A Lesson in a Suitcase!

 "VeYaakov Halach Ledarko"

"And Yaakov went on his way", a phrase we say after all the beautiful Holidays come to an end. Instead of just saying goodbye and waiting till next year we can take these 'big ideas' and pack them in a 'suitcase' and use it through out the year!

The idea of reflective practice is an important life skill for all of us to master. Being able to reflect on experiences, and see how they can enrich our life ahead adds depth and meaning to one's life.

All in a suitcase

To bring this idea to life we placed some items from all the Holidays/ circle times/ centers into a suitcase! This was a great way to show we are not fully saying 'goodbye' to each Holiday. The beautiful big ideas that we learned can stay with us the whole year!

 

Memory suitcase 

We put out a large assortment of pictures from the past month. Children blowing shofars, dipping apples in honey, building Sukkah’s & Shaking Lulav & Etrog’s!

Each child found pictures they wanted to add in their own personal suitcase.

Rozie found a picture of her trying on slippers for Yom Kippur.

This was a great opportunity for the children to communicate with one another. It was really cute listening to all the 'catch up' conversations from over the Sukkos break.

So good to be back with friends!

 

  

Enjoying the sensory bin.

Talented Levi!

Mistakes can be sweet too!

This week we seamlessly transitioned from Rosh Hashana to the Holiday of Yom Kippur.

The children were very familiar with the concept of 'Being Sweet' and wanting a 'Sweet new year'.

We wanted the children to understand what happens on Yom Kippur?

What happens when we make a mistake?

Yom Kippur Shul Center

Davening in our Shul center was a great time to discuss what we are asking Hashem for. We want a sweet new year and we are SO SORRY for all the mistakes we might have made.

Each child brought in slippers to role play what is worn on the day of Yom Kippur.

 

So many sweet moments were still being documented on our sweet board.
Levi noticed Motty needed help with tying his shoes and offered to help him. He quickly ran over to draw what he did and showed his friends.

And it was catchy ;)

Mistakes become SWEET

For our Yom Kippur we added an 'uh oh' circle on our board.

What happens when we don't do something sweet?

Our puppets role played different scenarios of friends making a mistake and not being sweet to each other.

Saying 'I'm sorry' is a very important life lesson that starts from a very young age.

After saying 'I'm sorry' we have a chance to fix it and make it better.

When a child did a mistake they would document it on the 'uh oh' circle.  After saying I'm sorry and fixing the situation they realized that even when they make a mistake it can be fixed and it makes Hashem so happy.

Menachem and Devorah leah playing with our friend puppets.

Challah dough made by the Torah Tots themselves!

The children are loving our new quiet time routine with mats and blankets!

Sweet twist on a 'Happy new year'!

"May you have a SWEET NEW YEAR!"

The phrase we hear and say again and again in the weeks leading up to Rosh Hashanah- the Jewish New Year.

We wanted to make this meaningful and practical for our class.

Children relate to puppets. We role played different scenarios of friends being nice to each other. 

We used the word SWEET to describe the kind ACTIONS that the children do!

SWEET = Mitzvah's! 

Mitzvah's make us happy and Hashem happy too!

We want a year filled with many sweet Mitzvahs! A year filled with those happy feelings, like when someone does something sweet to us and us to others.

Now it was time to take the tradition of dipping apple or Challah into sweet honey and connect it to this theme!

Each child tasting a little bit of honey.

Each time a child did a 'SWEET' action they used dry erase markers to draw it on our board and simultaneously receive a lick of honey! Sweet =  Mitzvah =  honey!!

Enjoy the SWEET MOMENTS!

Elizabeth and Dovi helped each other trace their hands on paper. They did it again on our Sweet Jar to show their friends what they did.

Devorah Leah helped Mimi get a paper towel after washing her hands!

Muka and Faiga helped each other clean up our classroom!

 Max and Dovi noticed a friend spilled the pennies from our tzedaka box, they quickly jumped on the opportunity and helped clean it all up!!

Bee inspired play dough

 Rosh Hashanah projects
The children cant wait to bring home their Honey jar for Rosh Hashanah!

Bee Beading

We placed yellow and black beads with pictures of bees taped onto the table.

How do bees make honey?

One of our centers helped the children learn how nectar is sucked out of the flower and brought to their bee hive. It was a great fine motor experience and hand eye coordination getting just enough of the yellow liquid in their little compartments.

Apple Art

Motty painting an apple using inspiration from a picture of an apple. He then later wanted to create the same picture using a different medium.

At snack time we discussed why we eat a Rimon- pomegranate on Rosh Hashanah. There are MANY seeds in a pomegranate, which represents the MANY mitzvah's that we want our year filled with.

Friendships and sweet moments

Enjoying some water in our sensory bin on the hot sunny days!