Sis. Cristina B. Franco (Oct. 18): "The Joy of Unselfish Service"

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I really enjoyed this talk, and it featured chocolate cake.  You can't get better than chocolate cake.  

The Activity:
  1. Discuss the stories of Victoria Antonietti and the widow's mite.
  2. Point out the importance of sacrifice in each story.  While not every act of service will require the kinds of sacrifice exemplified in these stories, at some time the decision to serve others will mean choosing to give up something important to us.
  3. Read para. 23 "And it will . . . love and sacrifice."
  4. Have the class members take a moment and ponder how sacrifice can make service more holy and any examples of this type of service from their own lives.
  5. After a couple of moments, ask the class members to turn and share what they were thinking of with a partner.
  6. Give the partnerships a couple of minutes to talk.
  7. Ask everyone to come back together and share with the whole class what they talked about in their partnerships.
Using the Activity:

Anyone in education will recognize this activity as a basic think-pair-share activity.  This activity is valuable for a couple of reasons.  First, sometimes we ask a really deep question (how does sacrifice make service more holy) and then expect students to have great answers within seconds.  By building in time to think individually (ponder) and then to share with, hear from, and discuss with one other person, this activity gives class members a chance to think more deeply about the question prior to sharing with the whole class.  Second, this activity is also focused on asking students to consider a gospel princple (the connection between sacrifice and service) and to remember examples from their own lives.  The idea is to help the class members see the application of gospel principles in their own histories. 

I hope this activity is helpful.  Please let me know how it goes.

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