Individual Worth Experience #3 and Candy Ball Activity

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Individual Worth Experience #3

Read Doctrine and Covenants 18:10 and 121: 45. Do all that you can to build others and make them feel of worth. Everyday for two weeks, notice the worthwhile qualities and attributes of others. Acknowledge them verbally or in writing. In your journal write what you have learned about the worth of individuals and how your confidence grows when you build others. 

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So we have been having a hard time with the way the girls treat each other. The way that they talk to each other has been awful lately. With this on my mind, I felt like this was a great way to teach a lesson on how to treat others while passing off Individual Worth Experience #3.

The Lesson

- Read Doctrine and Covenants 18:10 and 121:45

- Talk about how we are daughters of Heavenly Father, who knows us and loves us. He feels the same about all his children.

- Read John 13:34:”A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.”

- Ask the girls how we can love others as the Lord loves us. Discuss how we have to see others the way the Lord sees us.

- It is important to get to know people as they really are. Do not assume that there is nothing of worth there just because you can’t readily see it. The same goes for yourself. You have gifts that are yet to be discovered.

- Looking at this ball you can only catch a glimpse what is inside. You have to take time and dig in to really discover what is in there.

- Share a story about how getting to know somebody better changed the way you saw them. Ask the girls if they have any experiences to share.

- Challenge the girls to really dig to get to know people this week. Talk about some ways you can do that. Talk about how this will help them see people the way the Lord sees them.

Making the Candy Ball

Candy balls are a lot of fun. We did one at Christmas with my husband's family and there were a lot of laughs to be had. This was a perfect thing to go with this lesson, as you have to dig into it to see all the goodies inside. What I did was make this handout for the girls. You can print them here. 

I printed off the amount I needed and then stuck them down inside a mason jar. I then used that mason jar for the center of my candy ball. Then I started wrapping. I started with pieces of plastic wrap that were about 20 inches in length and then started wrapping them around the mason jar, sticking pieces of candy in the wrapping as I went. This took a really long time. The trick is to use pieces of plastic wrap and not just one long piece as you wrap. You want this to be a little difficult or the game will go too quickly. 

Mine ended up looking like this. It was about the size of a volleyball. I am doing this activity with only four Beehives so I didn't want it to be super big and have the girls be going home with tons of candy. When I do this activity in May however, I will be doing it with the Mia Maid class and there are eight of them so I will double this size for that. 

As you can see, you really cannot see what is inside. Once I had the amount of candy I wanted to use, I started wrapping several layers of just plastic wrap so you couldn't see what was inside. That is the whole point of the lesson. 

Playing the game

After the lesson, pull out the ball and it is time to play!

Sit on the floor in a circle and have everybody roll a pair of dice to see who starts. The person with the highest number is first. Hand her the ball and let her start to try to remove as much candy as she can. But she can only use her hands. No teeth, scissors or other tools.

At the same time, the person to her left will start to roll the two dice to see if she can get doubles. I brought a pie pan for them to roll into so that the dice wouldn’t go everywhere. Once she gets doubles, she gets the ball and the person to her left starts to roll. The ball keeps moving around the circle from player to player until there isn’t any candy left.

Once we got to the middle with the handout, we talked about how the candy ball was like getting to know somebody. It was fun to see some of the parallels the girls made. I then encouraged the girls to continue to do the second part of the Personal Progress Experience on their own. Be sure to follow up!

This was a great activity and I am excited to do it with the other classes as well. I hope that they learned something from it and they will all think twice about how they speak to others from now on.