Here is a two-handed narration you may want to use for an assembly, especially with Easter coming up. I use two narrators – one speaking the bold words and the other the normal print. The bold or normal has no significance, except to differentiate when the speaker changes. There is more of an explanation in my Poems and Phonics to use and enjoy post.

This piece works well as a class drama-based assembly, or as part of a service. Essentially, it is just a modern setting for the Good Samaritan. When I have used it with classes, the entrance of the ambulance is the action that children and parents enjoy. I always get a group of pupils to be the ambulance that comes on and takes the Samaritan away – but I always have one pupil standing tall and turning their head side to side, going Nee-Nah, Nee-Nah to imitate the siren and flashing blue light.

Just as an aside. The original bible version has a strong anti-racist theme. The Jews looked down on the Samaritans, so when Jesus told the story, his message was clear – You know your friends by their actions, not their race.

If you like the story, or even if you don’t, my daughter is running a half marathon on March 13^th 2016 to raise funds for research into motor neurone disease. This is a terrible disease that leaves the mind undiminished, as the physical body dies in small steps around you. If you could contribute please go to www.justgiving.com/Kate-Franks1

Many thanks.

Once upon a far off time, not so long ago; in distant place, not far from here, there was a man – just an ordinary man and he was going on a journey. He was driving along the motorway between Birmingham and London.  He was enjoying his drive, cruising along in the fast lane.  This was the life.

On he drove, until he began to yawn and being a sensible man he decided to pull in for a rest at the service station.  He got out of his car and made his way to the cafeteria.  He sat at a table and drank his coffee – but while he sat and rested outside men were busy.  They were lying in wait. They wanted his car keys and they wanted to steal his car.  Soon he made his way back, but now the sun had gone down.  Now all was shadows, and in the shadows lurked the men.  Leaping like leopards on an unsuspecting goat, they dragged the man to the floor, knocked him unconscious and with the keys they drove off into the night.

So, there the man lay on the edge of the car park, injured, alone and unable to walk.  There he lay as large limousine drove by. In the limousine was a rich man, a businessman who would have needed a suitcase to carry all the ten pound notes he owned.  But that was all his mind was full of – ten pound notes.  He looked at the man, “Drive on,” he said, “I can’t afford to be late for my meeting. I have money to make – and besides he looks like a bundle of rags.” Indeed, he did look like a bundle of rags, but that was just because he was bleeding and the thieves had dragged him through the mud.

Along came another man, a lawyer, a man who was supposed to spend his days thinking about what was wrong and right and making sure that the right thing would always happen.  Along he came and saw the man and thought, “I am a lawyer.  I charge 300 pounds an hour to talk about the right things and write about the right things. It’s not my job to do the right things,” and away he drove.

Then came a bishop – a man of God.  He was on his way to very special service and he was wearing his very special robes – all purple and white. He looked out of his car window, saw the man and said a prayer. He prayed that someone would come along to help the man soon, but he knew he could not take the chance that blood or mud might get on his fine clothes.

Then came a hitchhiker.  All he had was a back pack and he looked as if he had been on the road for a long time. He was young and looked as if he was a visitor from another country. This untidy, young man knelt down by the injured traveller.  He took out his phone and called for the ambulance.  He was indeed a traveller from another land, but he managed to make himself understood with his few words of English.  Then he knelt down and ripped some cloth from his own shirt. And taking a bottle of water from his backpack he began to bathe the man’s cuts and bruises.

The ambulance arrived and the ambulance men tended to the injured man and while they did the hitchhiker ran to the service station and even though he had little money, he bought water and orange juice and fruit and rushed back to give it to the man, so he would have something nice to eat at the hospital.

Away the ambulance sped, away went the injured man with his gift of drinks and bananas and on went the young, untidy hitchhiker.

Jesus told a story like this to make people understand that you can tell who is good person by the way they help others.  He wanted his people to understand that people from other lands could be good friends, even when people from their own land, who spoke their own language could be selfish and uncaring.