Keepin' it Cool in the Ice Cream Palace

One trip to the science teacher, Morah Mussy, was all it took... the kids were interested and we noticed! What was all of this excitement about? Ice cream, of course! Not just any ice cream, the kind we make in a bag, together, mixing and squishing and shaking, freezing and waiting. We asked the children why they loved ice cream so much, and this is what we got:

Because of these experiences, the children started making ice cream in the sandbox, during water play, and in the classroom. So we made a few small world trays and decided to turn our dramatic play area into a mock ice cream store.

Sela, Gavi and Sam are serving up cups of ice cream from the small world tray.

Asher made a cone out of brown paper and colorful cotton balls.

Lev found an air pump and is using it to pump up the ice cream. 

We made ice cream art using colorful paint, sponges and coffee grinds for added texture.

Then, something else happened: the ice cream truck came to our school!  Each child got a dollar bill to hand to the smiling gentleman through the window in exchange for his/her choice of kosher treat. The ice cream music was blasting and everyone was joyfully dancing throughout the whole process, which made the waiting much more exciting :) 

Expressing gratitude is something we do often. Here's Parker giving the ice cream man a picture he drew just for him. Mason, equally grateful, would rather pay money but made sure to say thank you for his treat. 

This got us thinking... we could do this! We could make our own ice cream and sell it! Our imaginations ran wild as we created flavors, toppings, pretend ice creams. We made signs and had talks of who would work where and whether or not we should have a truck or a store or both. All suggestions were heard and valued and everyone's interest was played out in one form or another.

 Yonah drew up a plan of how the ice cream store would look.  Here's his store, complete with a path that leads to the store and pipes on the top. 

Margot drew a map of ice cream all around the world

Asher created the flavor Strawberry Forest

Morah Nechama asked if we should have signs for toppings on our menu and Squirrel (Ziv) drew a sign for fudge. 

What kind of jobs should we have? Orli said that she would interview people for the store, her two questions were, What is your name? And, Do you like ice cream? She kept it short and simple and sent her new employee, Elliot, off to work in the store doing whatever he wanted!!!

Meet the Head of Hospitality, Margot! She's always making sure everyone is happy and has plenty of ice cream and toppings, particularly the unicorn kind. 

Erez and Ivy are the cashiers. They take the order, give the receipt and show their customers where they can wait. 

Once we became more familiar with how an ice cream store works, we were ready to assemble the menu and hang our signs.  We made small signs for the ice cream flavors and toppings but we also needed to create a big sign so everyone knew we had an ice cream store.  We decided on the name Ice Cream Palace and all chipped in on coloring and adding a border to the sign. 

Lily is drawing cookies, carefully placing chocolate chips all over, because she loves chocolate.

Adom is drawing a cone.

Mina is drawing lemon ice cream on top of a waffle cone.

Leora made a sign for the marketing team that says, Ice Cream Sale! "This way we can take it to the playground and let everyone know that we are selling ice cream!"

Asher and Margot are helping Morah Nechama create a giant menu.

On to the outdoor signage. Below is our big sign with a border taped on by the children.

Goldie helped Morah Stephanie hang the sing.

With all of this excitement going on, we forgot to mention that we're learning too! We've been thinking logically and collaborating on how to build the shop and what to put in it.  Our writing skills are becoming stronger as we write words by mimicking letters or observing others writing. We're measuring, counting and adding up items and numbers. Our vocabulary is growing and we're learning new words such as cashier, receipt, health inspection (yes, we had a health inspector come through to check on cleanliness!), signage... the list goes on.  Then there's the science of mixing the ingredients of the homemade ice cream and fudge.. and testing out flavors (everyone's favorite part).

Here's our final store front, seating is to the right. 

 We had a little help from the older campers in building the smaller tables and table decor.

Here we are learning our jobs as Morah Nechama pretends to be our customer.

Here we are in action, serving Kitah Daled. Orli and Goldie are taking orders, and Squirrel is asking how Sylvia would like to pay: with a high five, hop on one foot, silly dance, or counting to three with eyes closed. 

 The ice cream scooper is a big job!

 Erez waited patiently ( and didn't even eat a single topping ) for Sylvia to choose her favorite topping.

Not everyone was able to come into the store, so we took our truck to them! Kitahs Alef and Bet were very happy to be included, after all, who doesn't like to be served by superheroes and princesses? See below (extra pictures for added cuteness). 

Finally, we have to come to an end. How do we stop such a fun thing without feeling sad? With ice cream, of course! Our grand finale was an ice cream party along with baked and decorated cones and shapes for us to take home with us. 

Liav is painting his purple because that's his mom's favorite color. 

Elliot is making blueberry ice cream. 

We're Big, We've Got This

We're Big, We've Got This

     So, we've been here before.  We're the Kitah Vav-Zayin-Ches group.  We're certainly older than the campers in Kitah Alef, Bet, and Gimmel. We're even older than Dalet/Hey, traditionally the oldest group at Intown Jewish Preschool.  This is why the IJP Administration calls us "The Older Division."  It's a badge of pride.  It comes with extra responsibilities, as well as a certain amount of figuring out where exactly do we fit in and what would we like to do.  

     Some things never change; we know we like to play in the mud every now and then. (above, Pearl and Dovid join in with some of the younger children.)

     We also know that we like games with rules and strategies. We bring out games every Monday during Arrival Time and we try to squeeze in board games whenever we have a free moment during the rest of the week.  We're familiar with chess, Mastermind,  Hedbanz, Mancala and quite a few other games.  The Morah taught us Chinese Checkers.  (She thought she knew this game as a child, and then very recently, she actually learned the real rules.)       

     Our artwork shows our skills.  We know how to read and write.  We design our own bags, independent of a Morah.  (Above, Chana and Levi work on their bags.  Below, some of the results.)

     Now this was fascinating, from the point of view of a Morah.  We headed out to the Beltline on our scooters, ready for a good time of racing about, people-watching, and then cooling off at Chabad Center.  Pearl wanted to know, "Why is there a truck on the Beltline?"  Before a Morah could respond, the group read the words, Trees Atlanta!  The truck was there for, "Growing, Protecting, Educating."  Yep, we know that.

     Books have more meaning for us.  We can read a lot words.  (Above, Henia and Chana share a book about the White House, one of our Fourth of July themes.)

     We write, too.  When we shared Fourth of July concepts, we wrote some of our thoughts on our group mobile.  Chana wrote about being free to be a Jew in the United States.

     There are so many Junior Counselors on the playground!  Some of us went around and interviewed the new staff, asking them about their favorite foods, books, etc.  We wanted to learn a few facts about them.  What do they like to do in their spare time?  We wrote down their responses.

     Then, we started preparing for our Puppet Show.  It will be an original story, and we're still working on it.  Something about Mr. Banana Pants, and something about this and something about that.  After much discussion, we're ready to work on the script.  

     We decided that we must, must have tickets for the puppet show and that they must be numbered.  We're using our writing and math skills to get this job done.  Junior Counselor Yulie took us around to all the other groups so we could figure out how many tickets we would need.  Our conclusion:  we need an additional five.  We have to get to work on this.

     We build on our art skills, too.  Last summer, we learned how to paper mache using newspaper, glue and water. We make bigger bowls this time around, with a plan to use them to collect our tickets during the show.

     So it's all coming together for us.  We're using all our abilities as the oldest "bunk" to organize ourselves in our work and play.  (And, just in case we give the impression that we're only about literacy and math, here are a few pics where we're all about moving and fun!  Enjoy!)

Have a Happy Fourth!

Morah Susan, and the campers and junior counselors of Kitah Vav-Zayin-Ches