Back in our happy place!

There are no words to describe the joy of seeing our friends again at Gan. This whole week was filled with pure joy and a lot of catch up.

These last two weeks our 'big idea' is being together :) 

Adelle, was so excited to show her friends what was in her lunch box.

Catching up while playing together.

 O boy did we miss davening together. What a beautiful sight to see the children's happiness while doing Mitzvahs. 

Bubble fun!

 Was so sweet to notice the different skills they acquired during the break. Yanky showed us how he can write his name two different ways.

Reflection is an important process in our development. At circle time, we graphed what it was like to learn from home vs school.

We heard a lot of highlights that they shared with us. Arik told us about his blow up Jacuzzi and how he gently held his baby brother Avraham. 

Shmuel told us he missed the sand box at school. 

 Decorating 'cakes' with shaving cream frosting and shape sprinkles.

 Rubber band painting was such a fun process and beautiful outcome.

 Using our fine motor skills trying to help our animals get freed from the rubber bands.

Happy 4th birthday to Chana Rochel.

Washing our hands for 20 seconds, singing our washing song. We are so proud of our friends for helping us keep our classroom clean and making sure to keep washing our bad germs away.

Follow the Leader

This week in conjunction with Purim, Pre-K talked about what it means to be a leader.

Mordechai and Esther are great examples of leaders we want to be like.

A leader is someone who shows other people what to do in a kind loving way.

Leaders always try their best and will work together as part of a team.

Moshe told us that sometimes C-TEEN has  leaders too!

To really understand and internalize this concept, everyone worked very hard to create their own Shabbos Party Box, for them to lead a Shabbos party with their family at home!

From start to finish! Creating the box that would hold our party supplies was a lot of fun!

Because no Shabbos party is complete without a story!

Each child beaded a story chain to help us remember the story we will tell.

(copy of the story included in box so parents can remind)

Spencer designs her matching game for the box.

Preparing our food art activity!

We are going to show our family how to do it!

Knowing how to work with a team is important for a leader.

This STEM activity needed everyone to pull on their strings to stretch the rubber band to lift and lower each cup into the stack.

A good leader knows how to encourage their teammates!

In this game, we needed to get the hula hoop around the circle without letting go.

Everyone encouraged Mendel when it was a little tricky!

Covering with Kindness!

This week we learned the story of Purim, as its told in the Megilla that we will read on Purim!
Through costumes, puppets and conversation we got to know our Hero's Mordechai and Esther!

The name Esther means hidden! We looked at the way Esther acted throughout the story of Purim. She was humble. Esther was happy the way she was. She didn't brag, or show off how great she was.

King Achashverosh saw how special she was INSIDE. She didn't need makeup or fancy dresses to show her beauty.

Acting out the story!

A Song we learned to remind us of the 4 Mitzva's of Purim:

Send shalach manos to your friend

Give tzedaka to a poor person

Hear the Megilla read in shul

and eat the Purim feast until your full!

Four Mitzvah's of Purim

1. Hear the Megilla- 

We made our own Megilla with pictures and art. Decorated special cases to hold it in, using very fine motor skills to adhere tiny sequins to the glue!

2. Give Tzedaka to 2 people: Covering with Kindness!

We doubled up 2 Purim practices, and gave over a very important lesson to the children! One of the things we do when we listen to the megilla, is make noise (use a gragger) when we hear Haman's name! TO drown out any memory of the evil he did. 

We decided to make our gragger (tool to drown out Haman's name) into a Tzedaka Box! 

The important lesson, is that the best way to get rid of something bad, to block it out of our lives, is to ADD IN MITZVAH's! 

The children worked hard taping decorations onto a Tzedaka Box Gragger! They look forward to doing a mitzvah at the same time as shaking their Gragger!

3. Give Shalach Manos-

It is a Mitzvah to give a gift of food to a friend on Purim day! The children decorated pretty boxes which we will use for our classroom Shalach Manos exchange!

4. The Purim Feast-

Eat a yummy meal and celebrate the holiday with friends and family!

Purim inspired Challa today! Some friends turned their Challah into a Hamentash!

Hide and Seek gets Deep

Reviewing the Purim story with our very own Megillahs.

Role playing it with toys and puppet shows!

After learning about Haman's character, we learned what happens when we hear his name during the Megillah. Whenever a friend picked up the Haman puppet, we made lots of noise.

Making our very own royal graggers. Thank you Morah Malka for all the orange juice containers!

 Discovering at the sensory table what makes a louder sound when its filled or just a little bit?

Learning shapes while making Hamentashen.

Before learning the technique of making a Hamentashen, we focused on the shapes will be creating, the triangle and circle.

Sholom tracing a circle.

 Mina and Chana Rochel placing stickers on the triangle lines.

 Esther, using a circle paper to practice how to make a Hamentashen.

Professional hamentashen bakers at work.

 Portion controlling the jelly.

Why do we eat Hamentashen ? Why do we dress up ?

We learned a deep lesson while playing a hide and seek game.

We hid a Torah in the palace, who can find it? Is it still there even though we can't SEE it?

After finding the Torah we learned that when Esther was going to the palace she was reassured that Hashem is IN the palace too! When evil Haman made mean rules, Hashem was with us too it was like He was hiding!

That's why we hid the filling in the Hamentashen, and get dressed up!

Wearing our masks and making a clown costume on top of our pictures.

Menachem, making a self portrait while dressed up as the king. Arik, used a necklace to trace to make his big van.