Parshat Noach: Whatever Floats Your Boat

When Hashem created the world, He wanted the people and the animals to behave in the right way and make the right choices. Unfortunately, in the generation of Noach the people and the animals did not make the right choices. Hashem decided that the world needs a deep clean so He sent a Mabul, a flood, to wash and clean away all the people and animals that were not making the right choices. 

Hashem told Noach to build a Taivah (an Ark) with 3 floors. The first floor was for the food and the garbage. The second floor was for the animals. 7 pairs from each kosher animal and 1 pair from each non-kosher animal. The 3rd floor was for Noach, his wife, their 3 son's and their wives. 

It took Noach a long time to build the Taivah. Hashem was hoping that the people would do Teshuva (fix their mistakes) during this time, but all the people that saw Noach build the Taivah just laughed at him and didn't make the choice of doing Teshuva. 

After the Mabul(flood), Hashem promised that He would never bring another flood like this one. Instead Hashem will show us a sign and when we see that sign we will know that we need to do Teshuva. Hashem made that sign a rainbow.

Rainbow Milk Experiment

We created a colorful rainbow in a tray of milk and explored the surface tension and color blending at the same time. 

The children were invited to do the experiment on a water color paper. We all had a lot of fun watching the colors blend, making such beautiful art!

   

Morning arts and crafts with our friends.  

Whatever Floats Your Boat

Science and Discovery

In the spirit of Parshat Noach, Mitzvah Menches spent time this week experimenting with objects to test if they sink or float. 

The scientists were presented with a variety of materials and tools and were invited to build their own boats. Motty's imagination took flight and he decided to build a boat with two floors. Dovi determined that his boat would be made using plates and some carefully applied tape.

Evan testing his boat in the water to see if it would float.

Brachos (blessings)

Over the next couple of weeks we are going to be learning and practicing our Brachos on food. 

This week we practiced our brachos by playing different games that involved body movement - working on our gross motor skills too!   

The excitement in our class was real.

The last couple of weeks we started learning some new English sounds; phonograms. This week we learned our first 2 sight words. ''I'' and ''Like''.  

Highlighting the word ''like''.

Hebrew Capit 

We started the Hebrew reading program. The kindergartners were so excited about the fun homework they did.   

Ask your child what is the spelling that has no sound?

 

In Hebrew we read the sounds top to bottom, like Motty is holding his arrow.

אבטיח starts with an א

Tk had an exciting week, exploring and learning about the letter  א  through the medium of an אבטיח (a-va-tee-ach) or watermelon. אבטיח begins with the letter א.

Evan tried to use the cookie cutter to make the letter  א but the rind of the אבטיח was too hard.

Mendel and Evan were both successful using a slice from the inside.

 Faiga uses the juice of an אבטיח chunk to paint her א. Mendel painted his chunk of אבטיח  with dark
green and light green paint to stamp on his א

Menachem carefully scoops out chunks of  אבטיח to place inside the blender cup.

Everyone waited excitedly for the אבטיח to finish blending.

  

Enjoying the Fruit(juice) of our labor.

A is for Ant

Menachem uses ants to make the shape of an Upper-case A. Mendel peers at the magnified ants on his lower-case a.

Ants live in a colony and dig tunnels and rooms to live in. 

Evan buried his ants deep in the sand so nobody could find them. Faiga used a popsicle stick to make a tunnel in the shape of an A.

  

Happy 6th Birthday Yisroel!!!

Making a delicious birthday cake!

We were so excited that you shared your birthday with us in the class!

Continue to learn and grow and give nachas to your parents!

We love you!

"Water" you talking about??

"Noach and the Teivah" (Ark)

This week's Torah portion is Noach. We learned how Hashem wanted to 're-set' this world and give it a good wash clean. Hashem instructed Noach to build a big boat called a "Teiva" and bring his wife Naamah, his children and all the animals into it. They were saved from the big flood Hashem created, where the rain came down very hard for 40 days and nights.

We had a challenge this week:

How do we teach what rain is, when most of our friends haven't experienced it?

(On the Holiday of Sukkos we have a prayer asking for rain, we truly need it here in California!)

We prepared MANY different rain or water experiences in our morning centers to invite the children to get a hands-on lesson and get a little glimpse as to what it was like.

Friends helped us by circle time act out the story by spraying water and placing animals inside where they can be nice and dry.

Rain

Opening an umbrella got some curious looks from our friends and "what IS that?".
We role played by having a spray bottle to be the 'rain' and some dry friends underneath.

We placed many pictures around the classroom of what rain looks like and how it might affect us. 

Some children while looking at a car splashing in a big puddle thought it was a car wash.

Blue water and ramps were a great lesson on water and gravity. We experienced what puddles were as the water started to accumulate at the end.

Making a fun rain scene.

Esther using chalk to make rain.

Boats 

Mendel and Chana Rochel sailing in the ocean and spotting the sea creatures we placed on the floor!

Ice boats and pool noodles in our sensory table.

Shalom and Arik working hard on their Teivah projects by painting and sticking all types of animals on it.

Rainbow - A sign of  love

After the rain stopped, Hashem showed a beautiful rainbow in the sky to let us know this amount of rain will never happen again. It signified a new beginning and filling the world with goodness.

Esther and Morah Tally working on color recognition, matching the color sticker to the color of the rainbow.

Adelle using her fine motors while making a rainbow bracelet.

Where is Hashem?

It was so nice to see our friends following the climax of all the high holidays, Simchas Torah, when we celebrate and dance with the Torahs. We start the entire Torah all over from the beginning starting with Breishis (Genesis) . 

This week we focused on how Hashem made the entire world and is all around us. We took this opportunity to learn some of our directions.

Where is Hashem?

Our friends were excited to shout out "Everywhere!"

Its amazing to see by children, these deep concepts understood in such a pure and simple way.

We had fun during davening circle singing one of our favorite songs to remind us where Hashem is.

Hashem is here

Hashem is there 

Hashem is truly everywhere 

up, up, down, down

right, left and all around.

Here, there and everywhere 

that's where He can be found!

 Up and Down

Hashem is up and down! This was a great discussion as some children automatically think Hashem is only 'up there'. Hashem loves to be down here with us! This was a comforting thought, even when we are sad or get hurt when we feel quite down Hashem is there helping us through it.

This week we placed an assortment of activities to encourage direction usage.

Yarn hanging from the ceiling and scissors over our sensory table was great opportunity to practice our scissor skills as well as up and down.  

  Shalom watching the buttons fall DOWN the tube. Friends helping to pick UP the buttons.

 Placing butcher paper under the art table helped the children practice the words up and down.

Esther and chana rochel lying down while creating their picture on top of them. 

A fun sequin stool in our class was a fun sensory experience while learning up and down. Chana Rochel noticing the different designs while going different directions.

It was fun learning up and down during outside time. Up the stairs and down the slide. This was also a great lesson on turn taking and patience.

 Back and front

Learning how Hashem is in front of us and in back of us! Chana Rochel using pipe cleaners in a colander and taking turns putting some in front as well as in back. 

Bean bag fun with Morah leah! Practicing body parts as well as directions.

Fun outdoors! 

Socializing with the Kindergarten class outside, are some of our friends highlight of the day. 

Watching with fascination as our bearded dragon eats his lunch.

 Sneak peek at next week 

Getting ready for a very fun and wet week! We love when the children are part of the preparation  process for the next unit. Our friends this week were very busy decorating our new bulletin board.