Resources for Teaching Children about Following the Prophet + 10 Preparation Ideas #ldsconf

(Be sure to enter our Spring 2015 General Conference GIveaway. Over $400 in prizes including gift cards to Deseret Book, Sweet Salt Clothing, and Thrive Food Storage! Ends 4/1/2015)

In the last six months, I’ve thought a lot about what I want my children to learn from General Conference. In April, I posted many of our conference traditions. This year’s conference weekend will similarly be full of cinnamon rolls, updating 72-hour kits, and creative printables, but I especially want to hone in on one specific goal. That goal is teaching my children to recognize and follow the prophet’s voice.

There are many amazing resources available, but I’d like to share with your the ones that I found on lds.org. Here are a few of the things we are doing to better follow the prophet in our home.

1. Listening at meal times. I still remember an audio quiz I took in high school seminary. Our teacher played clips from general conference and asked us to write down who was speaking. He then played clips from popular music, TV shows, and movies and asked us again to write down who was in the clip. Sadly, I did much better on the pop culture part than the church part! That has always stuck with me!

One easy way to help your children to physically recognize the voices of general authorities is to play them often in your home. We literally have General Conference talks at our finger tips. Play a talk from April’s session at meal time, even if it is just a clip and talk about who said it and what it means.

2. Utilize prime real estate. Put the word’s of the prophets up around your home. One of my mom friend’s says that she has quotes taped to her cupboards, to her children’s doors, and even to the wall in front of the toilet! The more your children see and read the words, the more likely they are to remember them! We’ve done this this year with The Family Proclamation to the World. My Clear Plastic Tablecloth has gotten a lot of use! You can also put quotes under the table cloth for memorization.

I also did a search on Pinterest for free General Conference printables and found quite a few that I liked to print and laminate. (Putting this Laminator to use!). You can see some of my favorites on my General Conference Pinterest Board (along with other great ideas to help you prepare for general conference!). Above is one of my favorites from Mimi Lee Printables. You can find it here.

3. Play online games. My kids love playing games online. Why not use them to help get ready for conference! These matching games will definitely help with facial recognition if your child plays them during the next few weeks leading up to conference.

4. Take a tour of conference center online. There are child-led video tours of all the buildings on temple square. At two-minutes length, these videos would be perfect for a devotional or family home evening to familiarize children with what they will see conference weekend!

5. Subscribe to the Friend or view it online. There are articles in the Friend each month written by the general authorities along with the many activities and stories. My daughter reads at least 20 minutes a day for her school homework and the Friend provides perfect reading material while exposing her to the words of the prophets!

6. Make it fun. All three of my children love the general authority matching cards from the Friend (pictured at the top of the post). Even my three year old enjoys pointing at the cards and asking, “who is that?” I love hearing him try to pronounce Elder Uchtdorf and talk about the man who flies planes! 

7. Set up a writing and drawing station in the weeks leading up to conference with printables produced by the church. If you use up those printables before general conference, worry not! There are many more resources put out by church memories available to print out as well! You can check out some of them below!

I hope these ideas help your and your family to prepare to listen to the prophet’s voice. The more we listen to and heed the prophet’s voice ourselves, the more our children will as well.

Here are more resources put together by my talented blogger friends to help you prepare for general conference!

We hope that our activities and ideas will help to enrich your family’s General Conference experience! For more ideas and recipes, check out April’s General Conference round up for 13 additional posts!

Preparing for Inspiration

Quiet Time with Doh Vinci

General Conference Bingo

General Conference Yearly Calendar

General Conference Personal Progress Scavenger Hunt
General Conference Journal Cards
General Conference Fun Scratch Off Cards

General Conference Packet with Temple Memory Matching Printable

General Conference Journal for Moms

General Conference Fun Bags

What are your favorite conference traditions?

Be sure to enter our Fall Conference Giveaway going on through 9/27/14!!

This post contains affiliate links. All opinions are my own.