We are thankful for God!!

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

My Very Own Siddur...

The Kohavim children have been busy working on a God Project over the past months. Together they have shared their ideas and questions about God: Where does God live? What does God look like? How can you talk to God? And they have used different mediums such as, water color paints, clay, and photography to represent their theories.

As our school year is coming to an end, the teachers realized we needed to culminate our investigation of God in a way that celebrates the work we have done together and enables the children to further explore their ideas. We decided to create a Siddur that captures the children's experiences thus far with God. Just like the Siddurs the children flip through in the sanctuary on Fridays, each child will get to have their own personal Siddur reflecting their questions, ideas, and experiences. Over the next few days, the children will have the opportunity to personalize their Siddur which will grow and change with them as they grow and their ideas change.

What do you wish for in the week to come?

As part of our ongoing God Project, Kohavim has been thinking about all the ways we can talk to God. We realized that one of our weekly routines of making wishes for the week to come during Havdallah is one way we already do talk to God. On Monday, all of the children used watercolor pencils to illustrate their wishes for the week to come:

Noah: I wish to spend time with my mom.
Sabrina: I wish for my sister and me.
Eli: I wish for my house bees on it cause then animals won't use their claws to come in our door.
Hannah: I wish for my sister, me, my brother, and my mom to go out on a picnic on a nice sunny day.
Jacob: I wish for Iron Man.
Brett: I wish for aliens.
Ezra: I wish for cake.
Max Greenstein: I wish for a Bruins Bat. A player who plays the bats.
Molly: I wish for play dates on nice sunny days.
Lily: I wish for my sister could be nice to me.
Rachel: I wish for my glasses and for a cake.
Max Goldberg: I wish for Ninjago Legos.
Dylan: I wish for the Bruins to knock out the Rangers.
Ryan: I wish for the Bruins to win the Stanley Cup.
Zack: I wish to have a birthday party at the Garden and for the Bruins to beat the Rangers.
Eliza: I wish for more ladybugs. A thousand. And Captain America.

What do you wish for in the week to come? 

Where can you find God?

As we have continued working on our God Project, a small group of children met with Liz, our resident artist to starting thinking more about where God lives. After flipping through a book of photography and sharing some of their ideas, the children used iPads to take photographs of where they think God might live. Below are some of the photos the children took: 

God might live in the yellow daisies. 

God might live in beautiful flowers. 

God might live in the sky. 

God might live in us! 

Where do you think God might live? 

God Project

Young children are actively working to make sense of the world, including their own personal beliefs. We as teachers have been wrestling with how to support the children in Kohavim to explore their interest, ideas, and questions about God. How do you investigate something that you cannot hold, touch, or even see?

As we moved our classroom outdoors this past week, being in nature provoked discussion and many ideas about God. On Monday, Rachel independently started singing "Happy Birthday to God" as we sat down in a circle for morning meeting. When a child was pulling on a branch of a tree, Dylan and Zack discussed how God made that tree and pulling on the branch would be hurting God and God's feelings.

The teachers noticed how organically the children's comments emerged out in nature. On Tuesday, we set up one of the tables with pieces of watercolor paper and black permanent markers. We asked the children to draw their ideas and presented them with the following prompt: What do you think God looks like and where do you think God lives? Their drawings and comments (see just a few of their comments below) were amazing! Stay tuned to find out how we will continuing exploring their ideas together!


"I think God lives in the sky. I just drew the sky."

"He lives on a big mountain. God lives on a big mountain where it's always dark, mostly dark. It's a castle with God in it."

"Trees. He made the trees. I think God looks like a boy. It's God. God lives everywhere. It would be the world with a tree. I'm gonna make it extra big."

"I think he lives in an apartment. It's an apartment and that's God's creatures going into the house"

"God is invisible. Cause no one saw him"