Painting the Creation Story

On Monday, Talia, Evan, and Julian used water color paints to paint the story of Creation. The children started with blank white pages and added their own interpretations of the story as Jesse read aloud. They painted darkness and light, the seas and the sky, the land with grass and plants, the sun, moon and stars, animals, and the first man and woman. The children each had beautiful interpretations of the Creation story.

We are thankful for God!!

What does god look like? Here are a few representations of individual ideas. How would you represent God ?

Fun with bugs!

On Monday Elias spotted a spider on the wall, so we put it in a cup observed it for a while and let our little friend go free! 
The Lunch Bunch children enjoyed creating insects with small wooden tiles, markers and glue.  Playing with play dough and bugs has been a popular activity  all week long!

Capturing Spring

Today the Haifa children walked into class after a long vacation to find some beautiful flowers from Sauci's yard on the table! They were instructed to draw what they saw with the new markers. The girls at the table worked very diligently to make sure that their drawings reflected what they saw on the table. As you can also see, they added some embellishment, but hey, artistic license right?? Who knows what materials will be out tomorrow to capture these flowers???

-Alison and Sauci

Model Magic

The Etzim children were so excited to explore a new way to make sculptures yesterday!   Using glue and crepe paper, children discovered different ways to mix the two together into a moldable substance.   As Betty put the materials out, it was interesting to watch as each child approached the same materials in different ways.

Building Community

 The children are aware that we share our learning environment. This is more evident to them on Fridays, when Jesse and Liron, have class in one of our classrooms. Rachel and Molly wanted to share their beautiful pictures with those kindergartners. It was quite the process as Rachel and Molly did not use the typical painting implements ( brush). They worked with very thin sticks to complete their masterpieces. Molly dictated the following message:  "I hope you like the princess castle picture, please write back.": Rachel dictated " I hope you like the picture of the snowstorm I made, please write back." We are building connections with a larger community. We hope you write back to us!!!

Blue fingers? Who cares?

We were using some messy watercolors and eyedroppers to create some Chanukah decorations today in the Etzim classroom.  Everyone was very excited to start decorating, but pretty surprised to see they now had blue and purple fingers as well.  It has been wonderful to watch how comfortable everyone has become with getting messy as they immerse themselves in their work.
  

Whose Eyes are Those?

 

During the first week of Haifa Lunch Bunch Olive noticed two holes on the wall.  "Whose eyes are those?" she asked.  The whole group joined in a  long conversation and decided to add eyebrows, a nose and lips.  We had so much fun the next month we turned the eyes into a caterpillar, then a butterfly.  Last week we created Tootsie the Bear!  We wrote a book about Tootsie, with each class member writing a page of the story.  We were delighted and surprised to walk into lunch bunch one day and find a letter waiting for us from Wednesday Mayim, asking us why "you keep changing whatever is covering the holes?"  We responded "Because we like being silly."  We look forward to what we'll create next with this expressive and imaginative lunch bunch!

What do you want to do?

Looking around the classroom today, I was intrigued by the ways that the children found activities that engaged them fully.  The focus in their eyes shows the attention and energy that they are putting into their various creations.  Now that so much has been accomplished in getting to know their teachers, their classmates, and the routines that structure the day for the Keshet group, the children are exploring their activities more deeply.  It's wonderful!

Rock Art!

After some discussion at our second circle this morning Adam raised his hand and asked, "Can I paint a rock for my sister Mia?" I said, "Of course, in Lunch Bunch we can gather some rocks and paint them outside." Adam lit right up with the thought of "filling Mia's bucket", by painting her a rock! Adam inspired us all to paint and design rocks. The children painted big and small rocks. There were pink and orange rocks, green and blue, spotted and rainbow rocks too. If you get a chance come onto the playground tomorrow morning and check out the ROCK ART!

Making Connections

Today we cut open apples to see if we could find the star inside.   We did some apple printing, which lead to some fun, squishy hand printing.  When we told the children "Those are some messy Etzim hands!" Sophie S. said "If they were messy Etzim hands it would be algae or dirt on it because we are trees!"  This lead to further discussion about the meaning of our classroom name - trees.  This Etzim group will certainly be keeping us on our toes!

"Let's make Sasha!"

Rachel announced, "I am going to make Sasha with a coconut on her head and hand!" She proceeded to paint Sasha many times! Then Jacob Shaw painted Sasha, and Eliza too! So guess what the children named the mural? That's right..."SASHA, SASHA and SASHA!"

Art!

The children enjoyed painting outside today! They painted trains, crowns, people and smiley faces!

Shavuot~ Celebrating God's Gift of Beauty

 One of the many beautiful blessings of nature is the the colorful flowers of Spring time. We brought in some flowers for the children to look at and take time to notice details. We asked what colors did they see and what materials would they like to use to illustrate them with. They elected to use paint. What colors did we need? They noticed white, blue/purple, yellow, red, and green. There were 8 small containers, each table had a set of colors to use. Then came, you don't have enough of those containers. We needed 2 more so all the colors of the flowers could be represented. As they began their process one classmate said, we couldn't use white paper because the white paint wouldn't show up. So what could they do???  Then they talked about what background paper needed to be used. They wanted each background page to be 'different'.   Thus the artists began their journey of expression after thoughtful planning and thinking.

Drawing from a model

At the end of the day yesterday, Aviva was very involved in a work of art, as usual. Aviva loves to spend her time at the art table and takes great pride in the work that she makes. When I walked over to let her know it was time to clean up, I smiled to myself when I saw what she was working on. Aviva had taken one of the Paris postcards from Sauci's trip earlier this year, and was recreating the photo on her paper! She had carefully chosen colors that would match the Eiffel Tower in the photo, and was deliberately and cautiously making marks to match the photo. Watching Aviva go between the photo and her own drawing was a wonderful moment, because it gave me a minute to step back and appreciate the attention to detail that she was paying to this work, and I could clearly see how invested she was!

-Alison

Having fun with tissue paper and mod podge

The first thing the children noticed about the mod podge was its smell. Fortunately that didn't discourage our young artists from working hard to decorate the clay flower pots. It took some patience and fine motor coordination to apply the lightweight and flyaway pieces of tissue paper to the curved surfaces of the pots. Not to be discouraged the children persisted until they were happy with their creations. We will continue this colorful and sticky activity again tomorrow.

Lunch Bunch Fun!

At the beginning of Lunch Bunch I showed the children a variety of art materials. I then asked them to choose the materials they wanted to use. Check out their colorful creations! Wow!!!!!!

Music!

On Friday the Tel Aviv children had a special concert right in their very own classroom! Eli, his dad (David), and his brother (Noah) put on some show! Eli played his ukulele, David and Noah played their guitars! They played some of our favorite songs..."Happy Birthday to You", "The ABCs", then we sang a few Shabbat songs. At the end of their performance Eli, Noah and David taught us two brand new songs... "The Name Song", and "The Cats Song". "The Cats Song" was beautifully done and my personal favorite, I might add! After the concert Noah read us a great book, (My Cats Nick and Nora) and then we all walked up to the Sanctuary to celebrate Shabbat!

Eli, David, and Noah, we really enjoyed the concert! A very special thanks goes out to you Noah; it was so great to see you! The book choice was great and you read so clearly and confidently! Come back and visit us again really soon!

Processing the arrival of the fire trucks

Today was not an ordinary Shabbat as the fire alarm went off and we all had to vacate the building. Fortunately the Kohavim children rose to the occasion, and our exit went at least as smoothly as all our previous fire drills. The children had many questions and comments about the experience, so we encouraged them to express themselves at the art center. Josh was very proud of the pictures he made and asked if I would put them on the blog. Obliging teacher that I am, here they are! Children can express themselves in so many different ways, and as teachers we need to always be thinking about the role of the arts in enhancing this expression of thoughts and feelings.

Finger painting fun

Finger painting is a wonderful activity for children offering endless opportunities for open ended self expression. It stimulates the senses, sight and touch, strengthens hand and finger muscles, and contributes to fine motor skill development. Here Mia, Nathaniel, and Hadley enjoy this rich experience. Just rubbing the paint over your hands is soooo soothing and relaxing.