Family Home Evening

1)Identify what you want to have happen at family home evening.
What are you going to learn about?

President Hinckley has counseled to use the General Conference talks. He said "All of the proceedings of this conference will appear in a subsequent issue of the Ensign and Liahona. We encourage you again to read the talks in your family home evenings and discuss them together as families. They are the products of much prayer and meditation and are well worthy of careful consideration. "
Gordon B. Hinckley, “Closing Remarks,” Ensign, Nov 2007, 108


Other ideas for family home evening topics:
Church magazines –all have suggestions for FHE use.
Monthly Primary theme
Preparing for an important event (baptism, arrival of a baby, mission)
Family Home Evening manual
Topics from our Sunday lessons and talks
Faith in God
Duty to God
Personal Progress
For the Strength of Youth
Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts
Preach my Gospel
Gospel Principles
Holidays
Culture
Emergency Prep
Provident Living

Writing missionaries

Genealogy

Recording personal history information

3)Make a schedule –we usually do 2-3 months at a time
What works best for us is to have assigned resources for each week of the month. For example, right now on the 1st Monday of the month is an activity from the Faith in God book or Duty to God (depending on who is assigned the lesson), the 2nd and 3rd Mondays are talks from General Conference, the 4th Monday is the monthly Primary theme, and if we have a 5th Monday we try to do a service project. Then using some kind of chart everyone gets an assignment for each family home evening.

What works best for our family is to spend Sundays or 1 Monday every 2-3 months planning upcoming FHEs- (“Planning Family Home Evening Together,” Ensign, Aug. 2000, 70)
Each child has a folder to keep his/her lesson materials together.

They are given their topics and then they can prepare. They can even pick out hymns/songs, scriptures that go along with the lesson and decide on refreshments, etc. We usually partner up with the younger children to help them with their lesson plans.

At family council on Sunday evenings we review assignments for next night.

Family home evening resources
“Family Home Evening Helps: Five Family History Activities,” Ensign, Feb. 2004, 72
“The Encouragement Council,” Ensign, June 1987, 68
“Home Evening Missions,” Ensign, Sept. 1989, 70
“Home Evening Helper,” Ensign, Jan. 1990, 75
“Chapter-a-Week Home Evening,” Ensign, Feb. 1990, 72
“Lightening Up Family Home Evening,” Ensign, Feb. 1992, 64
“Threefold Family Home Evening,” Ensign, June 1992, 72
“Better Home Evenings—Plan on It,” Ensign, Aug. 1993, 65
“One-Quote Gospel Lessons,” Ensign, Apr. 1995, 73
Family Home Evening: Hero of the Month,” Ensign, Feb. 1996, 73
Five-Minute Lessons on Life Skills,” Ensign, July 1998, 71
An Evening Abroad,” Ensign, Apr. 2000, 68
Double-Duty Lessons,” Ensign, Apr. 1999, 57
Family Home Evening: Our Conference Gift,” Ensign, Oct. 1996,
“Teaching the Mission of the Church,” Ensign, July 1997, 68
“Our Home Evening History,” Ensign, Feb. 1998, 72
“Using Ensign Art,” Ensign, Oct. 1998, 72
Looking for a Family Home Evening Lesson?” Ensign, July 1999, 22
“Planning Family Home Evening Together,” Ensign, Aug. 2000, 70
“Reclaiming Monday Nights,” Ensign, July 2002, 73
”Ready-Made Family Home Evening,” Ensign, Feb. 2003, 73
“Successful Family Home Evenings,” Ensign, June 2003, 7
“Four Tips for Family Home Evening,” Ensign, Aug. 2003, 69
“Family Home Evening Suggestion Box,” Ensign, Sept. 2004, 52
“Family Home Evening Helps: A Hymn and a Scripture,” Ensign, Sept. 2004, 73
“Family Home Evening Helps: Family Home Evening with Baby,” Ensign, Jan. 2005, 73
“Baby Home Evening,” Ensign, July 1990, 74
“Strengthening Our Children,” Ensign, Sept. 2000, 30
“Primarily for Family,” Ensign, July 2001, 71
“Family Home Evenings for Tots,” Ensign, Feb. 2002, 67
“Family Home Evening Helps: Helps for Young Children,” Ensign, Mar. 2006, 71
“Home Evening for Young Families,” Ensign, Feb. 1994, 72
“Family Home Evening: Visual Aids That Teach Twice,” Ensign, Apr. 1996, 71
“Family Home Evening Times Two,” Ensign, Apr. 2004, 73
“Involving Teens,” Ensign, Sept. 2003, 73
“The Golden Years of Family Home Evening,” Ensign, Feb. 1997, 66
Family Home Evening Helps: Family Night Surprise,” Ensign, Feb. 2007, 73
Heather Lee Lyman, “Family Home Evening Helps: Family Night—MTC Style,” Ensign, June 2007, 71
Jennifer Hansen, “Family Home Evening Helps: Military Mail,” Ensign, June 2008, 75