We had a great week at school.  We started discussing color theory with the children.  We focused on the primary color red and how it 
stands alone.  The other primary colors will be done at another time as well as the secondary colors. Then we will do fun color mixing 
activities for the children to explore. There were new activities placed throughout the classroom.  In practical life, there was a very 
popular pumpkin scrubbing work that the children enjoyed.  There were new art mediums placed out. The children were busy in the 
classroom and really understand their routine now.  I started doing individual lessons with the children and assessing them this week.
This is very fun to get to know their language and math skills so they can be challenged to the level where they should be.  The 
children are so proud of their work and are eager to learn new concepts. I’m really proud of all of them.  Yay!!!!
 
At the beginning of the week we talked about Yom Kippur - our day to reflect on our past year and how we can bring our best self into 
the New Year-  We read the story of Jonah and the Whale teaching G-D’s forgiveness for our wrongdoings after praying and we 
learned about the hardest words to say - ‘I’m sorry’.  On another day we discussed how sometimes we don’t do our best and we 
make mistakes. On Yom Kippur we are given the opportunity to apologize for our wrongdoings by saying the Al Het prayer which 
translates to ‘missed the mark’- such as even a professional archer will sometimes miss the bull’s-eye. We practiced our bow and 
arrow yoga pose and enjoyed a fun activity outside practicing with magnetic darts to aim for the bullseye on a target.  The children 
loved it! 
We had a wonderful Shabbat Celebration where we set our Shabbat Table with a kiddish cup, Challah and candlesticks, and a vase 
of flowers to make it special. We sang Bim Bom Shabbat Shalom HEY! , We read the Story of Bim and her brother Bom who worked 
all week and then each saved Friday to do their good deeds/ Mitzvot of building houses and baking challah for the needy who 
couldn't afford to pay for their work and then they rest and enjoy Shabbat together at sunset. We sang & danced to the song ‘I’ve 
got that Shabbat Feeling’
 
Keshet
The Keshet students are working with the geography puzzle maps, land and water forms and flags of North America.  There are a few 
Practical Life activities on the shelves - upper end pouring water through a funnel into various glass bottles and having to watch 
carefully so as to avoid spilling.  The art activities, which are theme based, include tracing, cutting on the line, and sewing.  They made 
Jonah and the whale 'bleeding tissue paper' collages - water applied to the tissue releases the color and the tissue paper is later 
peeled  off.  We've been doing assessments to see where the children are in terms of number, letter recognition, and fine motor skills, 
and then present activities to challenge each child.  The Montessori phonetic approach includes the 'moveable alphabet' (individual 
wooden letters) as the children sound out and create words, 3-letter word BINGO games and the vowel boxes of objects with matching 
printed words.  
On Monday we had Tashlich; we walked to a nearby pond and threw our breadcrumbs into the moving water as we thought of 
(and in some cases, said out loud) things that we did this year that we could do better or differently this new year. This tradition may be done 
any time between Rosh Hashanah and Sukkot. Some parents reported their children chanting...
'To Tashlich we will go, to Tashlich we will go,
To throw away our aveirot, to Tashlich we will go.'