Do middle schoolers still play? Not, play organized sports games, or board games, or video games. But do they still want to let their imaginations run and use their hands to create and get silly together? Just a quick look around the middle school room this week said it all. Here we are… …making a rocking chair, …
Tag: imagination play
Feb 16
A Lonely Grandmother and a Foolish Soldier Make Shabbat…
I knew it in theory: eleven year olds are just at the beginning stages of establishing their own identity, they love doing “adult” things, and are increasingly able to take on different perspectives. Still, the children’s enthusiasm for our Shabbat project blew me away. “Can we work more on our characters today?” they asked RIGHT …
Jan 29
My kind of play
There is so much joy in being able to choose how you want to play and explore! Some of us just LOVE to show our ideas with glue and paint and paper. Others of us like to get our hands into sand to dive for Hebrew letters. We might really love to sort and feel …
Jan 28
Once upon a time…
… there were 12 Nitzanim children who LOVED reading Shabbat stories, but not just any Shabbat stories, stories with magic in them. “Can we read another story at כיבוד (kibud–snack)?” they would say to Morah Sara. Morah Sara heard the children talking about the storytelling that they do at school: “I filled my black and …
Jan 17
Shorashim Shabbat
It’s time for Shabbat! The guests are coming over soon! It’s time to polish the candlesticks. And dust the furniture. And cook a Shabbat soup. The sun is setting, and it’s getting dark. Time to light the נרות (nerot–candles) and cover our eyes. Now it’s grape juice time. Finally, let’s cut up the challah. Dinner time. Chicken …
Jan 08
Shabbat!
We’ve started our new theme–Shabbat! There are SO MANY ways to play Shabbat with our Shorashim friends! We’ve been getting Shabbat dinner ready in the מִטְבָּח (mitbach–kitchen). We’ve built houses to have our Shabbat in. We stamped the letters of Shabbat, ש shin, ב bet, ת tav and found ש shin, ב bet, ת tav in the sensory …
Dec 11
Chanukkah Everywhere!
We see חנוכה (Chanukkah) everywhere! “Look a menorah!” “Another menorah! It has a helper candle.” We weren’t sure about this one because it looked a little different, but then we counted. It had שמונה (shmoneh–eight) places for נרות (nerot–candles) and one place for the שמש (shamash–helper candle). Must be a חנוכייה (chanukkiyah–Chanukkah menorah). A סביבון (sevivon–dreidel), too! We even had a Chanukkah …
Nov 02
Shteelim Designs Felt Pieces
This week, Shteelim (“saplings” for Kindergarten) designed felt pieces so we could act out the story of Avraham V’Sara on the Felt Board We sat down and listened carefully to the text, stopping when we heard something we wanted to make We had so many ideas for the felt pieces we wanted to play with! …
Oct 19
Shorashim Design a Torah
This week Shorashim (“Roots” for Nursery) explored the Torah to celebrate Simchat Torah! We arranged shapes on the projector to look at ways we could dress the Torah. And we discovered that we could use the projector in so many different ways to add to our play! We could project the Torah on ourselves We …
Apr 27
Shorashim V’Shteelim Shavuot!
This week Shorashim (roots for nursery) and Shteelim (saplings for kindergarten) started our new theme, שבועות (Shavuot). We have been playing מגילת רות (Megillat Rut- The Book of Ruth), which is a special Jewish book that some Jews read or hear on שבועות (Shavuot). Much of our play has focused on three main characters – …