Journey to Israel

"Please have your boarding passes and passports ready!" The teachers called out as the children waited to go through "airport security."

ready!

Aboard the plane: Wave your hands in the air if you're ready to go to ISRAEL!!!

Our flight attendant, Morah Chana, reminds us to bring our seats to the upright and locked position, fasten our seat belts, and prepare for takeoff!

We've arrived in Israel! Let's daven at the Kotel

In the Golan, children decorated labels for wine bottles.

In Eilat, we played at the beach.

In Tel Aviv, we decorated visors to block our faces from the hot sun.

We squeezed our own orange juice on the moshav with Morah Ruth.

Finally, we made Lag B'Omer bonfire collages from wooden sticks and tissue paper.

Yum! An authentic Israeli lunch featuring falafel, hummus, pita, fries, and Israeli salad.

All good things must come to an end. Our trip to Israel was full of excitement and discovery, and we can't wait to come back next year!

Observing Worms

KDH has been digging up worms. It is great fun and they know that they are good for the soil in our garden. But when the worms crawl into the soil we cannot see what they are doing....

Today is Earth Day 2013. We read Why do we Recycle and learned a little about composting with worms. We really wanted to see how the worms build tunnels and crawl through the earth.

How could we do that? 

We recycled a two liter plastic bottle and a small plastic water bottle. 

Cut off the top of the 2 liter bottle.

Fill the small water bottle with warm water and set it inside the two liter bottle.

Layer the bottle with sand and soil. 

Go outside and dig for worms. We know how to do that! Thank you to Esther for not giving up until we had five worms. 

Top the worms and soil with dry leaves and crumbs.

We already saw one worm crawling down the side of the bottle.

Wrap a dark piece of construction paper around the bottle - the worms like the dark.

Wait one to two days, and remove the construction paper. 

We hope to see the tunnels made by the worms. We'll let you know what we find....

Making our worm house

Searching for worms

All Done!!

Morah Ruth

Ivrit: Bet is for Bayit

We can form the letter "bet" out of Popsicle sticks. Many of the children even decided to add windows and doors to their letter, making it look like a "Bayit."

Dead Sea Investigation: Part II

 Kitah Gimmel has shown so much curiosity and interest in the topic of the Dead Sea. It started with the sensory experience they were invited to partake in last week (more info on that here) and continued with Circle Time discussions.

Capitalizing on that interest, today we did a science experiment inspired by the salt crystal formations surrounding the Dead Sea.

Before we began the experiment, the children were shown two examples of salt crystals: One was the type that grow organically at the Dead Sea, and the other was a picture of crystals grown on a string similar to what we were going to do. Showing the pictures was intended to aid in making the connection between their classroom learning and the experiment, as well as highlight the differences between a natural salt crystal, and those we are attempting to grow.

Dead Sea!

home-grown crystals

 Here are some examples of the children's comments about the Dead Sea and salt in general:

"I like eating salt with challah!"
"Nothing can live in the Dead Sea!"
"Only people can go in the Dead Sea."

For the experiment, we followed some simple instructions of mixing salt and water in a jar, and suspending a string in it by a pencil. Our new vocabulary word was, "dissolve."

The children were eager to volunteer for both pouring and mixing duties, and eventually we had 3 jars on a sunny spot on the window sill, waiting for crystals to form. It should take 1-3 weeks to start seeing some results. Here are some pictures of the process:

  

Letter to Children in Kiev

IJP held a coat drive in the fall and KDH collected coats and money to send to children in Kiev. (see blog) They wrote us  back a letter and sent us pictures.

KDH talked about what we might send back. We walked to Richard's Variety Store and bought color pencils. We composed the following letter.

Dear Friends:

Thank you for sending us a letter and for your pictures. It is now Spring in Atlanta and it is warm outside. We just celebrated Pesach.

“I sang the Mah Nishtana in front of the whole shul.”  Menny

“We like Spring. I planted tomatoes, peppers, cucumber and zucchini.”  Einav

“I went to England for Pesach.”  Theo

“I like painting flowers and butterflies in the Spring.” Kira

“We made a zoo out of blocks with a pond, in our classroom.” Ari

“We ate chocolate covered Matzah.” Isaac

“I stayed home for Pesach and ate Matzah. I missed my friends at school.” Ana Chaya

“I hid the Afikomen.” Benjamin

“My daddy hid the Afikomen.” “I helped my Mommy set the table.” Nessia

“We went to Florida with my cousins, Bubbe and Zaidy.” Mendel

“We went to my Nana’s house for the Seder.” Esther

“We dig for worms outside.” AmaraLia

We painted a picture of a butterfly for you. We walked to the store and bought you color pencils. We hope you enjoy drawing with them.

Love,

Kitah Daled Hey, Your Friends at Intown Jewish Preschool, Atlanta, Georgia, United States of America

Thank you to Judith Hodara taking care of mailing the letter and pencils to our friends.

April Self Portraits

We have lots of yarn and ribbon in our classroom, donated to us by AmaraLia's grandma, to use for weaving and art....

KDH drew their self portraits and glued on yarn and ribbons for hair, noses, mouths and clothing. And don't forge the googly eyes which are always fun to add to a portrait!

Weaving ll

KDH continued adding ribbons and yarn to the large loom during center time. When the loom was full, we taped up the top and bottom and cut it off the frame. See our beautiful work!

A Conversation About the Dead Sea

As the children in Kitah Alef Bet grow and grow, and gain new language and conversational skills, the comments during our daily Circle Time have become richer and more expressive.

Many of the books we have read, such as Ella's Trip to Israel and It's Israel's Birthday!, describe the salty, muddy atmosphere of the Dead Sea, and what it feels like to float and swim in it.

This prompted the following exchange among the children:

Libi: "I can swim by myself."
Cassidy: "I don't like salty water."
Josie: "I can swim by myself. I like the salty water!"
Libi: "I love the beach."
Asher: "I got water in my nose!"
Libi: "I don't like water in my nose."

It is wonderful to watch the development of their vocabulary and social skills! They listen to each others' comments, think, and make connections to themselves and their own experiences.

Kitah Alef Bet Gets in Touch With the Holy Land

Artists at work: Making our own versions of the Israeli flag

The last two weeks have been FULL of learning about Israel! From crafts to cooking, Israeli culture has infused all that we do.

Bamba and Bissli are two of the most popular snacks made in Israel (that are currently available in the kosher section of many American grocery stores). We had a blast tasting these. Here are some of the children's responses to taste and texture of the Bamba snacks:

Reyn: I like it! Look, it's in my mouth!"
Amitai: "It tastes like cheerios."
Bryna: "It tastes good."
Josie: "It tastes like peanut butter."
Laylah: "It's crunchy!"

While many were hesitant to try the new snack at first, most of the children were asking for seconds and thirds by the end of snack time. 

Jules points to pictures of the Shuk (marketplace) and Israeli food hung in the play kitchen area.

 On Monday, we tasted another classic Israeli food- falafel! The children put the dry mix in the bowl, measured and poured water in, and took turns stirring the ingredients together.

Josie pours in water

Amitai mixes it up

The falafel balls before they went in the oven.

Morah Goldie highlights the difference between Israeli pita bread (round, with a secret pocket) and American sandwich bread (square)

Perly tries the new food

Freeda loves tearing up her pita!

Ziva takes a big bite

Josie smiles and declares the pita, "yummy!"