What's Important to High School Juniors?

What they said
These are the things that are important to the high school juniors in my seminary class (in no particular order):

• Fun
• Grades
• Friends
• Family
• Sports

What they meant
That's what they said, but that isn't what is really important to them. When we dug deeper to understand why fun is important, they came to the conclusion that what was really important was feeling happy and having a counterbalance for more serious things in life.

The path to understanding why grades were important went like this: grades are important because I want to go to a good college. I want to go to a good college so I can have a good career. I want a good career so I can have a good life. So what's really important to them is having a good life, the career, college, and grades are just a means to get what they want.

Friends were important because they wanted to be close to people who would help and understand them. Interestingly they also wanted to be helpful to others. And helping others was important so they felt important.

The Book of Mormon Has the Patterns
What they found exciting is that everything that is important to them (a good life, feeling important, feeling happy, having a counterbalance to more serious things) is patterned in the Book of Mormon.

Today we discussed the story of Alma and Amulek as a pattern for friendship. Tomorrow we'll cover additional areas of importance and discuss specific examples of patterns in the Book of Mormon that will help them with the things that are important to them.