General Conference is the perfect place to find topics for our family night lessons. The talk Choices by President Thomas S. Monson was filled wonderful messages. I was able to put this family night together fairly quickly. We read the words of our prophet and had a quick discussion.
Opening Prayer: by invitation
Opening Song: Choose the Right Way Children’ Songbook page 160
I have been thinking recently about choices. It has been said that the door of history turns on small hinges, and so do people’s lives. The choices we make determine our destiny.
- What classic piece of literature did President Monson reference?
Talk about Alice in Wonderland and what happens when she meets the Cheshire Cat. Remind your family that it does matter which path we take. The Plan of Happiness teaches us the purpose of our life here on earth. We should all strive to make choices that lead us on a path back to our Heavenly Father.
May we choose to build up within ourselves a great and powerful faith which will be our most effective defense against the designs of the adversary—a real faith, the kind of faith which will sustain us and will bolster our desire to choose the right. Without such faith, we go nowhere. With it, we can accomplish our goals.
Although it is imperative that we choose wisely, there are times when we will make foolish choices. The gift of repentance, provided by our Savior, enables us to correct our course settings, that we might return to the path which will lead us to that celestial glory we seek.
May we ever choose the harder right instead of the easier wrong.
As we contemplate the decisions we make in our lives each day—whether to make this choice or that choice—if we choose Christ, we will have made the correct choice.
Choices- Thomas S. Monson Game
Materials Needed:
Paper, computer or construction
Marker
Tape
Dice (I found a large foam dice at the Dollar Store)
Picture of Christ
On each piece of paper write down a situation that involves a choice. I chose situations that might come up in our family or things that might happen in our lives. Feel free to use the ideas I share or create choices that might happen in your family. Tape the papers to the floor. I opted to use our large tiles as “spaces” and had papers with situations written on them tapes to some of the tile squares. Put the picture of Christ at the end of the game.
How to Play:
The youngest kid goes first. They roll the dice and move an appropriate number of spaces. If they land on a situation they can share what they would do. I acted as the judge. If the situation was, “Kids were making fun of another kid during recess” and my child said they would not make fun of them I might invite them to move ahead 1 space. If they stood up for the kid and invited him to play I might choose to have him/her move 3 spaces ahead. This shows that each choice has some sort of consequences. If kids were not listening during the game I might invite them to move backwards on our game board. The first child to reach the end is the winner. Remind the kids we all win when our lives our directed toward Christ.
Suggestions:
- Your brother is talking to you during homework time and mom is upstairs working.
- You are at a friend’s house when your friend shows you a bad picture or pornography.
- Your friend invites you to their birthday party on Sunday.
- Someone is making fun of another kid at recess.
- You accidentally broke your mom’s favorite chair but no one saw you.
- Someone at school wants to copy your school work.
- You are at a small party and you want to try all the desserts.
- Your alarm goes off in the morning.
- Your mom is trying to make dinner but your little sister keeps crying that she wants a story.
If your kids are older they might be experiencing harder things than not talking during homework time. And some of the answers seem kind of obvious but stopping and talking about them helps kids learn to recognize what they can do. Especially if they come up with the idea themselves. As we talked about someone being unkind on the playground I warned my kids that the mean kid could start teasing you. They were determined to do what was right even if it was hard.
After the game we talked about people who had to make hard choices. We chose to talk about Jean Valjean as my kids were just watching a Les Miserable video with their dad before family night. My kids are familiar with the music and know the basic story. We love musicals. Jean Valjean had to make a really hard choice. We all agreed it was definitely the “harder right” President Monson was teaching us. Use this time to ask your kids if they know anyone in their family or someone from a book who chose the right, even when it was hard.
End with your testimony that when we choose Christ we make the right choice.
Treat: You can “chews” the right with some bubble gum. Or you can have leftover treats like we did from the shower I had on the weekend. 
Check out more family night lesson ideas here. Which conference talk would you want to see in a family night lesson? Share it in the comments below…
