Busy Day

The Keshet class celebrated Shabbat today, as Bailey led us in the blessings and shared a wonderful challah. Gathering for Shabbat is the highlight of our Thursdays, and an opportunity to come together to sing, pray and eat. Earlier, there was a lot of activity throughout the room, as children built with magnetiles, engaged in housekeeping play, explored our box with lots of pushing, dragging and climbing, worked at the easel, and enjoyed the rice in the sensory table. The children showed great focus and stamina, and we enjoyed a full week together.

Our Mitzvah Ring is growing.....

The Unicorns are always keeping their eyes and ears open to see a Mitzvah and hear a Mitzvah. Performing a Mitzvah literally means doing a commandment, but is often used to mean doing a good deed or carrying out an act of kindness towards others, whether done at school or at home. As Jews we don't do these acts because we are nice, but because it is our responsibility to help others.  Whenever Unicorns see or hear a Mitzvah, they remember them and share them in Unicorn Circle Time. We write the Mitzvah on a paper and the new Mitzvah Ring becomes another link in a growing chain.

In this Hebrew month of Tishrei, the bible commands us to build a Sukkah as a Mitzvah. The Unicorns also consider it a Mitzvah to work cooperatively to accomplish the task of building the Sukkah. The Mitzvah of building a Sukkah together as a community leads to the Mitzvot of learning to be a friend, of waiting our turn to share important ideas, and of listening while friends and teachers speak. One Mitzvah leads to more Mitzvot to add to our chain.

Here are some of the new Mitzvot that Unicorns shared at Circle Time:

• A Unicorn brought her sister in to read to us in class
• A Unicorn helped zip another friend’s jacket
• A Unicorn helped her mommy change her sister’s diaper
• A Unicorn passed a cup of mayyim (waterמיים) to a friend
• Unicorns helped looking for a friend’s family photo.
• A Unicorn shared a toy car with a friend
• Unicorns invited each other to our kitchen to play
• Together Unicorns picked up the play dough from the floor
• Unicorns are helping to clean up at home as well.

Your children have really embraced the Mitzvah Ring. We are using our math skills to count how many Mitzvot we hear or see in one day( in Hebrew too) and then count all the Mitzvot together. So far we counted 16 Mitzvot. Unicorns enjoy hearing about the Mitzvot of others and see that friends are doing Mitzvot at home as well as in the class. Our goal is to cover our room with kindness. We want the Unicorns to realize that every simple Mitzvah counts, and together our Mitzvot make a beautiful and strong chain that we can all be proud of.

Snacktime

Every morning, after playing outside for a bit, everyone seems to work up an appetite, and a few friends at a time, they gather around the table for snack. With the ever-changing daily offerings, such as cheerios, saltines, Ritz crackers, apples, peaches, strawberries, and pineapple, the children are always looking forward to what they will be eating on each particular day. One day a few weeks ago, when going to throw out his water cup, Eli asked me, "Can we recycle this?" Since that moment, we've kept a "recycling box" outside. When everyone drinks all they want of their water, they love going to water the plants with the remaining water, and then putting their cups in the recycling box. Thank you, Eli, for this great, easy idea that also helps to protect our earth.