Rosh Hashana

This week we all learned about the upcoming holiday of Rosh Hashana. We focused on the colors of apples and learned about the blowing of the shofar. We learned that Rosh Hashana is a celebration of the world’s birthday. We had the children create beautiful New Year’s cards and had them dictate to us what they wished for themselves for the coming up New Year. 

This week we did some collaging with glue on an apple cut out with red materials. This was great fun, and a good way to learn about colors; and what a wonderful way for us to strengthen our fine motor skills as we picked up small pieces of paper and place them on glue, which we squeezed out of glue  bottles with our strong hands! We also passed an apple around and described the way it looked and felt. The children gave us some great answers, such as, “its round”, “smells sweet” and “it’s smooth." We learned about where apples come from, and we predicted what color the inside of an apple is and what might be inside an apple. 

This week we learned about estimating. The children were paired in groups of two and asked to estimate how many apples tall they thought they were. After they made their predictions they lied on the carpet and had their assigned partner measure them with the apples. The children had a lot of fun guessing how many apples tall they were and measuring their friends.

We conducted an apple taste test where each child tasted a red, yellow, and green apple. Then each child chose which color apple was their favorite and then we graphed the results.  Believe it or not, there was a three way tie! Next, we moved on to honey. We baked delicious honey cake and sent a piece home. Each child had a turn to mix, stir, measure, and pour ingredients. We then charted what food we like to eat with honey. So many children said “apples.” How appropriate! 

We then experimented with sound. Last week we learned that there are three different sounds that the shofar makes and we got to learn the names of them; Tekiah (one long sound), Teruah (three separate sounds), Shevarim (nine small sounds)  This week we listened to the different sounds of the shofar, counted the blasts, and compared the different sounds that the shofar makes. Is it long or short? Is it high or low? Is it soft or loud? We then attempted to emulate the sounds, by blowing into our hands.

Songs of the Week 

"Five Little Apples"

5 little apples growing on a tree

5 little apples growing, I see.

I shook that tree as hard as I could

Down came an apple- Mmm, was it good!

Now how many are left? (4,3,2,1…) 

"Dip the Apple"

Dip the apple in the honey make a bracha loud and clear Le Shana tova U’metukah have a happy sweet new year (tune of ole my darling Clementine)

(Tune to “Wheels on the Bus”)

 The Shofar in the shul goes toot, toot ,toot

 Toot, toot, toot; Toot, toot, toot

 The shofar in the shul goes toot, toot,

 On Rosh Hashana morning

PAINTING CLASS

We looked at Georges Seurat's famous painting Sunday Afternoon on the Island of la Grande Jatte, where he used the painting style called Pointillism. We then painted our own pictures, by using Q-tips to create a similar style to Seurat. 

First Week of School

 Welcome to a new year! 

Along with transitioning and learning class routines, this week our unit was Getting to Know You. Part of having a successful classroom is creating a strong classroom community. It is important that we learn about each other as well as how to work well together. In order to get to know each other we interviewed each child about some of their favorite things and we will be creating a class book. They also shared with us what they can't wait to do this year. Each child illustrated a picture and then dictated their words to us. 

We additionally worked collaboratively to create a beautiful class collage. The children worked so nicely, sharing their space and their materials to craft our class masterpiece. We also worked together, measuring and taking turns, to make our class playdough. What a busy first week!

For math we graphed how many girls and how many boys are in the class. We then counted them out and then we added up the total. 

PAINTING CLASS 

This year I am teaching an afternoon painting class. We will be focusing on a famous artist and then creating our own masterpieces inspired by the artist of the week. This week we focused on Claude Monet and his Bridge Over a Pond of Water Lilies painting. I used tape and formed the shape of a bridge and then the children water colored the paper (over the tape). We then pull the tape off and voila!