Brave like a Maccabee

 The Chanuka Story continued this week with all of us getting into a cave (that we turned our table into). We took our Torah's & Shabbos Candles so we can still learn Torah and do mitzvos. 

When Antiochus's soldiers came to check on what we were doing, we quickly hid our Torah's and took out dreidels!

It wasn't very comfortable and fun to live as Jews in caves! A brave man Yehuda Maccabee stood up and said "Mi La'Hashem Eilai" "Whoever is for Hashem, come with me!" lets come out and fight King Antiochus and his not nice rules!

The children all raised their hands, and said yes- lets fight back!

We went into the Mini Beis Hamikdash for the continuation of the story! It was sad to see Antoichus's soldiers ruining our precious Beis Hamikdash. He was breaking all the olive oil's so that there would not be any Kosher oil to light the menorah.

Our Maccabee friends RAN to help clean up the Beis Hamikdash, 

and search for oil so we can light the Menorah!

It was very exciting to find ONE oil with the seal still on it

We poured some oil into a glass cup to see how oil can burn! The second miracle that we celebrate is that the oil that was only enough to burn for one night, lasted for 8 nights!

 

One of the ways we reinforced the true strength of the Maccabees was by posting our Mitzvah notes on a big Maccabee shield! The Jewish Macabees won the war because of all the mitzvah's they did and their trust in Hashem!

Cave painting & Menorah painting

 

Dreidel Centers:

We've been using the dreidel to have fun learning to recognize the letters Nun, Gimmel, Hay and Shin.

We did patterning with colored dreidels and also using dry erase boards wrote down the letter our dreidel landed on! Menachem drew a Shin!

 

Chaya Leah made  a gimmel on a dreidel using shapes!

                                                  

Alef Beis Letter recognition games!

Hebrew Letter Yud

This week we learned the hebrew letter Yud. We opened a siddur and pointed out that whenever we see 2 yuds together it is Hashem's name! After scrunching our bodies into the shape of a yud, we sang the song, "Hashem is here, Hashem is there, Hashem is truly everywhere...up up, down down...all around..." 

In that spirit we went on a Yud hunt all around our classroom! The children had to find the Yuds that were hidden all around! 

Hebrew Letters Kaf & Chaf

We introduced the letters Kof (with a dot) and Chof .

We did a tricky worksheet to sort out the Kofs and Chofs that look so similar! We also used our hand to make a fist/dot and every time Morah pointed to the letter Kof, we put it in our belly, and every time she pointed to the letter Chof, we put it behind our backs!

Yud Tes Kislev- Rosh Hashana for Chassidut!

We celebrated with a school wide hot lunch, with delicious vegetable soup and Pizza! Rabbi Lang told an animated story of a King whose son was very sick! Ask your child to tell you the story!