Cotton Mouth
Click here to see the intro and icebreaker / magic trick full screen
About the lesson:
This is a great object lesson, magic trick or icebreaker that is super easy to do, required very little prep and that the kids will love! It involves someone being silly, grabbing some cotton balls that they mistake as cotton candy (you can do this in a million different ways) and putting them in their mouth. They then pretend to be choking, pull of the cotton balls and then start to pull out an incredibly long string of paper from their mouth. This can take quite a while and if done correctly is hilarious!
Prep:
- Purchase the mouth coils which are best found on Amazon.com at the link below (50′ long):
- Place one of the mouth coils somewhere covered with several cotton balls
Lesson:
There are several ways you can do this and I am going to illustrate only one of many. Feel free to come up with your variations and share them with everyone in the comments below.
Come out scratching your belly, yawning and looking kind of tired and goofy.
“I am SO hungry… I don’t know what it is about (mornings, night, the elevation, whatever) that is doing it but I just CAN’T get full! I could eat a cow right now! Hey! HEY! IS THAT… IS THAT… (whispers reverantly) cotton candy?”
“How could it be? How did someone know that that is my very favoritest thing in the WHOLE world! But… it’s not mine… but I’m hungry! But… that would be stealing. But, I am so weak from lack of nutrition I could collapse at any minute! But… oh forget it!”
Grab the handful of cottonballs and stuff them in your mouth. Pretend to chew happily and then begin to choke. Pull of the cotton balls a few at a time and then finally start pulling out the coil. Play this up. Make it funny and dramatic.
About halfway through, stop and pick up a cotton ball and just stare at it with big eyes and then begin pulling it out again. If you want to mix it up, have someone ELSE pull it out (my wife thinks this is gross, I think it’s funny).
When it finally comes out… gasp and wheeze around before saying:
“They say you ARE what you eat and I guess, it’s true! You have to be SO careful what you put inside of you. You need to be careful about the things you actually eat of course, but you need to be even MORE careful about what you put inside your heart!”
“The Bible says that out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh and that is SO true! If you put good things inside of you, good things come out. If you put bad things in, bad things come out. You have to be careful what you let inside your heart through your eyes and through your ears!”
“I am so embarassed by what I did today. I ate what I thought was cotton candy even though it wasn’t even really mine! I stole that! And I am so sorry.”
“You are what you eat and you are what you DO! If I steal, I become a thief. If I watch or hear bad things, it will slowly make me into a bad person.”
“I don’t know about you, but after today, I AM GOING TO BE SO CAREFUL WHAT IT PUT INSIDE MY HEART AND INSIDE MY MOUTH! YUCK! That was SO gross!”
I was in Baton Rouge Louisiana when you did this live and instantly saw the potential! Love it!
That is awesome! I hope you can use it in your classes. It really makes for a fun lesson for sure. Glad you were there at Commit, it was a GREAT conference!