Assess Your Learning Activities for Life Preparation Lessons
“Assess Your Learning Activities for Life Preparation Lessons,” Doctrine and Covenants Seminary Teacher Manual (2025)
“Assess Your Learning Activities,” Doctrine and Covenants Seminary Teacher Manual
Appendix
Assess Your Learning Activities for Life Preparation Lessons
After you have finished teaching one of the categories of Life Preparation lessons, consider helping students reflect on their learning and growth by including an assessment activity from that category in an upcoming Assess Your Learning lesson. These activities can be adapted to better meet the needs of your students.
Teachings of Church Leaders
Apply the teachings of Church leaders in your life
Throughout the course, students had many opportunities to study and apply teachings from Church leaders. For this activity, you may want to remind students of specific talks studied in class. If possible, invite them to select one of the talks they studied and review it and any notes they may have taken. Encourage students to reflect on how the teachings from the talk have helped them strive to be disciples of Jesus Christ.
Consider dividing students into pairs for the following exercise. They could take turns interviewing one another. Afterward, you could invite one or more pairs of students to conduct their interviews in front of the class.
Imagine you are being interviewed for an article to be published in the For the Strength of Youth magazine about studying teachings from Church leaders. The interviewer will ask you the following questions:
What have you learned about studying teachings from Church leaders?
Of the talks and articles you studied in seminary, which were most significant to you and why?
What specific teachings of Church leaders have you applied in your life recently?
For the Strength of Youth: Making Choices
Receive strength from the Lord to make inspired choices
This activity will help students assess what they learned in the lessons associated with the category titled “For the Strength of Youth: Making Choices.” It may be helpful to review some of the content from these lessons with students.
One way to help students assess what they have learned and felt in these lessons is to invite them to write a letter to themselves. The following prompt could be used or adapted.
Imagine what your life will be like one year from now. Think about what you would hope to achieve in that time and any challenges you anticipate. Write a letter of encouragement to your future self. Some of the following questions could help you.
What have you learned and felt about receiving strength from the Lord to make inspired choices?
Are there any goals you have set that you want to keep working on?
What have you learned about how the Lord can help you effectively make inspired choices?
Building Self-Reliance
Build self-reliance in the Lord’s way
Consider asking a student to draw a stick figure of a teenager on the board. Invite the class to give this teenager a name and to create a few details about their personality and family situation.
Then ask students to come up with a realistic situation in which that teenager is facing challenges in life.
Invite students to form small groups and discuss their answers to the following questions:
How can relying on the Savior and His teachings help this teenager deal with challenges?
What could this teenager do to build self-reliance in their situation?
You might also invite students to share truths about self-reliance they have learned from the scriptures.
Some passages students may have studied in the “Building Self-Reliance in the Lord’s Way” lesson include:
Display the following questions. Invite students to ponder them and record their thoughts in their study journals.
What skills and attitudes have you learned that can help you become more self-reliant in different areas in your life (such as education, health, employment, or spiritual strength)?
In what ways are you becoming more self-reliant?
How will you invite God to help you continue to build self-reliance?
Physical and Emotional Health
Apply principles and skills to be more physically and emotionally healthy
Consider drawing a simple roller coaster or a path that has hills and valleys.
Why might some people compare their lives to a roller coaster or a path with hills and valleys?
What are some “ups” and “downs” we may feel in our lives?
Remind students that during this course, they studied various lessons that can help them turn to the Lord to become more emotionally resilient during all times of life.
Consider inviting students to list some of the principles or skills they learned to become more emotionally resilient. If possible, they can mention the scriptures or statements from Church leaders that teach these principles and skills. Students’ answers can include ways to improve thinking patterns and deal with stress, anxiety, sadness, depression, and perfectionism. They can also talk about improving their physical health.
Invite students to write down the answers to the following questions in their study journals:
What did you learn that was meaningful or helpful to you?
What skills have you used to turn to the Lord to become more emotionally resilient?
What successes and blessings from the Lord did you experience? What challenges do you still face?
What do you think the Lord might want you to do to continue to “look unto [Him] in every thought” (Doctrine and Covenants 6:36) to become even more emotionally resilient?
Invite students to share their answers and experiences, if they are not too personal. Look for ways to compliment students on their efforts and to testify that the Lord will help and bless them in His own time and way. Remind students that if they are experiencing serious challenges with stress, anxiety, depression, or other mental or emotional health issues, they should speak with a trusted adult or mental health professional. Turning to others for help when we are struggling is not a sign of weakness or a lack of faith.
Preparing for Future Education and Employment
Understand the importance of lifelong temporal and spiritual education
Share the following scenario or one like it to give students an opportunity to explain what they have learned about the importance of education.
While walking home from school, your friend Naomi mentioned to you that she does not like school. She feels like it is too hard and often can feel pointless. She has no desire to work hard in school or continue her education when she finishes high school.
Give students an opportunity to respond to this concern. One way you could do this is by sharing the following instructions. Students could complete the instructions individually or with a small group.
Create a response to Naomi that can help her understand the importance of education. Consider including some or all of the following in your response:
A scripture or statement from a Church leader
An explanation about why Heavenly Father wants His children to always seek after both temporal and spiritual education
Personal experiences or testimony
After students have finished creating their responses, give them an opportunity to share them with others.
Create a plan for future education and employment
Students have had opportunities to make plans related to their future education as well as future employment opportunities and other roles they will have during adulthood. Invite them to review the plans they have made.
Consider giving them a chance to make any adjustments that they feel are necessary. They could also consider how these plans are influencing their current choices. Then invite them to discuss the following questions with a partner.
What are your plans for your future education?
What plans do you have to prepare for future career opportunities or other responsibilities you will have as an adult?
How will you involve the Lord in your plans?
Succeeding in School
Apply skills to succeed in school
To help students remember some of the truths and skills they have learned that can help them be more successful in school, consider drawing a stick figure that represents a student. Explain that this student is struggling to do well in school.
What are some of the truths and skills you have studied that could help someone who is struggling in school?
If needed, you could invite the students to share what they remember learning about involving the Lord in their education, having honesty and integrity in their education, preparing for tests and challenging projects, and viewing challenges with a growth mindset. Review concepts and scriptures from those lessons as necessary. For example, you could invite the students to share what they remember about how the Prophet Joseph Smith involved the Lord in his learning (see Joseph Smith—History 1:10–18) or how Nephi viewed his challenges with a growth mindset (see 1 Nephi 16:18–23, 30–32).
Then invite the students to reflect on how they have applied these concepts to their lives. You could display questions like the following and invite students to record their answers in their study journals.
What are some of the truths or skills you have applied to your life to help you be more successful in school?
What difference have these things made?
How have you noticed your relationship with the Lord or your access to His help change as you have done these things?
After students have had sufficient time to write their answers, invite a few volunteers to share their thoughts and experiences with the class. Encourage them to listen carefully to their classmates and consider trying some of the skills that classmates have had success with.
Missionary Preparation
Feel an increased desire to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with others
In the “Love, Share, and Invite” lesson, you may have displayed an image of a camouflaged animal. Consider displaying the image again and reminding students of the following statement that was used in that lesson.
Elder Quentin L. Cook of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles taught:
Image
Elder Quentin L. Cook
An essential part of this missionary effort is for individual members to become beacon-light examples wherever we live. We cannot be in camouflage. (Quentin L. Cook, “Safely Gathered Home,” Liahona, May 2023, 23)
What might it look like for someone to be a beacon-light example as a missionary for Jesus Christ? What might it look like to be in camouflage as His missionary?
Students may have recorded how they feel about sharing the gospel in lesson 199, “Sharing the Gospel out of Christlike Love.” You could invite them to refer back to what they wrote. Or you could invite them to record their current thoughts and feelings about sharing the gospel. As they ponder and write, you might suggest that they study again one or more of the following scripture passages from lesson 201, “Choosing to Serve a Mission,” to remember some of the Lord’s promises to those who share the gospel.
After sufficient time, invite some volunteers to share what they recorded and what has influenced their desire to serve as a missionary for the Lord.
Temple Preparation
Feel an increased desire to make covenants with God in the temple
Consider using one or more of the following activities to help students assess their desire to make covenants with God in the temple. Students could write in their journal or discuss in small groups.
Display a picture of a temple and share how the temple reminds you of Jesus Christ. If needed, you can find an image in the media gallery at temples.ChurchofJesusChrist.org. Share your thoughts and feelings about making and keeping covenants with Heavenly Father in His temple.
In one of the temple preparation lessons, you learned about the importance of worshipping in the temple throughout your life. You may have written a letter to your future self about the importance of worshipping the Lord in His temple. Is there anything you have learned or felt recently that has influenced your desire to make and keep covenants with Heavenly Father in the temple? If so, add to the letter or write a new note to yourself.
Reflect on what you learned about making covenants with the Lord in the temple, including the law of consecration. Answer the following questions.
What have you done to better live the principles of the Lord’s law of consecration?
How has this helped you prepare to make a covenant with the Lord in the temple to live this law?