chag sameach

Levana and Shamayim shared a special seder on Monday morning.  We met for Havdalah, as usual, and said good-bye to Shabbat and hello to a brand new week.  We wished for all sorts of things for the coming week:  birthdays, mommies and daddies, kitties, thunderstorms and lots of sunshine.

Afterward, Tina showed us a special book called the Passover Haggadah.  We saw pictures of a seder plate and 4 cups of wine and even talked about the four questions.  Many of the kids already knew that we eat matzah on Passover to remind us how quickly the Jews had to leave Egypt.  They couldn't wait to let their bread rise.

We finished our morning by making charoset together and having a little mini feast.  It was fun to share this special day with good friends!!

Matzah, Matzah, Matzah

Time to set the table for a family Seder. Seder means "order". There is a specific order to the Seder to ensure that we tell the whole story.  Samantha puts a piece of matzah on each plate while Nicolas reads the Haggadah and leads the seder.  Haggadah comes from the Hebrew root "to tell". Our Rabbis have always known that the future of the Jewish people lies with our children and we can clearly see it demonstrated each day in our classrooms at TBSCC 

Hosting a Seder

Levana had the pleasure of hosting a Seder for their class and Keshet class in leu of Tu B'Shevat. We decorated table covers for our friends who were visiting for the meal. We always love to have other classes visit ours, and we always try to make everyone feel welcome. Thanks for coming, Keshet! and happy holiday!

A very full day: Tu B'Shevat

Thanks to the Levana students and teachers for hosting the Keshet class for a Tu B'Shevat seder.

We look forward to having you join us in our classroom soon.

A very full day: Tu B'Shevat

Thanks to the Levana students and teachers for hosting the Keshet class for a Tu B'Shevat seder.

We look forward to having you join us in our classroom soon.

A very full day: Tu B'Shevat

Thanks to the Levana students and teachers for hosting the Keshet class for a Tu B'Shevat seder.

We look forward to having you join us in our classroom soon.

A very full day: Tu B'Shevat

Thanks to the Levana students and teachers for hosting the Keshet class for a Tu B'Shevat seder.

We look forward to having you join us in our classroom soon.

Sharing our Passover Expirences

Today during circle we shared some of our Passover experiences with the group. I asked the group to close their eyes and remember their seder: who they were with, what they ate, something funny that happened etc. Then we each shared one thing that they loved about their passover experience with the group. I wrote it down and then they wrote their name next to their comment. It was fun to hear all the other kids react to each memory shared. there were lots of children saying, "yumm" and "we did that at my seder too!" Learning how to share stories and find similarities and differences in experiences is a challenging skill that is helpful throughout life. It was so nice to see how excited the class was to share about their seders and I'm sure we'll hear more about them throughout the week!

Mini-Seder

The Rainbows had a mini-Seder with the Levana class. First we all sat in a big circle and sang lots of Passover songs. Then we had the Seder. Each child had their own Seder plate filled with egg, parsley, apple, raisins, and Matzah. Thank you Levanas for working hard to make each one of us our very own Seder plate . Some of the children enjoyed dipping the parsley into their juice. Delicious! For dessert we enjoyed the chocolate Matzah. What a feast! After everyone finished eating, Tina hid the Matzah around the classroom and the children got a chance to find the Afikomen. All the children got stickers as the Afikomen was found. Thank you for hosting us Levana. We had a great time!

Chocolate Matzah

There are so many different types of spreads that taste good on Matzah. Today we went with chocolate! Using the back of a spoon, we worked on our fine motor skills to hold the spoon and spread melted chocolate chips all over the Matzah. Some of us took great care to make sure that the whole piece of Matzah was covered while others only wanted to spread a little bit. However the Matzah turned out, in the end, everyone agreed that the Matzah was delicious. A few of us even licked our fingers to get all the chocolate off. Yummy! We shared the Matzah with the Levana class at our combined mini Seder.

Teamwork

 As part of our preparation for Passover, the Levana children are exploring some of the foods found on the Seder plate. Recently we enjoyed a multisensory examination of eggs. We felt them, smelled them, and looked at them as they came out of the box, as we broke them into a bowl, and as we peeled the eggs that we had hard-boiled. Best of all, we all had the opportunity to taste eggs, both boiled and scrambled, as part of our snack. As we explore together in these ways, the social skills that the children are acquiring become apparent; they are able to share equipment, to take turns, and to help one another by holding the bowl. Their growing social ease enables the children to work together successfully, to learn from one another, and to enjoy the process.

Tu B'Shevat Seder with friends

On Wednesday, the Tel Aviv and Sunshine children joined together to celebrate Tu B'Shevat. We had a lovely seder lead by Sasha (tel aviv teacher). We ate three different types of fruit: apples (fruit with a pit/seed), bananas (a fruit that has a skin that we do not eat) and grapes (a fruit that we can eat whole). We also drank white grape juice to show that the trees begin to bud when Winter (white) comes to an end, and red grape juice to celebrate the arrival of spring when trees flower and bloom.

We all enjoyed the yummy snacks and have definitely learned that trees give us so many things. Not only do we get different foods from trees (fruits, nuts, etc.), they provide shade and help us breath and they give shelter to many animals and insects.

Celebrating Together

This morning we spent some time drawing fruits for a Tu B'Shevat poster that we brought with us to the Levana Tu B'Shevat Seder! Our Levana friends invited us over to join them in circle, followed by a beautiful Tu B'Shevat Seder where we sampled delicious fruits. Turns out we love apricots and figs! We really enjoyed ourselves and appreciated all the hard work the Levana teachers and children put into our celebration from the beautifully drawings that covered the tables to the amazing tree costumes worn by the children. Thank you, Levana!

A Movin', Groovin' Seder

Together with the Haifa All Stars and the Scientists, the Tel Aviv children had a lot of fun at our seder today. Each year we make slight changes in our Passover play to make it better and better. Standing in a large circle as the teachers read from a script, the children sang and danced along with our wonderful holiday CD. It was then time to eat! Some foods were more popular than others but a great time was had by us all. Thank you to Faye, Julia, Judi, Alison S., Lauri, Ellen, and Ebert for making our Passover celebration truly wonderful.

At the Seder

The Sunshines, along with their Unicorn friends, participated in a joyous seder today. This was the culmination of several weeks of preparation; there were songs and blessings to learn, questions to ask and seek answers to, foods to buy and prepare, and rituals to become familiar with. The children enjoyed many of the foods, including matzah, charoset, and hard-boiled eggs. Perhaps not surprisingly, the parsley was not a crowd favorite. Avram was willing to try it though; he dipped and ate, nodded and smiled, and then had a big sip of white grape juice.

Where does the lettuce go?

It's fun to play a matching game, and today's game involved finding the spot on the seder plate for the chosen items. Where does the lettuce go? What about the charoset? Look, here's an egg! Lots of the kids had fun with two different versions of this game that we played today.