Do you want some gum?
by Dyanna Swenson

I just read the talk myself but I made a handout for the girls that had excerpts from the talk with blank spaces so they could fill in the words as I read them...it helped them to focus on the talk as well as made it seem not as long. It also helped them focus on certain parts of the talk (I used the questions the manual has you ask after reading the talk for the excerpts.)

Also, I have a program called Young Women UUMPH program that gives you ideas for object lessons and it had an idea using gum. You were to ask if anyone wanted a piece, then open the gum, touch it and pass it around the room to get to the girl that wanted it.
The idea then was for her to not want it anymore, obviously, since it had been passed around. Then, you were to say that just as you wouldn't want this piece of gum because it had been passed around, you wouldn't want someone that had been passed around. This object lesson really bothered me. Although, yes, the concept is true, it wasn't necessarily the way I wanted to go....it seemed rather harsh and to not bring in repentance (something the lesson also focused on). So, my husband and I talked about it, and he said "Whydon't you focus on why the gum has wrappers and what the wrappers do for it?" I thought that was a GREAT idea and that opened up so many ideas...my object lesson ended up going like this:

At the beginning of the lesson, I nonchalantly asked if anyone wanted a piece of gum after getting one for myself. A couple of girls raised their hand...I chose to give the girl at the end one first. I opened a piece of gum, "dropped" it, then licked my finger and wiped it off, then passed it around the room until it got to the girl. She hesitated, then said "Um, I don't want it", I asked if anyone still wanted a piece, they all said no and I asked why. "Because it's all dirty and has germs on it now." I asked if I had left the wrapper on it, if anyone would still want it, they all said they would...we then discussed what the wrapper did for the gum:

1. kept it clean, protected it
2. kept it fresh and prevented it from stale
3. I then compared this to the Law of Chastity...it's like a wrapper for us that protects us from many things i.e., harmful diseases (compared to the first point we made) as well as spiritual and emotional harm (compared to the second point made).

This turned out really well, and later on in the lesson, as we were talking about the importance of Chastity, I brought up the gum and wrapper again, saying that just as each piece of gum needs it's own wrapper, so do we need our own testimony and faith in the Law of Chastity and the truth of it. I then gave the girls a handout with a quote from Boyd K. Packer, rolled up like a scroll and tied with a package of gum with it.