sure the children can see the numbers from where they are sitting. Each chair is worth 1,2,3, and 4 points.

6. Each player lays his answer slips face up in front of them so that they can see each answer.

7. A question is then read. The children then look at their answer slips, whoever has the correct answer slip picks it up, and then runs/walks quickly and sits in the highest numbered chair still available. The answers are then checked. If the answers are correct, they receive the points corresponding with the number that is on their chair. If an answer is incorrect, they must subtract the number of points that is on their chair from their total score.

8. Occasionally two players from the same team will run up an sit in the chairs. Once a person is seated he must not change chairs or return to his seat. If this happens, both plus and minus points will be received, corresponding with the chairs that they were in.Since he took a chair that belonged to another team, the team that did not get a chair will receive points based on the chair that the person with the wrong answer sat in.

9. Keep score as you go along. The answer slips will not be used twice, so they can be returned to you as they are used.

When I played this I think I snuck in some fake answer to trick them. Just to make sure they were really reading the answer. I.E. if an answer was 'obey the commandments' I might have had one in there that said, 'Don't obey the commandments.'

The kids really had a fun time playing this game. And I actually just played this game at a Teacher In-service meeting we just had. The Primary President asked me to come up with a game that we could incorporate the Teaching, No Great Call manual. I thought of BINGO, but then decided on this gams. So I made up a few questions from the manual, they were easily found in the Table of Contents. Even the adults had alot of fun, maybe even more than the kids did. :)

Again, about the book. They are amazing for F.H.E, but since they come in different editions (Book of Mormon, New Testament, etc.) I think they would be a wonderful help for teaching Senior Primary Classes. It has ideas for lessons, and really fun games.