While Morah Perline has been enjoying time with her daughter and new grandchild I have been spending the day with the Kindergarten class. Since I don't read Hebrew we have spent the day on English work. We started working on community helpers this week. We have talked about park rangers, vets and zookeepers, and firefighters. We also learned about using the comma when writing a letter. We are practicing by writing letters to our friends. When we played sight word bingo I was really impressed by how far the students have come in knowing their sight words. 

We are learning about money in math. This includes learning about needs versus wants and the difference between goods and services. We are playing games to learn to identify the coins and also they value so we can add up amounts. We have played bingo and a board game to practice this skill.

I have tried to add some fun art projects this week. The kids loved when we learned about pointillism and asked to do another project. We made a forest with a park ranger in pointillism style. We made fire trucks with boxes. We practiced our critical thinking skills by putting together a fire truck puzzle. We painted using match box cars instead of paintbrushes.

Focusing on social emotional skills we have been talking about how it is more important to be kind than to be right. We have talked about how when you are right it is important to be gracious. We also talked about how there is no need to argue to prove you are right if it is hurting another person’s feelings. 

Good Shabbos!

Morah Kristina

B”H

Dear Kindergarten Parents of the Purple Room,

CJP Shabbat Dinner

Kindergarten did an outstanding job at the CJP Shabbat Dinner. They were whizzes with the Parsha questions, answering loudly, clearly and correctly so all the parents could hear, and they shared many interesting Shabbat facts with the parents as well! Kindergarten had all their Shabbat artwork and crafts beautifully displayed. Truly impressive. We are so proud of them.

Kriyah -  Hebrew Reading

Kindergarten is learning about Israel and we are incorporating more Ivrit words into their daily vocabulary. Words such as בקר טוב (Boker tov) – Good morning, תודה (Todah) – Thank you,  ארץ (Eretz) – land,  ישראל (Yisroel) – Israel, and many cities in Israel. There are street signs all over the classroom of different places and cities Kindergarten will be ‘visiting’. They already have a plane with which to fly from Arizona to Israel. It’s an El Al plane, of course. Parents are welcome to come see the plane before it ‘takes off’ but please remember to bring your ‘passport’. The Kindergarten children are already prepared with theirs.

The children are going to visit the holy city of Yerushalayim and the Kosel/Kotel which they know is the last remaining wall of the Beis Hamikdosh. They painted their own Kosel and after looking at pictures of the real thing decided which colors they would use for their class Kosel: some thought it looked gold and some thought it appeared light brown. The class Kosel was painted both. It now hangs at the Tefila Circle area and the children are taking the El Al plane to daven there.

Parsha

Kindergarten has been entranced this week with a particular item the Kohen Gadol (High Priest) wore when he served Hashem in the Mishkan (Tabernacle). The Choshen (breastplate) caught their intense interest. It possessed 12 different beautiful gems engraved with the names of the 12 Shevatim (Tribes) in addition to those of our Patriarchs. Kindergarten was very curious to know which gems represented which son and played a game with a giant ‘choshen’ (breastplate) matching the gems to the names and putting them in the correct position. This was a very enjoyable way to integrate Kriyah (Hebrew reading).

Parsha Song:

https://www.chabad.org/549284

V’atoh tetzaveh
The Jews were told by Moshe
To bring shemen (oil) for pure light
For the Menorah to burn bright

Chorus:
Aharon was chosen to be
The Kohen Gadol from Shevet Levi
He wore many special things
And a Choshen (breastplate) with gold rings

The Choshen was made for him
It had the names of the twelve Shevatim (tribes)
All the clothes had to fit just right
He served Hashem with all his might

Chorus:

Shabbat Shalom!

Morah Perline

hB”H

Dear Kindergarten Parents of the Purple Room,

Kriyah -  Hebrew Reading

Kindergarten reviewed Shabbat words this week:   שבת (Shabbos),  דג (dohg) – fish, בשר  (bosor) – meat,  יין (yayin) – wine, חלה  (challah),  נרות / נר (ner/neros) - candle/candles, שמור  (shamor) – guard, זכור (zochor) - remember. They learned about the gematria (numerical value) of many of the Shabbat words and found that when they added the digits of the words they came to 7! What a hint to use these items on the 7th day of the week, Shabbat!

Shabbat

Creating Challah plates, Kiddush cups, Shabbat Art, and Havdala items such as Havadala candles and besomim boxes were just a few of the many creations Kindergarten made this week. They had so much fun spray painting the tablecloths and making napkin rings for the CJP Shabbat dinner. Spray painting has been strongly requested to be repeated. The Kindergarten created special Shabbat necklaces for their moms to wear at the dinner...,.

Kindergarten is eager to share at the CJP Shabbat dinner interesting facts about Shabbat. For example: why we light at least TWO Shabbat candles, and why we have TWO challos for Shabbos. They can’t wait for the Shabbat dinner!

Kindergarten learned about the ‘goodbye service’, aka Havdala, we make to say goodbye to Shabbat at the end of the Shabbat day. They know that we receive an extra neshama for Shabbat and when that goes away at the end of the Shabbat day, we feel a bit sad. We therefore inhale the delicious invigorating smell of the besomim at the Havdala ceremony. They learned how at the Havdala service we light the Havdala candle and then later put it out and see the difference between light and dark which reminds us of the difference between holy and mundane, Shabbat and weekdays.

Parsha

Kindergarten learned about many items that were made for the Mishkan (Tabernacle). One of these items was the Menorah. Kindergarten visited the Chabad shul to explore the Menorah they found there. There are many different ways of making a menorah but Kindergarten learned that the shape of the menorah that was built for the Mishkan (used in the desert) and later put in the Beis Hamikdash in Israel had 7 straight branches, in addition to cups that faced downwards and pretty flowers on the branches, too. They know the menorah had SEVEN branches with the three flames on either side of the center bent toward the center flame. What a nes (miracle)!

Shabbat Shalom!

Morah Perline

B”H

Dear Kindergarten Parents of the Purple Room,

Kriyah -  Hebrew Reading

Kindergarten integrated tray painting with kriyah (reading), blending colors and reviewing Shabbat words - lots of sensory fun!  Some words Kindergarten learned this week were: שבת (Shabbos),  דג (dohg) – fish, בשר  (bosor) – meat,  יין (yayin) – wine, חלה  (challah),  נרות / נר (ner/neros) - candle/candles, שמור  (shomor) – guard, זכור (zochor) - remember.

Shabbat

Shabbat is in the air! Kindergarten has been using paint in many different styles to create Shabbat Art. In addition to tray painting, they greatly enjoyed marble painting which will be used for more Kindergarten art. Kindergarten combined pastel drawn Shabbat candles with paint.

Parsha

The children learned that Hashem gave us many mitzvos. Some mitzvos Hashem gave us the reasons for and some He didn’t. One of the mitzvot we learn from this week’s Parsha is kosher, not to mix milk and meat together. They played a sorting game, separating milk/dairy and meat items.

Parsha Discussion:

What is the reason Hashem gave why we shouldn’t mix milk and meat together?

Jonah: It would make Hashem sad.

Nosson: Because one is watery and one is not.

Ben: I don’t know.

Shimmy: It could make people allergic.

Vella: I don’t know.

After discussing it the children found out that we really don’t know why because Hashem didn’t give us a reason for keeping kosher! We don’t know Hashem’s reason. We just keep the mitzva because Hashem told us to. The children discussed how when their parents tell them to do things, they sometimes give a reason and sometimes don’t, but the children have to listen to their parents anyway.

Kosher Song

https://youtu.be/7BHhRTjv_sU

All the animals that I eat,

Must chew their cud and have split feet.

Kosher meat just can’t be beat,

So I want only kosher.

So every time you’re in the market

Only buy food with a kosher sign on it.

It’s good for me and it’s good for you

And what do you know?

Hashem loves it, too.

All the chocolate bars I eat

They taste real good and taste real sweet

But I’ll make sure to look and see

The sign that says it’s kosher.

So every time you’re in the market,

Only buy food with a kosher sign on it.

It’s good for me and it’s good for you,

And Hashem, He loves it, too.

Conversation overheard as the children are drawing pictures:

Ben: Look, the giraffe is wearing a skirt.

Nosson: No, it’s not.

Jonah: He’s using his imagination.

Shabbat Shalom!

Morah Perline