You Decide!
Every day is full of decisions
by Alexandra Palmer
Suitable for Whole School (Pri) - Church Schools
Aims
To consider the importance of being able to make decisions.
Preparation and materials
- You will need the PowerPoint slides that accompany this assembly (You Decide!) and the means to display them.
- Have available the YouTube video ‘The thankful leper (Luke 17.11-19)’ and the means to show it during the assembly. It is 1.52 minutes long and is available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzZUDRrKgI8
- Optional: you may also wish to use the extension activity (You Decide! - Extension Activity) that accompanies this assembly.
Assembly
- Ask the children whether they can think of any decisions that they have already made today.
Listen to a range of responses. - Show Slide 1.
Explain that you are going to show the children six slides. You would like them to look at the pictures and decide which option they prefer. For example, on the first slide, they have to decide between a day at the beach or a day in the woods. You can encourage the children to vote in your preferred way, such as giving a thumbs up or a thumbs down, pointing to the side on which their preferred choice is situated and so on. - Show Slides 2 to 7.
With each decision, listen to a range of responses as to why the children have chosen that option. - Explain that we all have to make decisions every day. For example, we will decide who we play with, what to eat, which clothes to wear, which activities we enjoy doing, how to treat our friends and how to react when we are angry or upset.
- Ask the children, ‘What other decisions might we need to make?’
Listen to a range of responses. - Show the YouTube video ‘The thankful leper (Luke 17.11-19)’. (1.52 minutes long)
Ask the children the following questions about the video.
- During Jesus’ time, why were people so afraid of leprosy? (Answer: leprosy is an infectious disease. There wasn’t a cure for it in Jesus’ time, so people had to stay away from someone who had leprosy.)
- How do you think the people who had leprosy felt? (Answer: sad, angry, distressed and depressed.)
- Why wasn’t Jesus scared when the people who had leprosy approached him? (Answer: Jesus wanted to help them. He knew that he didn’t need to feel scared and that he had the power to heal them.)
- Before Jesus healed the people who had leprosy, he told them to go and show themselves to the priest. How would they have felt when Jesus said this? (Answer: they would have felt scared, worried and surprised. They weren’t meant to go near anyone, so they could have got into a lot of trouble.)
- What decision did the people who had leprosy have to make? (Answer: they had to decide whether they should do as Jesus said and go to see the priest despite their worries.)
- What decision did only one of the people who had leprosy make? (Answer: one of them decided to return to Jesus and say thank you.)
- Why did that person think that it was important to say thank you? (Answer: he wanted to show that he appreciated what Jesus had done for him because it meant that he could return to a normal life and rejoin his family and friends.)
Time for reflection
Ask the children, ‘Are there any decisions that we can’t make?’
Listen to a range of responses.
Suggestions might include the decisions that adults who look after us make, such as the time they wake us up for school, how we travel to school or what the teachers at school teach us.
Ask the children, ‘Why do you think Jesus gave people the opportunity to make their own decisions?’
Listen to a range of responses.
Explain that Jesus knew the importance of allowing people to make choices. Making choices is important to ensure that people have something called self-worth. Making decisions encourages people to appreciate and see value in themselves. Jesus knew that this was important for all kinds of people, whether they were rich or poor, healthy or ill. He believed that it was important for people to be allowed to make choices for themselves, whatever circumstances they found themselves in.
Prayer
Dear God,
Thank you for the decisions that we can make.
Thank you for positive decisions made at school and at home.
Thank you that Jesus encouraged people to make their own decisions.
Please help us to make good decisions that give people freedom and self-worth.
Amen.
Song/music
‘Our God is a great big God’, available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaXPXWBcE3I (3 minutes long)
‘This is me’ from the film The Greatest Showman, available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjxugyZCfuw (3.49 minutes long)
Extension activities
- Give each child a copy of the sheet that accompanies this assembly (You Decide! - Extension Activity). Ask them to record the decisions that they can make in the middle box, and record the decisions that they can’t make in the outer box.
