Welcome back and Tu B’Shevat

Dear 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 hello! 

After being away for just two weeks our friends eased back into their school routine smoothly. We kept our focus on interactions and gentle reminders to help support them through this.

A highlight of this week was that our friends began exploring Tu B'Shvat (the new year for the trees) We started our week playing in the kitchen area, which we loved! In the the kitchen area we had pretend fruits and vegetables. Our friends used their sorting skills to sort the fruits from the vegetables. We spoke about which fruits grow from the ground, and then practiced saying the Brochos!

   We say the bracha, Ha'adama for the fruits and vegetables that grow from the ground.

   We say the bracha, Pri haetz for the fruits that grow on the trees.

In the sensory table this week,  we had soil, plants, seeds, and pots. Were practiced our planting skills. As we did this, we talked about all of the things that plants and trees need to grow healthy: soil, water and sunlight to make their own food.

Next week we are going to plants our own pots to see how beans or seeds grow into something big.

At the table, we had clay, play dough and branches set out for our friends to sculpt their own trees. Playing and molding clay can be extremely therapeutic for a child who needs to physically express their emotions. In addition, their fingers are working to strengthen their fine motor skills and dexterity while their brain is working on their imagination and creativity.

With welcoming friends back to school, we had Liran's Birthday party and welcomed our new friend, Etai, to our peach room class. We  baked a cake together to celebrate Liran's birthday! We took turns pouring ingredients and mixing, and of course tasting it! 

Next week we will continue exploring Tu B’Shvat and watch our seeds grow . 

Shabbat Shalom,

Morah Ora & Morah Rivky.

Winter and Arctic Animals

Dear Families,

This week we continued exploring concepts of winter.

Learning Through Books

We read more books about winter and snowflakes. Our favorite book was Three Little Kittens by Paul Galdone. Not only did the morahs read this book to our friends,  we heard the audio version as well. Our friends were so focused and quite while listening the story.

         

Early Literacy Activity

Our friends were greeted with a set table of gloves and mittens alongside blue and white paints.They eagerly tried on the gloves working hard to fit their tiny fingers into them.

Then, they slowly dipped their gloves in the paint and stamped it on the paper. The slow stamping turned into fast moving hands on the paper as they mixed the colors and felt the cold paint seep through the glove creating a wonderful sensory exploration.

Arctic Animals Exploration

In the sensory bin this week we had arctic animals with snow, which we made from baking soda mixed with hair conditioner and ice. It was freezing cold!

 

We spoke about animals that live in the cold weather.

These animals stay warm because they have fur, and as humans we need hats, scarves and mittens to be warm when we go outside.

 

When we came back to school the next day, we opened our sensory table and we realized that our ice and snow had melted down. "Ohhhh noooo," we said. We took out a bin and started to rescue the animals from the water. Our friends had so much fun playing with the animals and rescuing them. 

Shabbat Shalom 

Morah Ora & Morah Rivky

 

We wish you a restful winter break, and we will see you soon! 

 

      

Winter is Fun!

Dear Families,

This week we explored winter in our classroom.

 It was so cold that it was snowing!

Our friends had their hats, scarves, and mittens on.

We practiced how to put our mittens on and off and match them by colors.

It’s Snowing!

Our friends played and touched different textures of snow (pretend snow).

Around the classroom we had snow made from pillow stuffing. Our friends  had fun running around the classroom and throwing snow up and watching it fall to the floor.

When we were done playing we took shovels and shoveled all the pretend snow into the bins.

In the sensory table we had crushed ice as a snow.

Our friends put their gloves on and were ready to build a snow man.

Some friends tasted the ice and said, "It's ice cream!"

The vocabulary words we used this week were:

Fluffy, cold, snow, and winter.

Art Exploration: Can You Make a Snowflake?

We used q-tips to create our own snowflake shapes. Liran, Leeann and Alma were focusing while they were using the q-tips. They didn’t even get their hands messy with paint! Aria, Asher, Audrey and Leif chose to use their hands to create hand print snowflakes.

Next week we will explore more about winter and have more frosty fun! 

Shabbat Shalom 

Morah Ora & Morah Rivky

Chanukah Exploration

Dear Parents

This week we explored Chanukah through storybooks. The words and concepts we are working on with our friends are Chanukah, Menorah and Dreidel. Leeann and Liran said, "Menorah" and Asher said, "Chanukah" very clearly. We are noticing many exciting language developments in all of the children.

We  explored candle wax through fine motor play with candles and our menorah. We used real candles and they have been practicing placing all eight candles in the menorah as well as the shamash candle. We counted the candles and sorted them by color and broken vs. non-broken. We saved all of our broken candles from this work and our friends created a group collage on canvas using candles and bits of wax and wick.

Our explorations continued with olives and olive oil. Our friends have been smashing olives to make oil as well as tasting them. Some of our friends likes olives, some do not, and some even said "More please!"

Happy Chanukah & Shabbat Shalom!

Morah Ora & Morah Rivky

Kindness & Thanksgiving

Dear Families,

Kindness

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

Discovery Table

Our friends continued investigating pumpkins. They really enjoyed scooping out pumpkin seeds using spoons. It was very interesting for morahs to observe our friends and see how long they can concentrate on this activity. Our friends explored their work for a good 30 minutes! When we were done scooping pumpkins seeds, each friend put them on a plate, and we counted how many each had.

Liran had 30 seeds

Asher had 35 seeds

Leif had 30 seeds

Audrey had 25 seeds

Aria had 10 seeds

Alma had 10 seeds

Leeann had 33 seeds

Spice Exploration

This was a class favorite! We used our senses 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 by drizzling glue on hard paper and pouring spices over the glue.

We hope to see you at the Thanksgiving Picnic Brunch next Wednesday at 9:00am! 

Next week will be short, but busy. We will be working on our heirloom project to be sent home at the thanksgiving brunch.

 

Shabbat Shalom,

Morah Ora & Morah Rivky

Fall and Thanksgiving

Dear Families.

With fall in the air and Thanksgiving around the corner, this week we used our senses to discover and investigate a pumpkin. Our friends took turns touching the outside of the pumpkin. They noticed the texture was mostly soft with a few bumpy rough patches around the pumpkin. Then we cut the pumpkin open and felt the inside. The texture was completely different. 

 

Fine Motor and Math Table Top Activity

We had play dough and cranberries on the table. Our friends used their grasping motor skills by picking cranberries with their fingers and sticking them inside the play dough. Then we all had a turn counting how many cranberries we stuck in. We counted in English and Hebrew and our friends repeated after Morah.

Science Exploration

Our sensory table was filled with sand mixed with spices this week. Cinnamon, Paprika, and Oregano aromas were present as the friends used measuring spoons and cups to pour sand mixed with spices from spoon to cup. We saw that the Paprika and Cinnamon spices left a residue on our hands.  

Shabbat Shalom 

Morah Ora,Morah Rivky.

fine motor skills and manipulating different objects

Dear Families.

We would like to welcome Alma and her family to our Peach Room family.

This week we were working on fine motor skills and manipulating different objects. We had a few stations for each friend to visit if they chose to go there.   

 

We explored  manipulative boxes fastened with all sorts of locks. Our friends had to use their fine motor skills to open up each different box. Inside, they found a fun surprise! The boxes were filled with cylinder pieces that they could take in and out. This took a lot of patience!

Our friends worked on the puzzles in our classroom as well. There were animal puzzles, transportation puzzles and shapes puzzles for them to explore. We needed to problem solve and find the matching pieces of puzzle. There was a lot of team work going on inside the Peach Room during this task!

We returned many times to drawing with markers and paint dots this week. When we paint, scrabble, or draw we are learning:

To develop our imagination.
Fine motor skills to hold the brush or marker.
The names of colors and how to make new ones.
To identify and create different shapes.
To express our feelings and our ideas.
About symmetry and balance.

Shabbat Shalom 

Morah Ora, & Morah Rivky.