ALEF--Israel introduction April 30, 2017

Dear families:

Great to see the children after our April vacation!  We talked about counting the Omer from the second day of Pesach until Shavuot.  Today, April 30, is day 19 of the count; we colored in the days on our class counter.

Cheryl led the tefillah for gan and alef in our classroom, since the church was using our sanctuary due to a flood in theirs.

Today we learned about Israel, for Israel Independence Day.  We looked at a map of Israel and found it on a world map.  Israel is about the size of Massachusetts.  We saw pictures of sites in Israel to reinforce students’ knowledge.  Each student got a mini Israel flag.

STORY: We read Sammy Spider’s First Trip to Israel.  Sammy Spider is in trouble!  He’s a stowaway—trapped inside Josh Shapiro’s toy airplane on a trip to Israel.  As they explore Israel, Sammy and Josh learn that “shalom” means hello, goodbye, and peace.  From the beaches of Tel Aviv and the Dead Sea, to Jerusalem, the Negev desert, and a kibbutz, we discover the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures of Israel with Sammy.

CRAFT:  Students worked on a packet of Israel puzzles and art, such as “me at the western wall,” a word search, writing a note to put into a crack in the kotel (western wall), bringing things home in your suitcase from Israel, and others.  Students solved a puzzle with the word “Yisrael” in Hebrew hidden in the window.

 HEBREW:  We learned the sound “eh,” represented by three dots under a letter, as in degel (flag) and  shemesh (sun).  Our Hebrew letter was פ pay, which is the first letter in Purim, Pesach, “parah” (cow,)  and “peel” (elephant).

BIBLE:  We read the pamphlet on David and Goliath.  David was confident that he could defeat the giant because he trusted in God.  We talked about invisible things helping us like love of parents, trust in God, lucky items, etc.  One student pointed out that David was small, but usually the smaller person is successful.  We sang and did the motions for David Melech Yisrael.

I hope to see you at the Synaplex on Saturday morning.

Judy and Cheryl (Esther and Tzipporah)