Gan Bet's Publishing Party!

Congratulations Gan Bet! 

Our class has published over 60 amazing short stories with each child publishing two or more! 

The children worked very hard to get to this special celebration and they were so excited to share their published works with their friends!  

After introducing each author and the two stories they chose to share at the party, they split up into groups to read to each other and enjoy a themed snack of ABC letter cookies!

You're Invited! Gan Aleph's Writing Journey Begins...

Have you ever received a piece of mail that says "You're Invited!" on the top? Were you excited? Were you curious about what you were invited to?










This week the children of Gan Aleph received an invitation to become authors! The morah displayed the invitation on the white board projector and read the invitation aloud to the children.

Their eyes beamed with excitement and were eager to accept this special invitation. They took turns writing their names below as an R.S.V.P and understood that by writing their names they were accepting this opportunity to learn and grow as writers.

We then discussed what does it mean to be an author? What does an author write about? We decided that authors write about things and stories that are meaningful to them. The children received a paper with a heart shape on it that was divided into 5 sections. They each drew 5 different things in their heart that were meaningful to them or things that they loved.

 We sat together and shared some of our hearts with each other. This interactive brainstorming activity with be placed in their writing folders for them to refer to as we begin our writing journey in Gan Aleph. The children can't wait to get started!

Publishing Party!

    Congratulations Gan Bet! 

Over the last month we have been learning how to write a "How To" book, teaching someone how to do something.

Each child chose something that they wanted to teach their peers, and they made it into a book. 

After writing their words, and illustrating their work, we took pictures of each illustration on the iPad, and they read/recorded their words making their own audio book! 

This afternoon, we celebrated the fact that everyone had written a book, and we congratulated our friends on their amazing work! 

To celebrate, we paired up and enjoyed listening to and learning from our friends books on the iPads! 

Oops-Won't rotate...

Writing a Megillah in Gan Gimmel

Gan Gimmel has been so busy getting ready for Purim! We are learning the story of Megillat Esther daily through the use of puppets, songs, storybooks, games and visuals. Working in small groups, the children are creating the story using their own words. The children have been employing all of their writing skills to write their own version of the story. They are illustrating each page as they complete the project. They cannot wait to bring these home to share with their families!

Learning about Life Cycles in Gan Aleph

"Frogs here, frogs there, frogs were jumping everywhere!" Gan Aleph decided to learn about frogs and wanted to know more about where they came from. We began with an activity in which the children were presented with pictures of Morah Aviva, from birth until now. They were challanged to put these pictures in the proper sequence, bearing in mind the natural order of one's life. For example, the children knew that her kindergarten picture would be placed after some baby pictures but before her wedding picture. After putting all of these pictures in order (and laughing while looking at some of them!) we went through Morah Aviva's life cycle thus far. We learned that living things have stages in their lives which led us to explore a frog's life cycle.

The children were provided with more pictures, this time of the different stages in a frog's life. They worked together to put the pictures in the proper order, and learned that frogs start off as eggs. The egg hatches into a tadpole which then grows into a froglet and ultimately a frog!

We read the book If You Hopped Like Frog, by David Shwartz and recreated his book with our own ideas and frogs jumping off the page! Through this book ,we learned that frogs can jump a distance of 20 times its body length! We took turns jumping on a number line to see how far we could jump and compared it to a frog's jumping abilities!

Frogs here, Frogs there, Frogs were jumping everywhere...Especially in Gan Aleph!!!!

Celebrating Dr. Seuss

Ganon Bet had a birthday party in honor of Dr. Seuss. While we enjoyed reading all his books, we liked Marvin K. Mooney so much that we re-wrote our own version! We voted on our favorite book so far and we had a tie between The Cat In The Hat Comes Back and The Foot Book. Do you have a favorite? We'd love to hear from you!

Purim Adventures Arrive in Gan Bet

Purim is quickly approaching and Gan Bet is busy getting ready for all the fun! The children have been working on their special rashanim. They designed their own shapes and learned how to turn them into Purim characters. They were introduced to casting material- a very messy job! Their next step will be to add clothing and faces.

The children have also begun to write their own Megillot. Some of the children are writing their Megillot in Hebrew, sounding out the words that they need. They are so proud and thrilled to read their own words.

Purim fun has only just begun...

Gan Aleph is actively engaged in their interactive Purim unit this week. The addition of new crowns, costumes and a "real" palace transformed our drama center into Shushan. The children honed their social skills by sharing the new props and costumes. They were able to reinforce the first few parts of the Purim story that we learned in class. As a follow up to all of this dramatic role play, the children have started to write their own megillot. This will enable the children to reinforce what they have learned and connect to the story. Stay tuned for more updates as we explore this wonderful holiday through many different avenues. What is your favorite childhood memory of Purim? We'd love to know!

Picture Perfect Presidents!

Of the people, by the people, for the people!
This week, Gan Aleph began learning all about our past presidents! We began with Abraham Lincoln, since his birthday is coming up this Saturday. We learned that Lincoln was the 16th president and was one of the greatest presidents of all time. To honor his presidency we engaged in many "Lincoln-related" activities...
After learning that Lincoln's face is on the penny, the children took part in a "Lincoln Penny Toss." They used their probability skills and predicted which side of the penny would win the race...heads or tails. They took turns tossing the penny and filling in their chart accordingly. When one side reached the top, they evaluated their results and looked at how many times each side was landed on.

We learned that Abraham Lincoln was 6 feet 4 inches tall! What exactly does that mean? We used a tape measure and our bathroom door to visualize how tall that actually was. We saw that when Lincoln wore his stove pipe hat, he was even taller than the door! The children wrote their names on index cards and measured their own heights against Lincoln's. Even the Morahs took a turn to see how much taller he was than them!

Last, we looked at some of the clothing our past presidents wore. We discussed how some presidents wore long jackets, white tights and white wigs! The children are using cut outs of their faces to create caricature-type images of themselves as president. They are carefully cutting out all of the clothing they would wear and using stuffing as white wigs! After learning about the role of a president, they each wrote what they would want to do if they were the president, and are attaching their ideas to their presidential portraits!

The March of Gan Aleph's Penguins!

Gan Aleph began exploring the fascinating world of penguins! We learned all about where penguins live, what they eat and how they surf and dive for fun! We focused on the emperor penguin, african penguin and macaroni penguin and learned what makes each penguin different from the next. We read the book If You Were a Penguin, by Wendell and Florence Minor, which we used as a springboard for writing. The children imagined themselves as penguins and wrote what they would eat, which kind of penguin they would be and even gave themselves a name. Vicky named herself "Oreo" while Matan named himself "Snow!" We then used water bottles, paint and many different materials to create our penguins... and wow, did they come to life! The children had to think about what features made their penguin different and then add that feature to their "penguin doll"(ex. the macaroni penguins have yellow hair!). Do you have any fun or interesting facts/stories that you would like to share with Gan Aleph about penguins!?

What's the Temperature?

In conjunction with our unit on the winter season, Gan Daled is conducting experiments to learn about thermometers. Several liquids of varying temperatures were set out, and a thermometer placed in each. The children tried to predict which would be warmer or colder, then read the thermometer and completed a chart with the temperatures. This science experiment also incorporated many math concepts, such as measurement, comparisons, and reading and writing numbers.