Values Assembly - Friendship: You can trust me...

One of a series of Assemblies for this month's value: Friendship. Also beginning to make the link with Lent and Easter

As the children came in I used http://naturesoundsfor.me/ to create some ambient sounds: they can be a great alternative to 'bunging on a cd' to create a quiet atmosphere! This time I used 'Wind in the Tress' + 'Horse Snorting' + 'Walking in Snow' to make a sound picture of the donkey walking through palms. I started by asking the children what they thought the sounds might be - prepare for interesting ideas about pigs and dinosaurs!!

1. Something to think about: (on display as children arrive): Have you done an unusual favour for a friend?
2. Use a picture of a house (see attached powerpoint): with a foundation of 5 bricks. Talk about how a friendship needs to be built on firm foundations like the house. Take 5 answers to your question and add a letter to a brick each time to spell TRUST in random order. Talk to the children about why they did what their friend wanted even though they weren't sure about it. Can you guess what the word is appearing?
3. Discuss what trust means.
4. Can you think of a time when Jesus' friends had to trust him? What were his 12 special friends called?
5. Tell the story of the preparation for the entrance into the City on Palm Sunday. Jesus asked his friends to fetch a young donkey for him to ride on. They thought this was a strange, unusual idea but did it anyway...
6. You could use a video clip from Youtube such as:

7. Alternately I would highly recommend looking at the RELive Easter Pack which (like their other resources) has a great short film telling the story from the donkey owner's perspective: http://www.reliveresources.co.uk/videos/
8. Prayer/Reflection: Listen to the opening sounds again (perhaps the children will identify them correctly this time!) and imagine the scene. Think how his disciples trusted Jesus. Think about the friends who trust you and how you trust them.
9. "So what?": (putting this value into action...) Learn to trust your friends.


Friendship Trust

Thank you.
The nature sound website is a new one for me. Great idea and useful in lots of circumstances. You learn something new every day, even at my great age!

Appreciate your upload and your helpful comments that go with the content.