Dear Peach Room Families,

Welcome back! We hope you enjoyed some time off with your families! Our peaches were so happy to be back together and we started off our week with lots of very sweet hugs and hello’s! 

After being away for just over a week, our friends eased back into their school routine smoothly. We kept our focus on interactions and gentle reminders to help support them through this transition. Although we did not work on any big projects, there were many opportunities for exploration and experimentation through both fine and gross motor provocations. 

Our friends explored gross motor activities by riding bikes, rocking on rocking horses, and pushing a shopping cart and a baby doll stroller around the classroom.

Fine motor explorations continued with our sensory bin filled with pasta and pots. Our friends used their imagination in different ways to pretend they were making pasta, cake or juice made from pasta. Some friends asked for gloves and filled them with pasta, which became a good touch and feel sensory activity.

 

We also did a lot of drawing and coloring with markers, paint dots and chalk on a piece of paper and on our chalkboard. 

It's so amazing how each friend used their imagination to express what they were drawing. 

Liran: Morah can you help me to draw yellow flowers.

Alma: I can make lots of circles .

Audrey chose paint dots to make lots of dots on her paper.

Leeann: Morah look I can do it too!

Kai: It's a horse!

Aria, Etai and Leif looked at friends and decided to join them with drawing.

When our friends scribble or draw, they develop cognitively by expanding imagination and creativity. They develop their fine motor skills by  holding a paintbrush or pencil. They learn to name colors and how to mix colors together to create new colors. They distinguish shapes, purposely create shapes and express their feelings and ideas.   

Shabbat Shalom,

Morah Ora & Rivky

Dear Families,

As we continued preparation for Pesach, there was much to explore and investigate this week. Our focus was on the Seder meal and the meaning of each element included in these special nights.

Grape Juice

 

Our friends made grape juice using mallets and smashed the grapes as we talked about how we drink four cups of juice/wine with the Seder. The mallets were loud when they accidentally struck the table rather than the grapes. Some friends liked this sensation and continued doing it purposely, while others covered their ears and preferred using their fingers to pinch. Then they literally got to enjoy the fruits of their labor and drank the grape juice!

Maror

 

Our friends explored the taste of the bitter maror as well as celery, parsley  dipped in salt water. Their reactions were so funny: some friends made funny faces as they bit into the maror while others really liked the taste of salt. Celery was a bit more familiar to most of our friends and some enjoyed the taste. Morah Ora explained that this was meant to remind us of the tears and hardships experienced by the Jewish people while in Egypt and as they made their way across the desert.

Eggs

Another food we explored from the Seder plate was eggs. Morah Rivky boiled eggs then peeled and cut them. Our friends explored the white part of the egg and the yolk. Audrey preferred not to touch the egg. Asher first ate the yolk then the whites. Etai, Liran, and Leeann asked for more and said, "That's yummy egg." 

Alma said, "Morah- look my mommy pack me egg for snack too!" Leif choose to eat only half of his egg. Aria quietly enjoyed her piece of egg with a happy face.

Our friends have been learning about shapes. We’ve been talking a lot about pyramids, and we incorporated the shapes of a pyramid into our learning using the light table. We spoke about the triangle shape because pyramids look like triangles. We need bricks to build pyramids and they’re  square. Our friends had some time to use markers to draw shapes on the light table. Then we used magnetiles to make shapes on top of our marker work. Liran and Leeann chose to build in color patterns. Alma and Asher used their fingers to trace the shapes on the light table. Lief, Etai, and Aria chose to get the cardboard boxes and build with them on the floor. Kai looked and decided to add some animals to their building.

 

Shabbat Shalom,

Morah Ora & Morah Rivky

Pesach & Matzah

Dear Families,

The  highlight of this  week was making homemade matzah. Each friend poured water into the sensory table full of flour, mixing it together to create dough. Some friends enjoyed the sticky texture while mixing the ingredients with their hands. Other friends did not, so they opted to use a spoon or kitchen utensils. Once their dough was ready, they rolled it into a ball and patted it. Then they took turns using our rolling pin to get it nice and thin. 

The morahs helped them move their matzah dough to our baking paddles, and they each had a turn to put it into our matzah "oven". We counted to ten in English and then in Hebrew and the matzah was magically baked for them to taste! Most friends seemed to enjoy their matzah though they did ask for water. 

We had an impromptu snack in our dramatic play kitchen complete with kiddush cups. One friend did not care for her matzah at all, saying, "Yucky!" and tried to scrape it off her tongue. She went to get a drink of water to wash it down. It's always interesting to see their reactions to trying new things. All of our friends enjoyed the process and worked hard on this project.

Friends are continuing to explore the concept of constructing pyramids in two areas of our room: our sensory table with wet sand and trays/containers for brick making and also our block area with duplos and cardboard builders. They loved building duplo pyramids and then knocking them down over and over!

We are noticing more and more how friendships have developed within our class. It is truly incredible to watch as they greet one another and us each morning, especially after an absence. They notice and ask about friends who are not at school. They help each other with simple tasks. They love to dance and play together. They are quite simply amazing little people.

Next week we are going to start exploring the concepts of a hagadah and  make our own to bring home so at the seder night our friends could follow the steps with their families.

Shabat Shalom, 

Morah Ora & Morah Rivky