Our Trip to the Newark Museum

Last week the Ganon classes boarded a big yellow school bus and headed for the Newark Museum!  After we enjoyed our bagged lunches, we began to explore the museum.  We visited the Hall of Science where we saw fossils, a cave with stalactites and stalagmites, and dioramas of different animals.  The children especially enjoyed our visit to the planetarium where they viewed an age-appropriate show about the planets and constellations, and the Fire Museum where they had a chance to climb onto a real fire engine!  It was difficult for them to decide what their favorite part of the trip was - It was all so much fun!!

Special Shavuot Treat With Ms.Terry

In honor of the upcoming holiday of Shavuot when it is customary to eat dairy foods, Ms. Terry (who is in charge of Yavneh's kitchen) came to visit Ganon Aleph and Ganon Bet.  She brought ingredients for making smoothies and a blender.  We talked about the food groups that each of the ingredients come from, and whether or not they are healthy for us.  Each child had a choice of strawberry, banana, or blueberry smoothies, topped with whipped cream!  YUM!!!

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Gan Aleph had a special visit yesterday from Kayla Nussbaum's grandma and mommy. Kayla's grandma shared with us her expertise on gardening.  She helped the class plant in our outdoor Early Childhood garden box.  The children learned how to pull weeds and clean up the box before they planted.  They used tools called "trowels".  Next the children laid down a fresh layer of soil and dug holes for flowers.  The class spelled out the letters for the Hebrew word "Shalom". Using the soil, they spelled out the letters and then planted herb seeds in that formation.  It it our hope that when the herbs start to grow they will grow in this formation.  We plan on using the herbs to cook in the coming weeks.  Finally the children planted marigolds and impatiens to decorate and frame the box.  The children will be watering daily and keeping a close eye on this amazing project.
As an extension of this gardening project, the children created unique flower pots to adorn their Shavuot tables.  They planted small flowers to take home in these beautiful pots.  These flowers can be transplanted to home outdoor gardens when they outgrow their pots.

Now You See It, Now You Don't

On Yom Ha'atzmaut Gan Gimmel began a special project which they completed in time for Yom Yerushalayim. They created pictures in the style of Yaacov Agam. Agam is an Israeli artist, the son of a rabbi in Rishon LeZion, and is known for his kinetic art.
The children decorated two pictures, one of the Israeli flag and one of Yerushalayim. By cutting the pictures into strips and gluing them on a fanned paper alternating pictures, they created kinetic masterpieces. Their art works seem to change with every movement of the viewer's head.

Hillula Time!

                      

In celebration of Lag B'Omer, Gan Bet enjoyed a Hillula with Gan Aleph and Gan Gimmel to honor the great Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai. As we sat in a darkened room, we sang songs around a "bonfire", with glow-sticks to light our space. The energy in our room got higher and higher as we pretended to climb to Meron to tell stories and sing songs about Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai! Our voices surely reached great heights as we sang with such devotion and sincerity "L'Shanah Ha'Baah B'Yerushalayim"!

Lag B'Omer Festivities

Ganon Aleph had a great time celebrating Lag B'Omer!  The children enjoyed a school-wide barbecue, after which they collected sticks and branches for a "bonfire" in our classroom.  Ganon Bet joined us for singing and s'mores around the "fire."  A fun time was had by all!!
Thank you to Morah Shira for bringing glow-sticks for all the children!

33

In honor of the Lag Ba’Omer we each brought in 33items from our house to share with the class. All 14 children in Ganon Betthought of different things to bring in. They ranged from pencils to gumballsto straws! We each had a chance to count our items with the class and thenglued them down to make a collage . We had fun sharing, counting, and gluingtogether.

"Amar Rabbi Akiva!"

Who can call the name of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai without thinking of his teacher, Rabbi Akiva! Gan Bet learned that Rabbi Akiva taught Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai the secrets of the Torah along with those very famous words, "V'Ahavta L'Reiacha Kamocha". We saught opportunities to put those words into action immediately; children displayed acts of kindness towards their friends, as they picked up after each other, shared toys and games, held the doors open for one another, and shared words of caring and kindness. As a visual representation of our thoughts on the idea "V'Ahavta L'Reiacha Kamocha", the children each illustrated a puzzle piece with pictures of chessed and kindness. We fit all of our pieces together and found that together, they form the ultimate representation of Love and Kindness, a huge heart. Twenty-two faces shined with pride and accomplishment as we gazed upon our final product.

Ganon Aleph & Bet Planting in Our Gardens

Ganon Aleph & Bet's gardeners were hard at work today planting red and yellow peppers, tomatoes and flowers in our garden plot! We can't wait to see it grow!!

The Itsy Bitsy Spider!

 

What a coindence that just as Gan Bet is learning about all kinds of creepy, crawly things, that we stumbled upon a spider on this week!

The children immediately noticed a fast-moving spider on our classroom floor as they entered the classroom and we decided to observe our eight-legged friend before helping him find an appropriate home. We placed a jar on the floor, which our spider happily crawled into and then poked holes in the top so he could breathe. We watched the spider's behavior and observed his appearance, while drawing pictures of him with cray-pas to document our find. Some children wrote observations about the spider also. In Ma'agal we then passed the spider around and shared our observations; we noticed eight legs, two feelers or antennae, and that the spider was a reddish-brown color. We guessed where his home might be, and what he might like to eat. We then learned about arachnids and what they eat and where they live. We decided that our spider would be the happiest outside, so we decided that we would release him in our garden. Before releasing him though, we decided to give the spider a name. The chidren voted via secret ballot and chose the name Fasty for our visitor. Well, his name definitely fit his personality; we excitedly released him into our garden, and he crawled very fast out of the jar and into a new home filled with our colorful tulips!

Star Light Star Bright!

Wediscussed what we see in the sky. We said we see clouds, stars, the sun, moon,and we know the planets are out there. We turned our discussion to the stars.We learned that there are 88 constellations. We learned that Polaris or theNorth Star is the last star in the Little Dipper. Long ago, sailors used theNorth Star to guide them; they didn’t have GPS Systems. A long, long time ago people didn’t have TV’sor go to the movies. The people would look up at the night sky and use theirimagination to draw lines and connect the stars. They would name their starpatterns and make up stories about them. We decided to make our ownconstellations and we each wrote a story about them. We also made our very ownconstellations out of Marshmallows!

Pat's Pals Return to ECD

Pat Rose came to visit us on Wednesday with some of her little friends.  She came earlier in the year to talk about how different animals adjust to the winter, and this time she showed us what the animals do in the springtime.  Among the furry friends (and some not so furry) that accompanied her were:  Smoke the chinchilla and her two-week old baby, a lamb named Lilly,  Freddie the frog, some baby chicks, a ball python snake, and Miss Charlotte the parrot who performed some really neat tricks!  Mrs. Rose talked about some differences between mammals and cold-blooded animals, and showed the children some eggs laid by birds, snakes, and frogs.  What a fun, hands-on way to learn about animals in the springtime!

Blasting Off in Ganon Aleph & Ganon Bet

Our astronauts have been busy exploring our solar system. It's amazing how large boxes can be transformed into rocket ships, shopping bags become space helmets and small boxes our air packs, because we know there is no air for us to breathe in outer space.

Happy 64th to Eretz Yisrael!!

Yom Ha'atzmaut was such a special day at Yavneh! Gan Aleph went outside to dance to the music of the BaRock Orchestra with the entire school in celebration.  The children had so much ruach! Gan Aleph watched the 7th grade girls perform a special daglanut (Israeli flag dance) and we sang Hatikvah with the whole school.  Gan Aleph even released special blue and white balloons into the air after the Daglanut dance was done.

Once the dancing was over, "traveled" to Eretz Yisrael. We started our journey in the cafeteria on an imaginary jumbo jet where our captain Rabbi Penn explained all the safety rules.  We had an inflight snack of a beautiful cupcake cake in shape of an Israeli flag! Yum!

Once we "landed" the children "disembarked" to each Early Childhood classroom.  Every classroom was transformed into another major Israeli city.  The children went from class to class, drinking smoothies on the beach in Eilat and playing in the waterfalls of Ein Gedi.  They dug for artifacts and made artful jewelry in Tzfat and put notes in the Kotel in Yerushalayim.  They sweated it out in boot camp just like Tzahal and made Israeli salad on a kibbutz.

Am Yisrael Chai!