Students in Science are learning about Darwin’s finches and bird beak adaptations. They are testing different “beaks” in different “habitats” to determine the beak structure that functions best to support survival in each habitat.

This week in Language Arts, we finished our novel The Giver and shared our initial reactions to its ending. We also celebrated with a donut dancing party because each student read 5 books in the past semester. We are beginning to share our creative writing with the rest of the class. The writing is so long that we are sharing the first few pages and then sharing the rest electronically. These students are prodigious writers!

In Judaics, we continued working on our tefillah projects on the different blessings of the Amidah. We also spent time on Parashat Terumah and had a fascinating conversation about why the B’nai Yisrael would carry around the broken set of tablets as well as the new ones. (See HaShavua for their answers)

Students in Geo-History started presenting their projects to the class. We heard from a group on the Renaissance art movement in Europe, and discussed the depiction in famous works of Leonardo da Vinci. We also heard about Enlightenment thinkers and the French Revolution, followed by a great report on the Industrial Revolution.

This week in Music we started with a guitar performance from Ayelet and a piano performance from Benny. We discussed the presentations coming up that will be on some of the most famous Jewish musicians of all time. They chose their musicians, and our Mimi Award winners were Ari and Emily!