General Conference was inspiring, as always, but one talk motivated Aaron and I more than any other. Sister Wixom, the Primary General President, told of a young family that read the Book of Mormon three verses at a time. It took them forever to finish, but they did the best they could and by doing so taught their children to love the scriptures.
Now, we've tried a lot of things. We've tried "Scripture Stories" where we show them a picture and tell the story. It's okay, but not great. We've tried the children's versions with pictures. Still not the best. We've tried just reading to them. Still not great. They flop around, don't pay attention and are not engaged at all.
So, when she said that in her talk, Aaron and I looked at each other and said: "Well, we can do that!"
The first night, I read, Aaron read, and Laurel read. We explained and talked about things as we went.
Night two, James wanted to repeat a verse.
Night three, William wanted to repeat a verse.
We've been consistent for well over a week and I'm so pleased. William is my stubborn child and I'm so happy to see him try. Laurel's reading is improving. James doesn't always want to, but we're patient. Above all, I love ending the day this way. So try it. Just one verse each, and talk about it. We're already in Nephi 2!
That's how we started when the twins were little. I think the biggest thing is to show them that it's important to your family and to be consistent in doing it no matter HOW you do it. I remember how excited they were when we finally finished. Now they are reading on their own too and it's great!
ReplyDeleteWe started this earlier in the year too! I like that the kids learn the language of the scriptures--the words are familiar now and they don't even bat an eye over the harder words. Still, some nights are better than others. We're always working on the reverence and listening part as half the time they can't sit still even for this short time (we read 1 to 2 verses each). And we're not 100% for every night, we've missed a few, but we're trying!
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