Peek Through Our Window
A glimpse into our week at YLS
January 8, 2016
27 Tevet 5776
Dear Parents,
Shabbat Shalom,
Morah Chana, Morah Rachael and Morah Butsie
Explored
- This week, we explored our learning space and our surrounding environment to find and identify shapes that exist in our world. We found rectangles and squares and described the difference between the two. Additionally, we found spheres and cylinders. We even discovered some shapes that we didn’t know- a quatrefoil and a pentadecagon!
Discovered
As our learning of Sefer Beresheit comes to close, we discovered how much we remembered! We took our parsha pictures from the whole sefer and sequenced them. It was incredible to see all that we had remembered.
During morning meeting, we discovered that many friends had learned Parashat Shemot over break. Many friends reminded us that we meet Moshe Rabbeinu in Parshat Shemot. Some friends taught us about the burning bush that attracted Moshe’s attention. We also spoke about Moshe Rabbeinu and all the miracles Hashem made before Paraoh.
Created
As our winter break came to a close, we decided to create a winter break book. In this book we shared our favorite memories of winter break. This book will live in our research center and will allow friends the opportunity to read about their friends’ winter break.
- In active play, our friends created a “Cheetah Mobile.” Our friends first created a blueprint using our outdoor chalkboard, and they referred to it as they built their structure.
Celebrated
- We celebrated finishing Sefer Bereisheit with a siyum! All week, we prepared for the siyum by hanging decorations, making food that reminds us of the various parshiyot, and practicing the special tefillah we would say. On the day of the siyum, we welcomed a class of friends from Gan Chabad of the Main Line. We listened to a dvar Torah, written and delivered by Moriah Sinensky. Our siyum expert, Mrs. Tova Sinensky, then led the tefillah. Afterwards, we sang and danced. Our guests were very excited to explore our learning space, so we gave them an opportunity to try our monkey bars! After the siyum, we reflected on what we thought went well and what could have been improved. Our friends had many suggestions- but we all agreed that, next time, instruments are in order!
Wondered
Before winter break, we had been wondering how we could make paper airplanes that really fly. This week, Rafi brought in a book to help us make several kinds of paper airplanes. Some friends brought them outside to test and to adjust them to improve their flying ability.
This week many friends in our class made boom-a-rangs out of popsicle sticks. We were curious to know if they would fly and return back to us. We tested our boom-a-rangs and discovered that some flew, while others did not. Thinking deeply about this, we wondered if it depended on the shape of the boom-a-rang and the direction we were throwing it in.
Ivrit at YLS
Dear Parents,
This week we reviewed things we learned from the beginning of the year. We reviewed what I like to eat, what I like to wear, what I like to do and sizes- small, medium and large. We learned the song “אני אוהב” and we discussed what we like to eat. We also learned the song listened to the song “מי יודע מדוע ולמה לובשת הזברה פיג'מה.” We discussed the clothes that the zebra wore each day in the song and the clothes that we wear each day to school. We looked around the room to see who in the class was wearing the same colors and who was wearing different colors. We played a game where the children chose pictures of what they like to eat and and what they like to wear and shared it with the class.
Words and phrases:
I love- אני אוהב/ אוהבת
to eat- לאכול
to drink- לשתות
to do- לעשות
to play- לשחק
to jump- לקפוץ
to sleep- לישון
I am wearing- אני לובש לובשת
shirt- חולצה
skirt- חצאית
pants- מכנסיים
dress- שמלה
big- גדול
small- קטן
medium- בינוני
Songs we learned this week:
מי יודע מדוע ולמה לובשת הזברה פיג'מה
Shabbat Shalom,
Morah Chana
Specialties at YLS
Music: Sheridan Seyfried
We are enjoying having some new instruments with us! The ukulele is starting to feel comfortable for many of us. The kids are starting to get quicker playing two distinct chords on the ukulele. I'm optimistic that by the spring we will have four chords and can play some songs! We also introduced some hand drums (djembe, bongos) to add to our percussion instruments which already include shaker and tambourine. We sang through many earlier songs and introduced a brand new song, "Home" by Philip Phillip where we learned to sing a wordless chorus! We tried to see how slowly we could play beat patterns on tambourine and shaker. This is a deliberate method to help kids train themselves to play accurately by doing things very precisely and slowly. We're planting seeds so that later control will come easier. It takes a lot of control to play slowly and the kids enjoyed competing to see who could be the slowest! After a few weeks of singing pretty intensely, I introduced the violin. The kids loved hearing this and getting their hands on it to try some simple songs. I played the left hand notes while the kids played the bow (sometimes with some help). Violin is a tough instrument! But that didn't stop most of our friends from trying to play.
Art: Patty Papatheodore
The week before vacation we learned about animals that live under the sea. We practiced painting and drawing skills and based our artwork on Pablo Picasso’s fish paintings.