Quarterly Activity: Follow the Prophet!

With “Follow the Prophet” as one of the songs we’re focusing on in Primary this year, I felt impressed that we should have a Quarterly Activity on the subject. The children were struggling to learn all the verses of the song, so I thought that bringing the song to life might help.

I work with an amazing group of women with marvelous ideas and sweet spirits, so the plan jelled quickly. We decided to focus on both modern and ancient prophets.

Our gathering activity was musical chairs to the tune of “Latter-day Prophets” – with a twist. As each child was out of the game, they were given a picture of a latter-day prophet to be used in the next activity, which was a quick telling of what each prophet was most known for. Once all of the children were “out,” they were invited one-by-one to put their picture on the chalkboard while my counselor told them a little about their prophet’s picture and added a printed note below each. The instruction would be used later in a matching game.

We then invited the children to walk in the footsteps of the prophets by following Jonah. I invited my son (because his favorite prophet is Jonah) to lead the other children to the back of the cultural hall, where we dressed him in a simple prophet costume and opened the door to the hallway, revealing an 8’ long whale for the children to crawl through to start their “Follow the Prophet” adventure.

As the children exited the whale, they found footprints with pictures of modern and ancient prophets leading them into one of the Primary classrooms. Upon entering, they found our recreation of the Garden of Eden and Adam’s prophet costume:  a garland of flowers and a child’s hoe. (Hey – it’s what we had on hand!) Once they identified who the prophet was, we sang that verse of the song. Meanwhile, one of the parents picked up all the footprints and arranged them through the hallway to the next room. “Adam” led the children this time.