Book of Mormon Camp

As some of you may know, I am in the Primary Presidency, and as our quarterly activity we decided to do a "Book of Mormon" camp for our kids. We planned to have this over three days and just had the activity last week - which was a HUGE success. The idea was for our kids to come and focus on one of the stories for 3 days. We split up our kids into jnr & snr and had about 7-8 kids in each group. We did the story of Nephi, Abinidi, Ammon, 2000 Stripling Warriors, Alma the Younger and the Brother of Jared. The older kids went to workshops the first day to immerse themselves in the story (we had great teachers) and then on the second day they put together a skit to present to the parents on Thursday night. On the third day they worked on their skits and put together their costumes - they were also able to make a journal and write in it their feelings about what they were learning. The younger kids got to watch the animated story depending on their group and also learned a song which went with their story that they performed on their parents on Thursday night (we were their teachers). The younger kids got to make folders with pictures of their stories and other Book of Mormon heros. We had a camp atmosphere and gathered at the start of each day to sing our theme song "Scripture Power" and then disperse to their classes. We ended each day with "game time" and a treat and then sang Book of Mormon stories. The presentation Thursday night went great, we had tremendous parent support and the kids all did an amazing job. We actually had a little over 100 kids for this activity - which is great when you consider this is Summer. My kids still to this day play the CD over and over with the songs they learned. Clayton walks around singing the song he learned "Faith" which goes with the Brother of Jared skit Ashlen performed in. They all grab their scriptures and hoist them in the air when we sing Scripture Power, which is what they did for their parents. These kids were sponges and the experience we had to participate in this amazing "camp" was awesome. I think that they truly felt the spirit as did we as a presidency while we were planning the activity. We wanted to be sure the children understood how important the scriptures are and what wonderful stories and lessons we can learn when we take the time to read them. We also wanted them to realize that they have power when they read, that knowing these things will bring them closer to their Heavenly Father and I believe that they took that away from camp. We are sooo looking forward to next year and the feedback we are hearing from the parents is positive too...we have kids walking around Queen Creek singing loudly and proudly. Clayton reminds me that he went to Book of Mormon camp everytime he hears the words "Book of Mormon".


Clayton & Tristen with Sister Cartright and Sister Sanchez..they learned about the Brother of Jared


Me in the Cultural Hall with the jnr kids playing games..thankfully the snr kids were in the other cultural hall


Brother Borba teaching Ashlen's class on the Brother of Jared


Ashlen, Sarah & Anna in their costumes for their skit.