Honesty Has Superpowers!
How honesty can change the world
by Hannah Taylor
Suitable for Whole School (Pri)
Aims
To discuss the importance of telling the truth.
Preparation and materials
- Have available the YouTube video ‘The truth according to Arthur’ and the means to show it during the assembly. It is available at: https://youtu.be/upppyMrSa7c (play up to 6.30 minutes).
Assembly
- In today’s assembly, we’re going to think about the word ‘honesty’.
Does anyone know what honesty means?
Listen to a range of responses. - That’s right. Let’s practise some honesty with a little game. I’m going to tell you some facts and you can tell me whether each one is the truth or a lie.
- My name is . . .
- I am an alien.
- I am a teacher.
- I have multicoloured hair.
- I have a monkey sitting on my shoulder. - Well done, everyone. Now that we know about honesty, let’s listen to a story about why we should always tell the truth, and what happens if we tell lies.
Show the YouTube video ‘The truth according to Arthur’ up to 6.30 minutes.
- What a great story! Now let’s see who’s been listening carefully. I’m going to ask you some questions about the story.
- Why did Arthur lie about scratching his mum’s car?
- Why were The Truth and Arthur not friends?
- Why was Mum happy with Arthur in the end? - There are several reasons why telling the truth is good.
- It shows kindness to others.
- It enables people to trust us.
- It leads us to build lovely friendships and relationships.
That’s like having a superpower, isn’t it?
Time for reflection
Honesty is:
- always telling the truth, never stealing or cheating
- not hiding the truth about something, being sincere
- being able to share honestly how we feel
Ask the children, ‘Have you all been honest today?’
Pause to allow time for thought.
Encourage the children to think carefully about being honest today. Encourage them to pause before they speak to check that they are telling the truth.
Pause to allow time for thought.
Encourage the children to take time to think about how they can be more honest. Ask them to consider how it will make their friends, family and teachers feel.
Pause to allow time for thought.
Encourage the children to think about how they would feel if someone wasn’t honest with them.
Pause to allow time for thought.
Prayer
Dear God,
Please help us to tell the truth,
To never steal or cheat,
Or hide from the things that we have done wrong.
Give us the strength to be brave and honest
So that we can be the best versions of ourselves.
Amen.
Song/music
‘Beautiful honesty song for kids’, available at: https://youtu.be/LAS324oYpXI (2.42 minutes long)
‘The family Madrigal’ from the film Encanto, available at: https://youtu.be/Yp5nPGWWMh4 (4.54 minutes long)
