Garinim

We have jumped into November! The children are now eager to enter the classroom each morning and quickly take off their jackets and work on switching their shoes before quickly finding an activity to work on.  This week we had the opportunity to paint with water-colors.  The children were presented with red, yellow and blue paint and delighted in dipping the brush into multiple colors to see what color would come out on the paper.  We practiced threading this week by using animal shaped beads and the children were very excited to see all the different shapes.  This week we also put out moon sand with the woodland creatures, which was a huge hit.  Some children enjoyed digging the animals into the sand and seeing what prints they left behind while others delighted in feeling the texture of the sand and squishing it together and feeling it break apart.

 

The children have been spending more time learning to respect their classroom and are really helping to keep it clean.  If they spill some rice while pouring or notice that many corn kernels have “jumped” out of the sensory table they quickly grab the broom and dustpan and set to work cleaning up the mess.  One child even noticed there were a lot of paint splotches on our art easel and quickly grabbed a sponge and some soapy water and set out to clean it.  

 

On Thursday we welcomed a new friend to our classroom, Pierre.  The other children were eager to show him around and helped to guide him through his first couple of days with us.  It was so nice to see the children who just started a couple of months ago take on the leadership roles and show him around.  

 

On Friday we once again gathered together to celebrate Shabbat (the Sabbath).  We lit our candles, said our blessings and enjoyed our challah and grape juice.  We also introduced the value of Chesed (kindness).  Over the next week or two we will be talking about how we can be kind to each other, especially at school and home. We will be continuing to talk about music next week as well.  

 

Alim

We had a great week of school.  We took out fun rainbow activities because we have reviewed the Primary and Secondary colors.  The children have been making beautiful 3D rainbows in art with different textures to glue on them.  We discussed the color wheel. The sound of the week was “Pp”.  We read the AlphaTale book The Pigs Picnic.  There were corresponding sheets to practice the letter formation of “Pp” and the sound.    All the children have been busy bees working throughout the classroom.  

 

Alim Judaics  -  This week in Alim - we continue to work on filling our ‘kindness jar’ with pompoms.  I introduced the hebrew word ‘Chesed’ for kindness, showing compassion and love and using our manners.  Each child contributed a way to show ‘chesed’ to their friends, such as sharing a toy or taking turns on a bicycle.  We will continue along this theme next week, as we begin an art project for our Bulletin board in the hallway.  In Yoga Yeladim, we enjoyed ‘Rainbow’ Yoga to go along with our ‘Rainbow’ theme of colors in the classroom.  We learned many different ways to create a rainbow with our body and learned -what makes a ‘rainbow’-  we acted out the sunshine touching the raindrops as they fall from the sky.  We learned that the hebrew word for rainbow is ‘Keshet’.  We will continue to learn all the colors of the Rainbow in Hebrew.  For our Shabbat celebration, we sang and danced to tunes by Andi Joseph, said our prayers over the candles, wine, and challah and read PJ Library’s ‘Sign Language Shabbat’ book - learning ‘how to sign’ for those who have trouble hearing or speaking.

 

Keshet

This week we are learning all about Connecticut; the state capitol, the state bird (american robin), the state flower (mountain laurel), the state tree (white oak), the state animal (sperm whale), the state insect (praying mantis). Our spider plant saplings grew roots (after spending eleven days in a weak tea solution) and were ready for planting.  The children eagerly prepared their pot with gravel and soil and planted their little plant.  Let us know how they do over the next few months!

Now that everyone is into the routine of story writing straight after morning snack, journals were distributed with the first entry on November 3, 2021. This means you will not get to see the week’s stories each Friday, but will have to wait until the journal is completed, with about two weeks worth of entries. The Keshet students are practicing ‘control’ and this includes waiting your turn, being considerate of your friends, being kind and polite, walking calmly and quietly in the hallways… being a good listener.  They earned their Special Day, voted for ‘Pajama Day’ and came to school in jammies on Thursday. 

xMusic with Morah Dawn this week was a  team game of ‘clap and name the note’ with a choice of a  two or four point clue. Both teams were spot on, and I think we’re now ready for musical notation cards, laying out cards to a tune of a familiar song.  

 

 

•  Yoga Yeladim with Morah Sherri was a ‘Shabbat’ theme - we enjoyed many Shabbat tunes, and acted out a short story about how we celebrate Shabbat - by resting (child’s pose) and enjoying time with our families and friends in Temple (DD pose), how we prepare and clean for Shabbat, dress in our fancy clothes, enjoy Mom’s chicken soup and Kugel and an afternoon ‘Walking Meditation’.  Ask your child what ‘Shabbat candle pose’ looks like. 

See this week's photos here https://photos.app.goo.gl/ECecauPyNNzB6xkv5