Samuel Says

Instead of the more traditional Christmas songs, I thought I'd teach the kids "Samuel Tells of Baby Jesus" pg 36, as I like the different view of the story as told by Samuel the Nephite.  I found a flannel story picture of a Nephite and then created my own visuals (shown here) to help the kids remember the words.

First verse I started out by explaining that the song begins with Samuel telling what will happen in the future, and I drew 4 speech bubbles for each phrase:

1) within 5 years
2) night will be as day
3) baby Jesus will be born (mixed up in picture - sorry)
4) in a land far, far away

For the chorus, I explained to the kids that they should image how they would respond if they were listening to Samuel's words.  He says something and then they say something back.  So I also did speech bubbles for this, and talked about how the word "HOSANNA" is a joyful exclamation of happiness and excitement.  They really got into that, and sang out with real gusto:

The 2nd verse is all about how the story actually happens as Samuel says it will.  The story itself now unfolds.  Since Samuel the Lamanite is known for prophesying while standing on top of the wall of the city, I did my visuals for this verse on brick shapes, and then build the wall that he would stand on.

This was a lovely song to work on with the kids, I only wish I had more time to prepare it, they struggled a bit with the 2nd verse when they were singing it in sacrament.  But they sure knew their HOSANNAS!