DR. SEUSS AND UNITARIAN UNIVERSALISTS
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU

(NOTE: Please review the Introduction before using this Session Plan. Thank you.)

SETTING THE STAGE
STORY SYNPOSIS: Fanciful way to celebrate a Birthday (10 Minutes)

AFFIRMATION: Everyone is important.

THEME: Celebration

PREPARATION: Reflect on birthday celebrations that you have had. What made them special?

NEEDED:
Happy Birthday to You
Display: Birthday party items, such as candles, hats
Construction paper or light card stock, markers, colorful stickers for making cards.
Listing of Birthdays for the group members.

SESSION PLAN
OPENING: Selected by the group. This can be used each session.

CHECK-IN: Welcome. Each person says his or her name. Allow time for each person to briefly tell something that went well since the group last met, or something that did not go well.

Leave an empty chair for someone who is missing from the group that day, or to recognize that others are welcome to be invited to join the group.

STORY: Happy Birthday to You!

EXPLORING
Why celebrate birthdays?
How do you celebrate birthdays? How does your family celebrate birthdays?
Are there any stories you have heard around your birth? (Examples: home birth, unusual transportation to the hospital)
How do or would you feel if no one wished you "Happy Birthday"?
Birthdays are a way of paying special attention. "If you hadn't been born, then you might be an ISN'T. And Isn't has no fun at all. No he disn't."

Creating birthday parties
If you were planning a party for someone, like your mother or father, what would you have? (food, decorations, presents) who would you invite?
Focus on making the party special for the person for whom it is being planned.

Annual Birthday Party for the congregation
The group can sponsor an all congregation birthday celebration, such as during fellowship hour or as part of a pot luck dinner.
* Invite people from the congregation to bake a cake for each month. For example, someone with a birthday in May could bake the May cake. Include the month on the decoration.
* The group can make table decorations, generically, or specific to a month.
* Publicize the all congregation celebration, including why the group feels that it is important to celebrate birthdays.
* At the congregational party, ask people to gather around the cake for their birth month. The group for each month can develop a chant for their month, why their month is a great time to have a birthday. Go through the year and have each group give the chant for their month.

Very own birthday cards
Have each child make a birthday card for themselves, and put on their birth date. Talk about this special day because they are special. They need to feel good about themselves.
Add wording like, "I am special," "There is no one else like me." Or have participants write a message to themselves. Collect the cards and send them back to the participants on their birthdays.

CLOSING
Sing "Happy Birthday"

GROUP REVIEW AND ANNOUNCEMENTS.
What did they like about the session? (theme, activities, someone special being there, etc.)

Announce the story for the next session and who will be the adult facilitator(s), or if there are special events in the time before the group meets again.

Rev. Helen Zidowecki, May 2003