Creativity is the teacher's greatest tool. Whether you are a school teacher, Sunday school teacher, Gospel magician or a professional speaker.
Are you a magician? You can add depth to your shows by finishing with a trick or illusion that illustrates a message you want to share. The final thought you want your audience to keep.
Teaching with magic is great, but even if you are not a magician, creating memorable object lessons adds to your ability to convey your message or lesson.
I have had many teachers ask me how I create object lessons. Creating your own object lessons can be easy. I'm often at the dollar stores and odd lot discounters looking for new ideas. Perhaps I see an unusual box, or a one dollar child's toy. I try to picture how I might use it to illustrate a lesson.
I'll ask myself questions like what is this item used for, what does it suggest, what type of character do I see using it.
Try this: take any common household object and tell how it is used. Does this relate to any value or moral you want your children to learn? A wastebasket. It's used to keep trash in until we finally get rid of it. Do we use our memories as trashcans? Holding onto bad memories we ought to rid ourselves of?
Think about the area in life where you are an expert. (dogs, cooking, computers, gardening, firefighting?) Come up with examples of something you do, and how it symbolizes something larger in life.
As a magician, I'll go one step further and incorporate these items into a magic trick or routine. A squared circle can become that trashcan. I can show the empty can and an empty crate. Place the can in the crate, and start producing different items that we might have strored up. Memories that might be holding us back. Produce a toy and talk about envy or bitterness. As a child envies another child's toys, are we envying someone else's success or prosperity? You can produce many items from a squared circle to illustrate the message.
Magical or nonmagical object lessons can be a powerful tool to make your messages more memorable.