Chanukah

As Chanukah drew near, the kindergarten children worked excitedly with the Pre-K class to complete their replica of the Beit Hamikadash. Working from the plans the children devised based on what they learned and their vision, they successfully completed this beautiful project. The children’s final task was to make steps leading to the beautiful golden menorah inside the Beit Hamikdash! They finished just in time for Chanukah and our beautiful Temple remains displayed in the hallway between the Pre-K and Kindergarten classrooms.

As we learned about Chanukah, the children explored the importance of having a strong moral character and doing the right thing…even when it is not easy! During the day, we would make sure to notice and acknowledge those times when our friends “did the right thing”. The children even choose to focus on certain behaviors that would help them to do the right thing! Here were some of their ideas: “listen to the Morah even if someone doesn’t”, “don’t say, ha, ha, ha when someone is sad”, “not to tattle”, “not to hurt people with my hands when I am mad”, not to fight over toys” and “try my best!” The children were so excited about “doing the right thing”, that we decided to roll play various scenarios to help them make the right choice when a difficult situation arises. One situation was when a friend would say, “don’t be friends with him/her!” The children acted out different ways to handle this situation. They used their words to say, “Let’s all be friends together!” and actions, by giving each friend a hug!

Our classroom has been filled with Chanukah fun and the scent of yummy Chanukah foods! Morah Natasha and Robert Stein joined our class to help us each make a beautiful Chanukah Menorah using colorful Sculpey clay. Each child made a unique menorah that they were able to use at home during Chanukah. Some of us even made dreidels! We sure enjoyed playing the dreidel game with our homemade dreidels. Mrs. Ellen Arian helped us to make the perfect Chanukah celebration in our classroom! Together with her, the children made homemade applesauce and delicious potato latkes! The children set the table, and enjoyed the wonderful treats they prepared!

Perhaps our favorite Chanukah story was Jeremy’s Dreidel by Ellie Gelman and Judith Friedman. In the story, Jeremy makes a dreidel using Braille for the letters because his dad is blind. After reading the story, we talked about other ways people communicate and we discussed sign language. So, as we reviewed letters and the sounds they make, I signed each letter. The children were thrilled to later discover a puzzle that matched the sign to each letter!

We continue to work daily on our handwriting, sight words and developing our reading skills. The children look forward to reading the daily message each morning. The message includes sight words we have learned, familiar words, and words that the children can blend the sounds to read. They eagerly write their response in their journal each day. As they are becoming more independent readers and writers, the children will look for clues in the classroom to help them write their responses!

A new math game was introduced: Dreidel Addition! Each child rolled a die and found the matching number on one set of dreidel cards. Then, rolling a second time, they found the matching number on the other set of dreidel cards. Each time they recorded the number, and finally, they added them together to find the sum! What a fun way to add!

Avery special morning was spent with our dads, “Build it with Daddy!” A Zimmer parent lovingly made a large wooden menorah. Our children then worked with his/her own parent to create a piece of art together that was added to the menorah. The entire Zimmer Community enjoyed helping to create this stunning menorah! Each day of Chanukah, all the Zimmer children joined together to light our beautiful menorah, chant the blessings and sing Chanukah songs. I hope you shared a wonderful Chanukah with your family!

 

December in Kindergarten

As the temperature cools outside, a warm glow of excitement is shinning in our kindergarten class. The children are filled with anticipation as the story of Chanukah unfolds in our classroom. We began our study imagining what life was like when all the Jewish people lived together in Israel. We learned that the Beit Hamikdash was the beautiful Holy Temple, and the center for Jewish ritual and life. As the children closed theirs eyes, they tried to envision what the Beit Hamikdash looked like as I described the appearance of the beautiful structure to them. We tried to feel the happiness and pride the Jewish people felt as they lived their lives together in their homeland so many years ago.

We learned that inside the Beit Hamikdash was a truly beautiful gold menorah. This menorah had 7 branches and was lit by the High Priest each day. The glow illuminated the beautiful Temple. The children were intrigued that only the purest of olive oil was used to light the menorah. I asked the children, “Where do you think the High Priest got the olive oil?” The children responded, “olives!” “Yes, I said, but where did they get the olives?” “From the olive trees”, they said. Finally, I asked, “How did they get to where the olive trees grow?” It was through this dialogue, that the children began to understand how precious olive oil was all those years ago. Certainly, they did not go to the local supermarket to buy it! Rather, they deduced, they had to walk or ride a camel to the olive trees, pick the olives, and travel back with them. Only then could the olive oil making process begin! And, after all that, only the very first drop of oil from each olive could be used to light the magnificent menorah.

Keeping all these ideas in mind, the Kindergarten met with the Pre-K class, and together we wrote up a plan to recreate the Beit Hamikdash based on how we imagined it looked! Many ideas were given, and the children got busy designing and creating walls, a floor, a ceiling and a golden menorah! As our Holy Temple began to take shape, we met again and discussed our progress and the jobs that still needed to be done. This planning session, the children decided to start making a beautiful door worthy of the Beit Hamikdash. The children’s enthusiasm and imagination has fueled this beautiful project. We can’t wait to showcase our finished project at the start of Chanukah!

Our new shared reading book, Duck and Hen, has prompted us to think about what it means to be a friend. What do you do if a friend does not want to play what you are playing? What can you say or do so both friends are happy? The children brainstormed ways they can handle this situation! They offered these ideas: “first play what you want, then play what your friend wants”, “one day play what you want and the next day play what your friend does” and “find something to play that you both like!” By thinking and planning ahead about these situations, we are better able to handle them when they arise! We also learned two new sight words from the story: “Do” and “Went”. We all enjoyed playing sight word bingo together with all the words we know!

A fun new math game was introduced using two dice. The children roll the dice and “add” the two numbers together. Then, they record their responses on their individual bar graphs. Finally, they compare their results to those of their partners! We also used dominoes to help us practice adding and recognizing different ways to add numbers to get the same sum! The concept of lighter and heavier was also explored using a pan balance scale. The children have really enjoyed using the scale in their play as well!

As Chanukah approaches we will be exploring the many values the Chanukah story teaches, as well as engaging in many wonderful projects, which I will share with you in the next blog!


Be sure not to miss these fun Chanukah family events: Build it with Daddy, Monday the 14th at 8:30am and The Chanukah Bubble Party next Wednesday, the 16th at 4:30!

The Values We Learn from Thanksgiving

The beginning point for any study of a holiday for us at Zimmer, is what are the values we want our children to understand? Examining the Thanksgiving holiday from this perspective allowed our kindergarten children to engage in meaningful dialogue and gain a thoughtful understanding about Thanksgiving, one that became relevant to their own lives.

Specifically, kindergarten examined the values of communication, gratitude and perseverance from the Thanksgiving holiday. As we explored the idea of communication, we talked about how the Pilgrims had to find ways to communicate with the Native Americans when they first came to America. We spoke about the idea of "non-verbal" communication and how we often use non-verbal ways to communicate. We role-played together various scenarios when we can use our bodies to express how we are feeling or to communicate an idea. We used facial expressions, body movements, hand motions...etc. This process lead us to talking about our "attitude", and that our "attitude" makes up all of these non-verbal and verbal messages we put out in to the world. Our friends and people who come in contact with us "read" our attitude and it affects the way they act towards us. This really helped the children understand why their friends react to them in certain ways. Throughout the weeks preceding Thanksgiving, we could often be heard asking in kindergarten, "what is your attitude saying now?"

Naturally, our study of Thanksgiving involved reading stories. Over the course of a week, we read the chapter book, The Pilgrims at Plymouth, by Lucille Recht. As we learned more about the Thanksgiving story, the children came to understand that the Pilgrims had a strong desire to leave England and start a new life, and so they were willing to work really hard to overcome the hardships they found in America. They persevered despite the difficult journey and the barren land they came to call home. In fact, the children discovered many ways that they thought the Pilgrims were grateful even with all the hardships they endured!

"The pilgrims got help from the Native Americans...they helped them grow crops and catch fresh fish!" "That they did not sink!” "That they had food on the boat." "The Native Americans did not hurt them" "Just for getting to land" "That the Mayflower held a lot of people" "For freedom" "They could pray as they wanted in America" "They could learn new things" "That they could leave England" "In England, you could go to jail or be killed if you got caught praying the 'wrong way', so they were grateful to be alive" "That the Mayflower did not catch on fire!"

We then discussed that the Pilgrims were grateful for the very basics of life...because they were happy to be alive, safe and free. Their attitude was one of gratefulness...and so they shared their harvest meal with the Native Americans who helped them. So, we said, we have so many wonderful blessings in our lives, (parents, family, health, etc.) and so many material things too. (toys, clothes, homes, etc.) It would be so nice, if like the Pilgrims, we could express an "Attitude of Gratitude!” Each child spoke about something that made them feel grateful (we specifically tried to think of the Pilgrims being so happy for very basic things...) and we then illustrated our idea. We put them all together in a wall hanging, to demonstrate our "class' collective ideas of demonstrating an attitude of gratitude!

The children really enjoyed our discussions about communication and the importance of communicating effectively. Next, we explored the Native American symbols and how they use them to communicate. During centers the children really enjoyed copying them, and talking about their meanings. We made rainmakers to use at our special music program, and after painting them, the children added the Native American Symbols they liked best!

Our yearlong mission of becoming "our best self" has often been a topic during our study of Thanksgiving. As we learn to communicate effectively, and think about our attitude, this helps us become "our best self". As we come to appreciate our blessings, this too, helps us become our "best self". When we become frustrated we sometimes need to reevaluate our emotions, take a deep breath, and keep trying...All of these things help us work towards becoming our best self!

Hands on Learning!

The kindergarten has enjoyed many opportunities to learn through hands on experiences! After reading a book together called The Eggshell Garden, the children eagerly expressed their desire to make their own “Eggshell Garden”! So, after preparing our challah dough, we washed out the eggshells, and set about planting the seeds we had. As apples are readily in season, many of us have one for snack, and we saved the seeds. We also were lucky enough to have a cotton plant on hand, that a classmate had brought to school for “share” (our “grown up” version of show and tell). After the children planted the seeds, they decided to create signs for their plants in order to know which were apples and which were cotton! Every day the children check to see if they sprouted! We discussed what we would do when the plants start to grow, and we decided that we would plant them outside since the eggshells will not provide a lot of growing room!

As we work with numbers, the children have discovered that playing number games is loads of fun! Our class favorite is Number Go Fish. The game was introduced during math centers. The children had such a great time playing the game, they frequently choose to play during their “free choice” center time! We also enjoyed several other fun number games. One game required the player to add connecting cubes to create a “snake” and then compare the length of their snake to that of the other players! Another game used a spinner with numbers to 10, and a board that required the players to help the squirrel get to his peanuts! These fun games reinforce number recognition, one to one

                                                                                    correspondence, counting and measurement.

The children also had a chance to see and interact with a very special animal. Two special visitors (Morah’s daughter Becca and her friend Sarah) came to school with Sarah’s pet African Pygmy Hedgehog, named George! We learned that he is nocturnal, active and awake at night) unlike our pet snake, Roger Michael, who is diurnal (active and awake during the day). At home, George enjoys a meal of high protein kibble cat food and mealworms. In the wild, they primarily eat insects. George hides his head in his quills and makes a noise when he is scared! (we got to see and hear both!) We even got to see him enjoy some mealworms! After spending some time with us and the PreK class, the girls brought George to visit the rest of the classrooms! We then enjoyed the popular book by Jan Brett, Hedgies Surprise.

We have begun our study of Torah stories, and we began with Parsha Lech Licha. This story about Abraham and Sarah reminded us that Hashem wants us to fill the world with goodness and holiness, just like Abraham and Sarah did. We dialogued together about our individual journeys toward becoming our best selves. We discussed that in our quest to be our best self, we are each filling the world with goodness and holiness. The children offered these ideas: “to not say bad words”, “not laugh when we are meeting”, “not to tattle on people”, “not to be mean”. Working towards improving on these, the children felt they were developing their personal best self, and also bringing goodness into our world! Each child then retold the parsha story in their own words and made beautiful illustrations of the story!

Kindergarten enjoyed a special visitor, Dr. Kovtun! Dr. Kovtun taught us all about the tools a doctor uses. We got to look inside our ears with an otoscope, and hear our heart beat with a stethoscope! We learned about vibration and Dr. Kovtun checked our reflexes. One child remarked, “a reflex makes your knee move when you are not really moving it!” We learned that we could keep healthy, by washing our hands frequently and not putting our hands on our face! After the doctor left, we read a story about going to the doctor, and the children shared their stories about going to their own doctors! Many of them shared about how brave they were when they had to get a shot!

As we explore the fall season together, the children have been dialoguing about how nature sustains us and we sustain nature. The children discussed how we need water, air and food to live and that nature provides all of these. We also focused on how we need to take care of nature so we will have it forever! Nature depends on us to make responsible choices to respect, preserve and nurture it. Likewise, as one element of all that Hashem created, we must also respect and take care of ourselves. We talked about all the ways we can take care of our bodies: eat healthy, exercise and rest.

Our dialogue about trees led us to discuss all the uses for trees. We spoke about how we use trees for paper, books and houses. The children pointed out that we should not use all the trees, because they give us such important things like oxygen, air and shade! They suggested we could save trees by sharing books, instead of buying new ones and bringing in their unused paper products from home to reuse at school!

The children have been enjoying noticing the leaves on the trees change colors. We read the book, Why Do Leaves Change Colors? and then we took a walk outside and observed the different kinds of trees and their leaves. The children pointed out the evergreen trees and that they have needles, not leaves! They identified a maple tree by the shape of its leaf and a weeping willow by the shape of its branches and leaves! We found one tree that we could see from our classroom window and once inside, the children then drew a picture of this tree! We will continue to observe the same tree throughout the seasons and record our observations in their pictures!

During Literacy centers, the children enjoy using different materials to form words! Using letter cubes, letter tiles, and even play doh, the children form sight words, color words and their names. During math centers, we went on a number hunt throughout the building! The children wrote down the numbers they saw and we discovered many important ways we use number! The children had a blast, and we learned how important numbers are in our daily lives!

This past week we took some time to reflect on our past accomplishments, fun times and learning in kindergarten so far this year. As the children and I look back we are also discussing and planning ideas for future learning and fun. It is an important life skill to learn to take time to reflect on the past, evaluate our accomplishments and areas we would like to work on, in order to best plan for our future! The children enjoyed the process and we will set time aside throughout the year for these reflections!

Our exploration of Sukkot in kindergarten gave us a wonderful opportunity to also study nature. The children dramatized how they would feel walking, sleeping and eating in the desert .We used our senses to help us describe what it must have been like to wander in the desert for 40 years! Our discussions of Sukkot led us to decide to create our classroom sukkah with natural materials we could find in our own backyard! Together with some class parents, the children and I delighted in exploring our own terrain, and collected branches, leaves, acorns, pinecones, nuts and other natural materials. Our parents helped us to create one of the walls of our classroom sukkah using the larger branches we retrieved on our walk. The children then used more natural materials, as well as recycled materials to add beauty and their own personalities to our sukkah. We even enjoyed our snack inside! Naturally, we needed to create decorations for the beautiful sukkah here at Chabad, and the children worked well together to create a huge paper chain!

As Simchat Torah approached, the children spoke about how special the Torah is, because Hashem gave the Torah to us. The children knew the Torah contained stories, and we spoke about how stories are often used to teach us lessons. We recalled some Torah stories they knew (Noah was naturally a popular favorite!) In discussing the story of Noah, the children recalled that Hashem told Noah to build an ark even though it was not raining. I asked the children why did Hashem ask Noah to do such a thing? They responded; "because the people were not being "good", and Noah was the only one following the rules. Noah and the animals were safe on the ark when the rain came." This then led to a discussion about rules, and why we need to have rules. The children gave us examples of the rules they had at home. "Don't run on the stairs", "don't leave the house without telling someone", and "brush your teeth" were some of their ideas. "Why do mommies and daddies give us rules?" I asked. "Because they want us to be safe", "they want to take care of us", they responded. I asked the children if they had ever not followed the rules at home and what happend and they responed that their mommies and daddies were "worried", or that they had gotten hurt. Through this discussion, it was easy for them to conclude that mommies and daddies give us rules because they love us very much....just like Hashem.

Through stories in the Torah, Hashem teaches us many lessons. We decided to create our own story that would teach a lesson. Together we brainstormed different ideas about lessons that are important for us all to know, and then individually, each child “wrote” and illustrated their own story! We are creating a special classroom book containing their wonderful stories. We will begin to study Torah Stories this week, and in preparation, we closely examined our Torah and each child used the Torah as a model to create the front cover for our Torah Stories Book. After voting, the children elected to call the book: Torah Book. Each week we will add a Torah Story to our book.

Through our shared and guided reading experiences, the children are learning more new sight words, and becoming more confident in letter/sound recognition and blending sounds. Each morning our message contains sight words we have learned, and our daily journal writing reinforces their new reading and writing skills. At our morning meeting, we enjoy playing rhyming, letter/sound and guess the word games! As the children continue to develop writing and reading skills our “office center” in the classroom is gaining popularity! Writing and reading opportunities are always present in all our other centers as well!

In math, we explored the concept of “more”, “fewer”, and “the same”. We read the book Just Enough Carrots, by Stuart J. Murphy and the children enjoyed it so much, we read it again. Then the children broke into 2 groups. Each group was given small objects to sort by color. One group sorted into containers of the same size. The other group sorted into containers of different sizes. When we came together, we decided that it was easier to “see” which container held “more” “fewer” or “the same” when the containers were the same. Then we brainstormed ways to check which had more/fewer/the same, and the children said: count the objects, weigh them, or measure them! So we put the objects in a measuring cup! This led us to a discussion about volume. Then we decided to use different containers to compare how much water each held. First we filled different size containers with water, and guessed which held more. Then we used the measuring cups to check our answer! Math is so much fun!

A Journey of Self-Reflection

As we begin the year 5770 our kindergarten children began a journey of self-reflection. Throughout the days of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the children took time to think about how a new year can be a time for new beginnings. We discussed that in the New Year it can be a time, to start over, try harder, and thus, our journey of becoming our “best self” had begun. But, we recognized that sometimes it is easy to forget our good intentions, and we need a way to help us remember our goals. With this in mind, the children decorated beautiful mirrors, and studied their reflection to ponder just how they would try harder in the coming year. Realizing the struggle we will sometimes feel, we hung up our mirrors in order to remind us of our journey this year to be our best self! As the year progresses, the children and I will continue to dialogue about their individual journeys. We will add documentation as the children continue their self-reflection to becoming their best selves!

Birthdays are cause for celebration, and in kindergarten our celebrations are both fun and meaningful. As a classmate’s birthday drew close during the time between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we had an opportunity to discuss how our own birthday is our own individual beginning…our own “new year.” Together, we came to understand that each of us has our own special purpose, and we can all affect the world in a positive way by bringing goodness to the world. We shared our ideas, and will be creating individual books in honor of our birthdays, about how we bring goodness to the world! Our birthday celebrations include a “baked from scratch, healthy cake”. The children have an opportunity to use math skills measuring both the dry and wet ingredients. This special cake, called a Wishing Cake, was super yummy and very special, as each child made a wish for our birthday girl, as they dropped in chocolate chips to our batter! After sharing the cake, the children enjoyed dancing to their favorite songs, and reading the books our birthday girl bought as a gift to our classroom.

Math a mystery? It was in kindergarten! With the help of our “Mystery Math Box” the children enjoyed a multisensory experience as they worked on their counting and one-to-one correspondence skills. The children reached inside the Mystery Math Box and described how the objects inside felt. Then, they tried to count the objects while they were still inside the box! Finally, we opened up the box, and checked their guesses! After being introduced to the class, The Mystery Math Box was placed in the manipulative center and the children have delighted in continuing to use it with their friends. Patterns were explored with the help of our pattern blocks. We learned the proper names for all the blocks, and they then created their own unique patterns with them. The pattern blocks continue to be a classroom favorite!

We are learning our color words in our shared reading book, Birthdays. In our journals, we wrote a sentence about our favorite color and then made an illustration of something that color. We also went on a color hunt! Each child received a card with a color name on it, and we went on a color hunt in our classroom to search for objects in that color!

As September draws to a close, and the cool fall weather arrives, our class is growing as a community of learners and friends. Our daily routines have become established, and the children are growing in confidence and maturity. I am so proud of all of them!

Kindergarten had an exciting and busy first week of school. We were delighted to reunite with old friends, meet new friends and discover our class pet, a garter snake! The children came up with some different names for our snake, voted and choose, “Roger Michael” and nicknamed him “Snakey”. We learned that Snakey is diurnal, because he is very active during the day!

As our days together progress, we are becoming comfortable with our

daily routines and good habits. Each morning we write and draw in our journals in response to our daily question! These questions give the children “food for thought” to help them transition into the school day. They draw pictures, use invented spelling and dictate their thoughts. Our most popular question so far this year was, “what is your favorite sweet treat?” as we prepared for Rosh Hashanah! Our morning meeting has quickly become a favorite and special time as we share personal stories or objects with our friends. During this time, we feel respected for our uniqueness as well as a sense of belonging to our classroom community.

The scent of Rosh Hashanah fills our classroom and the message fills our hearts. We tasted sweet, yummy apples and created a bar graph based upon our preferences. We baked healthy honey cake and soon we will enjoy apples and honey and challah with raisins at our upcoming Rosh Hashanah celebration! The children have explored ideas about how they can be their “best self” in the New Year and we walked to the river and practiced Tashlich, thinking about our “best self”. We learned that a shofar is blown to remind us to stop and think about our “best self”. Rabbi Mendy and Rabby Yitzchok blew the shofar for us. We tried too, and several friends were able to elicit a delightful sound!

During our shared reading we have explored concepts of print and parts of a book. We learned our first sight word, “I”, and we are beginning to blend sounds we know. The children use invented spelling in their daily journal writing. Our centers our stocked with literacy and writing materials and the children often write signs during their play!

We explore math concepts with daily routines using the calendar through graphing, ten frames, place value cups, counting, predicting and estimating. The children used colorful strips to compare lengths as we examined measurement. Of course, on Friday, we use measurement tools to prepare challah, a class favorite!

It wouldn’t be kindergarten without play! Our most frequently visited centers so far have been the block, sand and writing centers. In play, the children “try on” various roles, such as, Ice Cream Shop Owner, Architect, or Writer. They experiment with language, problem solve and use writing to make signs. Outside time is shared with friends daily, where we can run, climb, dig, ride, draw and enjoy nature. Through play, the children continue to grow together as a class community!

Shanah Tovah!

Morah Melissa

Welcome to Kindergarten

My name is MELISSA YARGER and I am the kindergarten teacher at Zimmer. I received my teaching certification in Early Childhood Education from William Paterson University, where I continue to serve as recording secretary on the board of Kappa Delta Pi, the International Education Honor Society, at the William Paterson University Chapter. I am a member of NAEYC, (National Association for the Education of Young Children) and believe strongly in honing my skills through collaboration, workshops and seminars.

As an early childhood educator, I have the privilege and responsibility to promote the development of young children. I enjoy working together with families, as I assume the unique opportunity of educating children through the fostering of their imagination, curiosity, socialization and self-esteem. My classroom provides an inviting and safe environment that encourages children to explore and develop new interests and learning experiences, as they share ideas in an atmosphere of mutual respect and fun.

I have been married for 16 years to my husband Bill and we have a teenage daughter, Becca. We share our home with 5 cats, a frog and many fish. I love to read and working with children to help them develop their reading skills each year brings me great joy and pride.