Team work using three C's!

Communication, Collaboration, Cooperation.

 

As we were closing up the holiday of Purim, we repeatedly noticed the children gravitating to the puppet theater! 

Each day we were amazed all over again,  at the team work the children displayed, taking turns 'putting on the show'!

:) It was also a wonderful opportunity for us to see the children's interpretation on the story...which "Big Ideas" stuck out in their minds etc...

It takes quite a bit of coordination to decide who will be performing, 

and who will be part of the audience....

The finale! Rochel took out all the puppets for the end of the show to take a bow!

This sight got us thinking.... this is just the beginning!

What beautiful team work! 

The children inspired us to spend a WEEK focusing on

TEAM WORK (Before we dive into Pesach Curriculum)

using the three C's :

Communication, Collaboration, and Cooperation.

In the preschool classroom,  life is all about learning how to work with others and this is an especially challenging proposition for young children. 

 (It doesn't change too much beyond school and in the real world! Successful people are those who can succeed in working with others!)

To promote teamwork or the three C’s in a fun and inviting way, we came up with creative games or art activities that our students can do together… where the TEAMWORK is a key to the success of the project!

Circle Songs and Games

Part of our daily morning circle includes a segment where the children get into a circle and sing our Torah song. In the beginning of year it was very political as to who's hand they were holding etc...

Doing this dance every single day as a routine helped the children learn to  take turns holding each others hand.

One day this week they were very proud to do it on their own with out any assistance from Morah!

We created a zigzag of colored tape on the floor going in different directions, alongside a bucket of blocks.

The children figured out to line it up on the line as a team! It was long and hard work but slowly most of the class got to work on it!

Celebrating their efforts by balancing on the long line they made!

This also facilitated communication and cooperation, as some of the children were fast at it --which required them to wait for their friend in front to continue, before they could proceed.

Spontaneous team work, following the children's interest:

Morah Leah noticed a spider next to the blocks. What if we use the blocks to build a home for the spider to protect it? 

Will it climb over the blocks (walls? )

The LOVE that friends have is heart melting!

Ice painting

Using one big paper and a water table, each child found space and worked together to create a beautiful painting.

Parachute Play

Parachute play is all about teamwork. Lifting the parachute up and down all together so that we can make the balls fly high off the chute requires us to count together, lift together, and not let go of our part of the parachute in the process…

Obstacle course:

We created an obstical course game that needed each child in our class.

With a full bucket of bean bags at the beginning of the obstacle course the challenge was each child had to hold a bean bag and do the whole course with out dropping it to fill the empty bucket at the end of it!

Shua weaving in and out of the cones.

(while his friends were cheering for him ;)

Levi very proud of himself!

 

Large Group Murals:

Working together to color, paint, or in some way create something together also gives us the opportunity to promote the three C’s. While the children were coloring in a picture of a tree, they had to communicate with each other about any spaces that still needed colored in, work together to color side by side, and make decisions on the direction or style of coloring they chose to do along the way. 

 

 I noticed that by coloring together, the children also modeled for each other different coloring techniques or preferences… 

We pass the ball around....

One of the activities we did as a GROUP to build team work was playing "we pass the ball around." 

After playing the game (being directed by us Morah's), we noticed the children on their own, partnering up to "play together."

It was absolutely adorable how they connected feet and played a very close range passing game ;)

Building as a team...

Clean up time is always team work! (Definitely one area where the children FEEL the success and value of WORKING TOGETHER!)

Birthday's are not just for receiving gifts...at Gan we GIVE!

Birthdays are for Giving!

This week we celebrated 2 birthdays on the same day! Reena & Jacob both turned 5!

At the birthday we spoke about the fact that each year, when we are another year older, our neshama (soul) has the strength to do MORE MITZVOT ! 

One of the Jewish birthday customs is to enjoy eating a  new fruit after saying the special "Shehechiyanu" blessing.
Thank you Tracy for bringing Persimmons!

Another birthday tradition is to give extra Tzedakah (Charity)

In honor of Reena's birthday the Hettena family donated a beautiful play food and Kitchen supplies set. 

The children all enjoyed playing with the new kitchen supplies for our classroom!

Thank you to the Kryger family for ordering a new "Shabbat Set" for our classroom! We look forward to enjoying it each week as part of our Shabbat Party!

Letter recognition using Play-dough!

Teachable Moment....after the rainstorm!

On Monday morning Rochel came in really excited to share the news that there was a tree outside our school, being chopped down since it was no longer strong enough to stand, it had fallen from the storm over the weekend.

One thought that went through our mind was, "oh well... and lets get on with our Purim lessons..."

But then a bigger thought popped up..."Hey-look how excited she looks about this! Lets take a deeper look at the tree...what a rare opportunity to see the roots of a tree and learn more about why it fell, and even more...how could we use the fallen tree at Gan...to enrich our classes!

"Look at the big roots!"

With out saying any information we let them just sit there and take in what they were seeing while the children discussed it among themselves.

Yaisef trying to balance on a piece of the tree trunk! 

It was a fantastic gross motor skills activity!

The kind workers who were cutting the tree, preparing it for removal; were gracious enough to create for us a three level tree stump! 

(They even walked the heavy stumps over to our yard for us to keep!)

The kids were so excited to explore, feel and look at the inside of the tree.

Climbing, taking turns and making room for all...

  Noach discovered little white bugs that were eating at the wood.

We discussed that those bugs might be the reason for the tree falling, not being able to weather to storm!

Ilani peering into the hole

What a great learning experience.

Menucha noticed the biggest one was a heart shape!

Walking from stump to stump.... became jumping!

Thank you tree ;)