"It's a Jungle In Here!"

When Mrs. Oliker agreed to come back to our class and give us more drawing lessons, we had no idea what a catalyst for exploration her visit would be. The last time Mrs. Oliker taught the children how to draw all kinds of aquatic life since our class' interest was the ocean. Last week the children requested to draw elephants and lions. It was so exciting that the children begged Mrs. Oliker to come again and teach us how to draw more jungle animals.

That same day the KDH ocean in our block area had to be taken down to be scanned into a poster for the Auction. Now we had wall space to put up new artwork. The children's elephant and lion drawings were so amazing, we just had to have them up in a rain forest.  We put up green and yellow streamers. and started to put up the drawings.

Over the next few days we did two different kinds of ice painting. The children experimented with mixing colors. Blue + Yellow makes Green. Blue + Yellow + Red makes brown. We used the children's paintings to give depth to the rainforest.

Collage giraffes and tigers, animals made from recycled toilet paper rolls moved into the forest too. Jungle animals were added to the block center. Animal masks for Purim are of a jungle theme too.

 Because of the cold weather, we could only go outside for short amounts of time. Elephants, snakes and frogs could be seen moving about the classroom.

Jungle Show and Tell gave us more to discuss, books to read, lots of animals to talk about, especially the many monkeys!

An I Spy type of game was added to the rainforest.

Purim animal masks are of a rain forest theme too!

So for now KDH has left the ocean and come onto exciting dry land, the rainforest!

Morah Ruth

Tu Bshvat in KDH

Tu Bshvat, the New Year of the Trees is alway a welcome respite from the cold winter. It reminds us that better weather and better things will follow. We also think about all the goodness that trees provide and the seven special species of Israel. What are some of the things KDH did for
Tu Bshvat?

KDH brought in Show and Tell items relating to trees. 

The children were surprised to hear that paper is made from trees. We talked about the process and then recycled some paper and made a new piece of paper from it.

Still life drawings of fruit done with water color pencils are beautiful. No surprise to us.  We love the children's art.

Today, Tu Bshvat we created trees from the pretzels, fruits and nuts and snacked on them.

Yum!  Trees are so important!

Morah Ruth

Magnets in KDH

KDH loves the new magnatiles that we have in our classroom. Magnets themselves are always interesting. We keep magnet rods in our science center all the time. Yesterday while playing, Amitai showed us that his kipah clip was sticking to a magnatile. He discovered that his clip was magnetic.What a good day to have chosen magnets as the topic of Show and Tell.
As we often do when we introduce a topic or want to delve deeper, we start by asking the children what they know. Show and Tell was to be a hands on way of seeing and hearing about magnets from the children.
This is what we found out:
Magnets have a North and South. North and South attract each other. North and North repel. South and South repel. Thank you Eli for showing us this.

Magnets attract through paper. Thank you Cassidy for your magnet trick and Layla, Mia and Motty for bringing in magnetic books and games that also were based on this concept.
Magnets attract through plastic. Libi, we can't wait to have your game in our center for everyone to try.
Magnets are used in toys that we love to play with. Thanks Sholom, Josie for showing us your toys.
We draw and "write" with magnets. Thank you Ziva for sharing your magnadoodle with us.
A strong magnet will make the steel bolts attracted to it into temporary magnets. Thanks Perly and Bryna.
We love to have magnets on our refrigerators to decorate and hold up papers. Thank you Kemp, Adaya and Mia.
We also use magnets to learn our aleph bet. Thank you Amitai, Luba and Mina.
We are looking forward to a lot more learning and playing with magnets!

KDH Show and Tell

Why were there so many hats in KDH today? Luba had a raccoon hat with a tail, Amitai was sporting a top hat, and Bryna looked glamorous in her Hello Kitty hat. Sholom was wearing a wizard's hat, looking like he was ready to pull off a few stunts. Perly had a helmet with him. Is it Purim already?!! No, not that. Adaya had a house, Kemp brought in a book about Homer and Mia had a stuffed animal, named Henry. Why??

Wednesday is Show and Tell day! Each week we have a different theme. 

Today's theme was the Letter "H." 

Show and Tell began after the Chagim. The first week was the Letter F as in Fall and/or Fall objects. 

 Cassidy is showing us the Letter F that she drew filled with fall leaves. 

Our next topic was the first letter of each child's first name.

Laylah wrote her name with Legos and Josie had a jar with the word jar written on it with stickers.

 Libi brought in a lamb that begins with L. 

 Mia had a monkey for M.

 Kiddush cup for K was what Kemp shared with us.

The next week the children brought in objects that started with the first letter of their last/family name. 

 Perly and Bryna Tedoff served us all tomatoes, yum!

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 Ziva had an egg for E as in Efron.

 Adaya showed us her Mini Mouse for M as in Malka.

Motty shared a lime for L as in Levin with the class.

Before Thanksgiving the children all shared something that they are thankful for. 

 Josie is thanking for her parents, who got married. 

 Mina is thankful for her family and the trip her to Disney with her grandparents.

 Eli is thankful for the good things Hashem has given him. He has toys, art projects and a lovely family.

 Sholom appreciates his home and family.

Motty is thankful for the Torah. 

The Morahs are thankful for sweet, creative children, with their sense of  apppreciation and  humor. 

Cassidy actually brought her mother to school for show and tell to show us what she is thankful for. 

Motty asked us, "Do you know why Josie's parents' wedding picture is black and white?  That's because it happened a long time ago!"

Wipe away a tear and then, You gotta laugh! 

Morah Ruth 

Ladybugs Galore in KDH

KDH chose to order ladybug eggs to grow in our classroom. We waited patiently for the package to arrive. During that time we read books about ladybugs, their life cycle and why they are so important to have in our garden.

Pikes Nursery was giving out bags of ladybugs. I brought a package into school and we all gathered around to put in them in our vegetable beds. We were advised to put them on leafy plants and to spray the leaves with sugar water to keep the ladybugs attracted to those plants. Even the younger classes got in on the action.

When our package arrived with the ladybug eggs we looked at the vial carefully.  Where were the eggs? They had already developed into the grub/larva stage. We put them into the ladybug domed home and gave them water. Each day we look to see how much they have grown. 

"Are they moving?"

"Are they in the pupa stage yet?"

All the children are making their own scientific log, drawing and writing what they observe.

 Ladybugs were the topic of Show and Tell this week. We were delighted with the drawings, projects and books the children brought in and shared with the class.

 Ladybugs are so much fun that we are also reading non-fiction about them. Morah Chana Liba read The Grouchy Ladybug and everyone was mesmerized.

Discovery, Science, Literacy, Sharing....... all wrapped up in...........

 ladybugs.

Morah Ruth