Friday, November 16, 2018

Thanksgiving is coming!

Dear parents, with fall in the air and Thanksgiving around the corner, this week we use our senses to discover and investigate a pumpkin. Our friends took turns touching the outside of the pumpkin, they noticed that the texture was mostly soft with a few bumpy rough patches around the pumpkin. Then we felt the inside. The texture was completely different!

Spice Exploration
This was a class favorite! We used our sense of smell, sight, and touch to explore and create a scent collage with spices. Our friends had a chance to smell each of the spices. They then decided which ones they wanted to use to create their own scent collage.

Yehonathan preferred the cinnamon, Ella really like the cumin, Angie liked both the color and the scent of the paprika.They experimented using paint and stamp brushes to spread the glue before sprinkling the spice of their choice. We talked about how we use spices when we cook our favorite food at home.

Thanksgiving
Our friends have been practicing using kindness with our friends and Morahs. We talked about the mitzvos that our friends did at home and practiced using mitzvah hands, mitzvah feet, and our mitzvah mouth at school.

Dear parents, we hope to see you at the Thanksgiving lunch on Wednesday at 11:30!

Shabbat Shalom - Morah Ora and Morah Goldie

Friday, November 9, 2018

Dear parents, 

This week our friends did different activities with transportation. Every morning of this week our friends matched the transportation puzzles, specifically Yehonathan enjoyed these puzzles a lot!

Then our friends took their cars to the car wash in our sensory table where there was soapy water and sponges.  Angie and Madison were scrubbing their cars to make sure they were super clean. When our friends were done cleaning their cars they took pretend people for a ride around the classroom.

Another great activity our friends did was painting with cars. They stretched, walked, crossed the middle line, and drove their cars right through the paint during this gross motor activity. We also made our own traffic lights and Morah explained to our friends the safe way to cross the streets.

We would like to thank our kindergarten friends and their Morah for making such a delicious soup to wish us a happy Rosh-Chodesh.

Shabbat shalom! -Morah Ora and Morah Goldie

Friday, November 2, 2018

Dear parents, 
This week in the peach room our friends had so many fun activities with animals. We had farm animals in the sensory table with sand and different size scoopers to find and name them all.

The next day we washed and scrubbed animals with sponges and toothbrushes which our friends enjoyed! With the beautiful weather outside Morah likes to set some activities outside for our other classroom friends to join in and play together with us.

We brought wild animals with white paint and black paper, each friend picked an animal they liked and dipped it in the white paint and then stamped it on the black paper to see the different foot shapes each animal has. We spoke about how animals and people have different shaped feet, some are longer than others, some are wider than others.

This week we learned about Parshas Noah. Morah Ora made a make-shift ark out of a big cardboard box with cut out windows. We took turns peaking through the windows and said hello to our friends and Morah’s. Then Morah added a bridge to our ark. Our friends took turns going inside the ark and balancing their bodies on the bridge. These activities help our friends build some motor skills!

On Friday our friends went outside to play with the animals in the petting zoo! We were so excited to be able to pet our beautiful animals and hear all the different types of sounds they make, and feel how different each animal feels.

The peach room would like to thank Yehonathan for donating the new animals and magnatiles for our friends to play with! Thank you so much!!

Good Shabbos!
Morah Ora and Morah Goldie

Friday, October 26, 2018

Dear parents,
 
This week in the peach room we continued learning and exploring the days of creation. On day five Hashem created sea creatures and birds.

This week we had play-dough birds, butterflies and feathers on the table. Our friends used their imagination to explore different ways of playing with the tools. In the sensory bin we had fish with fishing nets, our friends pretended we were fishing.

On the sixth day Hashem created animals and people. Our friends played with farm and zoo animals as we made the sounds they make, moooo! Rawr! Hashem created such an amazing world! Blue skies, the sun and the moon, millions of twinkling stars, flowers and trees, oceans, sea animals, and of course people.

People can do so many amazing things! We can think, we can build, we can drive cars and fly airplanes. How could it be that people can do all these things? Because Hashem gives us so much strength to do so!

On the seventh day Hashem decided that Shabbat is going to be a day of rest. When Shabbat came everything stopped, and this completes the seven days of creation. With Shabbat the world was now complete.

Every Friday in CJP we get in the Shabbat spirit and we bake challah and sing Shabbat songs. We make special brochos and we have a Shabbat party!  We will continue learning about Shabbat in depth in January, culminating with our Family Shabbat Dinner. Next week we are going to learn about the Parsha of Noah and the animals.

Shabbat shalom! - Morah Ora and Morah Goldie

Friday, October 19, 2018

Dear parents,

Everyday our mornings begin with activities to help our friends practice their fine motor skills as well as hand coordination.

Madison, Ella, and Hailey like to practice their skills in the sensory boxes. They like to open and close them as well as drop the different materials inside. Angie likes to play with puzzles and is ready to use her skills to play with more complex puzzles. Yehonathan likes to count all the materials on the table, which he’s really good at!

In the peach room this week we are continuing to learn about the days of Hashem’s creation. On the third day Hashem created land, trees, and flowers. On Monday we had green play- dough and sticks on the table, all of our friends made pretty green trees!

On Tuesday we made a beautiful art project and we colored with green paint and sand. On Wednesday we made a nature collage on sticky contact paper with flowers, leaves, and sand. Morah is going to hang this beautiful work in the classroom! On Thursday our friends made sensory jars with the moon, sun, and stars.We practiced pouring water from a pitcher to a jar without spilling on the tray!

This week in the sensory bin we had different kinds of animals with sand and grass. We learned that Hashem created animals to live on the land.

Next week we will continue learning about the last few days of creation. 

Thank you!
Shabbat shalom - Morah Ora and Morah Goldie

Thursday, October 11, 2018

Hello! We would like to welcome Yehonathan, a new boy that joined our classroom. We are so happy to have him join the CJP family!

     This week we began learning about Parsha Bereshis. We learned that Bereshis is the first word in the Torah and that in this Parsha Hashem created the beautiful world we live in. We made many projects to demonstrate what was created on each day of the week. 

     On day one Hashem created day and night. Our friends used white and black paint to make day and night. In the sensory bin we had black and white beans, as well as little suns, moons, and stars. Our friends enjoyed scooping beans with scoopers and speaking about how we sleep at night time and say Layla Tov to all our friends and family. When it’s light outside we see the sun and we say boker tov. We go to school and play!

     On the second day of creation Hashem created the sea and the sky. The sensory table was filled with blue water, soap (to make some waves), and gel. Our friends had so much fun using their hands to feel the little gel balls in the water. To explore the clouds in the sky morah prepared a fun activity for our friends. She put mirrors on the table with shaving cream and pretty blue stones. Our friends used their hands to create different types of clouds. 

     We also used blue paint and rolling paint brushes to create the sea with waves, and for the sky and clouds we used cotton balls and white paint. We repeated after Morah’s words and said “The sky is white and the sea is blue.” Next week we will continue learning and exploring the days of Hashem’s creation.

Shabbat shalom! - Morah Ora, Morah Goldie :)

Friday, October 5, 2018

Dear Parents,
Welcome back after the high holidays, we are happy to see each other and be back on our regular routine! 

Routines and Schedule
Our friends are growing up and developing new skills every day.  When we start to sing the clean up song our friends right away know to put the toys back where they belong.  Then we start to sign the choo choo train song and everyone know that they need to get their green circles and put them on the floor, sit down on them, and wait for Morah to start davening with them.  Our friends know that before we eat a snack or lunch we need to wash hands with soap.  When it's time to go outside our friends run to the door and knock on the door to make sure everyone in the hallway knows we are coming outside.  When they see their cots ready for them, they know it is time to nap and they get ready to rest.  Creating a predictable routine is so important for children and helps them know what to expect in their environment.  Feel free to look at our visual pictorial schedule that is hanging up outside of our classroom. 

We are very excited to welcome a  new friend to our class next week, Yehonathan!  Morah Goldie will also be joining the peach room as our second Morah.  We can't wait!

Shabbat Shalom!
Morah Ora