Our youth conference this year will be Moroni's Quest, Book of Mormon themed. They challenged the stake to read or re-read the Book of Mormon before youth conference. We had talked the last several months about doing a read-a-thon and the challenge confirmed the need to do it. A few weeks before the event, we mailed letters out the parents with details. We held it over a three day period, Friday- 1pm-10pm, Saturday- 8am-4pm, and Monday- 1:30pm-7pm. We completed the Book of Mormon and had some great discussions about it.
For food, we brought snack things- water bottles, candy, trail mix, gum, etc. We kept the food simple for meals- baked potatoes, pulled pork sandwiches on rolls, pancakes, and a deli tray.
For the reading part, we spent 90% of the time listing to the podcasts at 1.5x speed. We did stop every once in a while and take turns reading but the podcasts were able to move faster.
We held it in the gym for Friday and Monday and stayed at a counselor's house for Saturday. It was nice to spread out in the gym and have everyone take a good amount of space for wiggle room.
We brought the soft cover Book of Mormons and highlighters for the young women to use if they did not bring their own. I also brought a reading chart for the young women to color in as they read along.
Things that helped keep us awake- finger nail polish, snacks, coloring pages, walking around the gym. I also downloaded some songs to my iPad for brain breaks- Cha Cha Slide, Hokey Pokey, Sid Shuffle
Assessment- I think it was a great project and I think the young women enjoyed it. The reading chart was a great way for everyone to keep up. I don't think I would recommend trying to do it in less than three days, so much information packed in so little time. In fact, I think if we do this again, I would stretch it out to four or five days. The brain breaks were a great way to move and then quickly re-group.
