Music Video

This Jenny Phillips music video, "Live Like You Believe" was shared on the Church News website:

The Song of the Heart

Young Women love music, don't they? 

Here's a video about a beautiful young woman from Hawaii, Marissa, who loves music for many reasons —most of all because it has led her closer to Heavenly Father.



You can also download an MP3 of Marissa singing “Nearer, My God, to Thee,” in the youth music library.


How could you use this video?

Consider working with your young women to select a song they'd like to learn and share in sacrament meeting or New Beginnings. Be sure to coordinate this through your priesthood leader - there are guidelines for music to be used in sacrament meeting. You can see them here in the music section of Handbook 2.

Or you could show this video and then invite the young women to plan an activity for sharing talents.

or other ideas - you can share how you plan to use this video by commenting below.

Here's a video link to share:  https://lds.org/youth/video/the-song-of-the-heart?lang=eng

Video: I Choose to Be Pure

You will love this new youth website video!

Six youth from six different religions talk about their decisions to stay sexually pure.

They answer these questions:

Why do you choose to be sexually pure?
Some people say they can't control themselves. What do you say to that?
How do you feel about your choice to stay sexually pure?

Wouldn't it be wonderful if all young women could answer these questions articulately?

Link to share: https://lds.org/youth/video/i-choose-to-be-pure?lang=eng

(be sure to read the comments below the video)

Chastity: What are the limits? video

This is a great video to foster a discussion about the value of virtue and the standard of sexual purity.



Shareable link:  https://lds.org/youth/video/chastity-what-are-the-limits?lang=eng

Ideas on how to use this video:

• Show it during an activity followed by a discussion.
• Ask questions such as: When is the best time to decide on your limits? How do you know what is right and what is wrong? Why would a young man push you to do things that are not right? Why is it important to remain virtuous? How will your virtue affect your happiness? How will your virtue affect your future husband and children? Why do you think God gave us this standard?
• Listen to or read Sister Dalton's talk - "Guardians of Virtue" and have each young woman follow this counsel: "Making decisions in advance will help you be guardians of virtue. I hope each of you will write a list of things you will always do and things you will never do. Then live your list." 

More on this topic:

• For the Strength of Youth - Sexual Purity
• Personal Progress - Virtue
• "Guardians of Virtue" Elaine S. Dalton, 2011 General Young Women Meeting

International Video Contest Winners

Members from all over the world entered the Church’s first International Video Contest to create their own Mormon Message. The winners have been announced and you can view their videos here. 

Some of the videos were created by youth ages 13-17.

I think "Life" is very creative and I enjoyed hearing a young woman talk about her values and the music industry in "Staying in Tune." There are many others - so take a look!

Article: "The Mediator Jesus Christ"

I mentioned this current New Era article in my collection of Easter Resources. I love this story written by Elder Boyd K. Packer. It has deepened my understanding of the Atonement. I just noticed that it's featured on the youth website.  This makes it easy to share - I hope you will do that.

Sharing

Here are some ways to share this article:

Click the small "Share" button just below the article.

This opens up four choices, email, twitter, facebook, delicious.

The most commonly used are email and facebook.

To email, you can click on "Email" and work through lds.org to send a link. This requires signing in. Or you can just copy the URL and paste it into emails you send to your young women and others. To make it easy - here's the URL:
https://lds.org/youth/article/the-mediator-jesus-christ?lang=eng

You also have two facebook sharing choices. If you have a facebook account, you can click the little thumbs up icon in the right corner of the window - this will show up on your "wall" telling friends you "like" this article. Or you can click "Share" and then "Facebook."  This will open up a window where you can write a few words and automatically share the link.

Video 



Here's a little hidden gem - If you scroll to the bottom of the article, you will see this:

To see a video about this parable, watch “The Mediator.”

You can view a video of this story online and also download it - right click on the words "The Mediator," (either here or in the article) select "save as." The video should download to your computer.

It is also  available on the DVD "Book of Mormon Video Presentations" (53911).

Easter

Easter is coming in less than 2 weeks!

This is an ideal time to help young women focus on the Savior.

What Easter resources are available?

Take a look at the LDS Media Talk blog post "Preparing for Easter." The author did a wonderful job assembling a list of resources.

I'll embed the videos here for you:

His Sacred Name - An Easter Declaration - new Mormon Message on Easter



You can find all the scriptures from this video in Church News and Events.

He Lives: Testimonies of Jesus Christ - last year's Easter video



An Apostle's Easter Thoughts on Christ, by Elder Jeffery Rr Holland



A few more things:

I can't think of anything better than "The Living Christ: The Testimony of the Apostles" - perhaps you could challenge young women to read it, or better yet, encourage them to start their Personal Progress Faith value project. One possibility is to memorize "The Living Christ."

April 2011 1st Presidency Message by President Thomas S. Monson - "He is not here, but is risen" 

Special Witnesses of Christ - testimonies from each member of the First Presidency (text)

President Monson's April 2010 General Conference address - "He is Risen"

Classic talk by Bruce R. McConkie from the April 2011 Ensign - "The Purifying Power of Gethsemene"

My favorite story for understanding the atonement is "The Mediator Jesus Christ" by Boyd K. Packer, shared in the April 2011 New Era. There is a video of this story called "The Mediator" available on the DVD "Book of Mormon Video Presentations" (53911). This video is not on any official LDS sites but it is on YouTube in poor quality and I'll embed it (slightly guiltily) here:

195 Dresses video

Modest prom dresses, a personal progress project, and a creative young woman:




Here's a link you can share:

https://lds.org/youth/video/195-dresses?lang=eng


Ideas on how to use this video

Share or view it with your young women to encourage creative thinking about Personal Progress projects. Invite them to plan and begin working on one of their own projects.

Plan an activity night to learn how to modify dresses to make them modest. Invite young women to view the video before coming, or show it during the activity.

Share it as a follow up to the Sunday lessons on the temple with a reminder to prepare for the temple by dressing modestly.

What are your ideas? Share them in a comment.


For more resources on modesty, see the "Dress and Appearance" page in the online For the Strength of Youth.

The Miracle of Personal Progress video

You will love this!




Youth website link

Vote for your favorite video!

Visitor's choice voting for the church's International Video Contest began yesterday.

You can view videos in professional, amateur, and youth categories.

VOTE HERE

Be sure to share this fun project with your young women.

Read more

General Young Women Meeting

It's coming up this Saturday!

Here are highlights from last year's meeting:



Send a link to your young women to help them get ready for the broadcast - https://lds.org/youth/video/general-yw-meeting-highlights?lang=eng

(or link them to this blog post :)

When to watch:

LIVE BROADCAST	REBROADCAST
8 p.m. Eastern time	10 p.m. Eastern time
7 p.m. Central time	9 p.m. Central time
6 p.m. Mountain time	8 p.m. Mountain time
5 p.m. Pacific time	7 p.m. Pacific time

Broadcast information here

Read more

Kyiv Ukraine Temple Celebration Video

This video is a little longer than normal (6:13) and it may not seem like a topic that will rivet the youth, but be sure to give it a try. It's the second most viewed Mormon Messages for Youth video right now. There's something powerful about hearing youth around the world share their experiences with the Gospel.



How to use this video?

Looking forward in Young Women Manual 3: Lessons 15-19 are about family history and temple work. This video might be a good resource to prepare young women for the unit. You could send them this link:

http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessagesYouth#p/c/E395F43BA88AEEB6/1/6WQA2Mc7qqU

Questions to consider:

What experiences did the youth in this video have with the temple?
What experiences have you had with the temple?
What do you think their challenges might be?
What challenges do youth in your community face?
How do you stay strong?

RSS Feeds and Podcasts

Did you know that finding this blog and reading it is the old fashioned way to use the internet?

When you do that, you are "pulling" content by working to find it.

Instead, most youth live in a "push" internet environment.

They sign up or indicate what kind of content they want and then it's delivered or "pushed" to them. Facebook is an example. Friends, photos, "liked" pages, are all pushed onto their wall. The new Youth iPhone app pushes the latest youth content to phones.  This is a good thing!

The LDS Church has embraced "push" technology. To learn more, read this post from LDS Media Talk (an excellent blog I follow): RSS Feeds from the LDS Church. You will learn all the ways you can have Church content pushed to you. The post includes a list of podcasts, but here are two that weren't included. They are particularly useful for youth and their leaders:

• Mormon Messages Video Podcast
• Mormon Messages for Youth Video Podcast

These podcasts are the simplest way to get good youth videos onto your computer, iPad, iPhone, iPod so that you can share them.

And guess what?

You can have content from this blog "pushed" to you.  Read about RSS feeds from the blog post I shared and then sign up for the RSS feed from Blessing Young Women (scroll down a little ways on the right sidebar).



Or you can "like" the Blessing Young Women facebook page and updates will appear on your wall.

YW Manual 3: Lessons 12-14

Young Women will soon be learning about the priesthood in their Sunday lessons.

Lessons 12-14 are now updated in the online manual

Lesson 12 -  The Blessings of the Priesthood

Lesson 13 - The Priesthood Can Bless Families

Lesson 14 - We Have a Wonderful Legacy

Each of these lessons has suggested discussion questions, current words from the prophets, conference talks to study, scripture resources, videos, lesson application ideas, and suggestions for Personal Progress. All if these resources are linked right from the online lesson.

Aren't these extra resources fabulous?!?

Here are the videos suggested for YW Manual lessons 12-14. Remember, these are supplementary resources. They don't necessarily need to be shown Sunday in class. You could email or text a link to a video and ask the young women to watch the video before or as a follow up after class.  You could also use videos in Mutual or firesides. I will include textable, emailable links that go to  the church's YouTube channels for each of the videos below. I like the idea of sharing these links because it will introduce this rich video resource to the youth.


Lesson 12 video - "Blessings of the Priesthood"
Shareable link:  http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessagesYouth#p/u/10/cI5FiXO0bAo





Lesson 13 video - "Becoming a Priesthood Man: Priesthood Duty" from 2011 Strength of Youth Media
Shareable link:  http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessagesYouth#p/u/10/cI5FiXO0bAo 





Lesson 14 video - "The Message of the Restoration"
Shareable link: http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessages#p/search/0/ySyv1I2e9RE





"Reviewing the Lessons of the Past"
Shareable link:  http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessages#p/c/AF19F9A40E87ED75/6/ELIa7f3QcaA





Other videos on the priesthood

"Elder Perry on the Priesthood Part One: The Oath and Covenant"
Shareable link:  http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessages#p/c/D7FB5EC9689A2F7C/1/R2wMnmwiIIQ





"Elder Perry on the Priesthood Part Two: The Aaronic and Melchizedek Priesthoods"
Shareable link:  http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessages#p/c/D7FB5EC9689A2F7C/0/9SV8JpwDfUI





"Directing the Lord's Work" Elder Bednar explains the role of an Apostle
Shareable link:  http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessages#p/c/D7FB5EC9689A2F7C/2/yBtE5QbcDbU

CES Fireside with Elder L. Tom Perry

Video of yesterday's Church Education System fireside by Elder L. Tom Perry was just posted on lds.org.

Here's a link. I don't have any details - yet.

Preparing for Trek?

If your youth are going on trek this summer, here's a video to help them get ready.

Reviewing the Lessons of the Past, Elder L Tom Perry




What is trek?

Trek is a reenactment of Mormon pioneer handcart journeys that took place in the mid 1800s.  This experience helps youth understand the sacrifice and determination of the early pioneers. Testimonies deepen and unity grows as youth and leaders work together to overcome obstacles and complete their journey.


Here are some resources I found online:

Ensign Magazine on the real trek -  The Pioneer Trek: Nauvoo to Winter Quarters

lds.org safety guidelines

How to prepare for trek pdf

Handcart Trek reservations website

handcart-trek.org website

Ideas and resources for a successful trek

Pioneer trek clothing pdf

there's lots more - just search pioneer trek in google

Newest Mormon Messages Video: "Unselfish Service"

Elder Dallen H Oaks, shares insights on service. This video will work well with Young Women Manual 3, lessons 31 and 32.



Suggestions for using this video:
Before viewing, ask the young women to listen carefully to Elder Oaks' words and identify at least one principle about service.

Questions:
What did Elder Oaks teach about service?
What experiences have you had with serving others? How do you feel when you serve?
How have your parents served you? What can you do to thank them?
How is happiness related to service?

Activity Ideas:
Have the young women plan a service project.

YW Manual 3: Lessons 8-11

Families
My daughter teaches Young Women and I just sent her an email with ideas for lessons 8-11.

Maybe it will help someone else if I paste it here:



Are you doing lesson 10 tomorrow?

Here are the resources online

http://lds.org/manual/young-women-manual-3/lesson-10-encouraging-enjoyable-family-activities?lang=eng

Look at the right sidebar.

It doesn't list videos but here are a few I like:

Cute lds commercials about family fun:

Swashbuckler

SciFi

Runaway Stage

You can also search Mormon Ad Homefront on youtube for some of the older ones.

There's a new video on the Mormon Messages youtube channel called Families can be together forever - it's good.

I also really like this video - Two Brothers Apart

Video: Touching the Hearts of Our Youth

I'm back!

This is perfect advice for parents AND leaders from Elder Hales

Mormon Channels

The LDS Church has "Mormon Channel" - its official media channel. It also has a Mormon Channel on YouTube.  They are different and this might be a little confusing. I'll try to sort them out for you.

Mormon Channel (radio.lds.org) is the Church's official media channel, also known as Mormon Radio.  It hosts audio content. Programming is delivered via the internet. You can read more about it here. You can listen live, or to a wide variety of archived programs. There's even a Youth Voices channel (with one broadcast so far). Mormon Channel also offers a number of podcasts - so you can subscribe and have episodes downloaded automatically.



Mormon Channel on YouTube, also known as the Mormon Messages Channel is an official Church YouTube channel. It hosts video content (some of it available in up to 12 different languages).



Somehow I stumbled on this site - also known as Mormon Channel (mormonchannel.org). It seems to be a portal, linking to the other channels.



In addition,  there's a Mormon Messages for Youth channel on YouTube - hosting many of the videos I share on this blog.


There's plenty of youth friendly media available on these sites.

Do some exploring - and share what you find.


I hope this helped!