Today was the 10th of Tevet, a day in history when the Romans surrounded Yerushalayim for 2 1/2 years and finally destroyed the temple. I am still unsure if they surrounded it by building a wall or with Roman soldiers but we built a wall out of wooden blocks around our own “Yerushalayim” with the Jews inside and the Romans outside gaurding it…

For Yosefs coat, we cut out a white coat from felt and used water colors to color it. We then stuck it on a paper Yosef.

And then to explain the idea of saving food (to prepare for the famine) we made a storage house out of brown construction paper and I hid food stickers all over the house and the kids went looking for food to stick in their storage house- very cute!

For some reason, I cant upload photos, so when I get the chance, I will:)

Today I was chatting with my mother in law. She is a professional educator and I was telling her how just sitting at the breakfast table and talking about the story of Chanukah, the kids absorb so much. They ask questions and we discuss the different concepts and words and it becomes something that they truly understand, not just a story being told to them.

Some conversation pieces that came up this morning were
“what is a war” – from talking about the war that the Macabis faught
“where is Syria and Greece” – which led us to our map on the wall and looked at where those countries are situated today
“why didn’t the Yevanim like the Jews?” this was a tough one considering my Cutie is only 4, but these questions just kept coming and coming…

I then showed them how we can use olive oil to light a menorah and we took a babyfood jar and filled it half way, put a wick inside and lit it and watched for a few hours to see how long it lasted. Then we discussed how the oil in the Menorah lasted 8 DAYS!!! The kids really understood how that was really such a miracle since they saw with their own eyes that it only lasted a few hours, never mind a whole day!

We then painted with dreidels which Cutie loved- he dipped the dreidel into red paint which I put into a teaspoon and then spun it on a piece of paper. He loved the different designs it came up with, the finished product is gorgeous but here he is in action:

Then we learned Parshas VaYeshev and decided to paint a multi colored coat for Yosef. I took an old white T-shirt and cut it down just the front so it looked like a coat. We then laid it out and everyone got a bunch of different colored paints and painted it. We laid it to dry and got a gorgeous multicolored coat! While it was drying, the kids decided to continue with the paints and fingerpainted on the paper that I had laid out under the coat. It was a great great activity and they had a ball!

oh- and we BAKED Sufganiyot- SO easy, I did it with all 3 kids…
I got the recipe from Redbook Magazine, heres the recipe:
Sufganiyot Recipe
They came out delicious!

So thats it for now, we will see what other fun activities we come up with as the week progresses! a wonderful week to all~~~

We have started a really fun way of learning the weekly Parshah:
Every week we first sit down and talk about the story of the current Parshah. I use My First Parshah Reader which is fabulous for Preschoolers.

We then “act out” the entire Parshah using all the toys and books in our playroom. The kids LOVE it and ask to “play” Parshah all the time. By the time Shabbos comes, they know it so well, and make daddy very proud when he asks them questions at the Shabbos table!

Here are some of the scenes we “acted” out from Parshas Chayei Sara and Toldos:

This is Eliezer speaking to Rivkah at the well getting water for his camels while Avraham and Yitzchak wait for him to come back

Here are Yitzchak and Rivkah with their twin sons Eisav and Yakov (you can figure out who is who:)

We spoke about how Yakov loved learning Torah and Eisav was a hunter

Here is Yakov getting the blessing from Yitzchak

These are just a few, the site for some reason is not letting me upload more photos… but we literally played out each scene from each Parshah- you can use any toys, and it makes it more real for the kids to identify with each person from the Tanach.

This week we are going to concentrate on the different laws of Shabbos and the Mishkan-

I really enjoy the Montessori method of learning and am trying to incorporate it into our daily lives.  I love the idea of having trays of activities and how the kids almost teach themselves with our being on the sidelines. If we can master that, we will be really happy!

So now I am just brainstorming some ideas for the coming week:

1- A Shabbos Lapbook: we will draw/cut out pictures of things that we do and don’t do on Shabbos and put them in the correct column. I’ll put the empty lapbook on a tray along side a glue stick and pictures for Cuty to paste. Also will put a few markers if he wants to color and draw pictures of his own.

2- Discuss the idea of Mana and how we were given an extra portion on Fridays, hence we have 2 Challahs… and then bake Challah which is an amazing activity in itself (from the rising of the yeast to the measurements of ingredients, kneeding the dough etc.)

3- Starting this Friday night and Shabbos day we will get Cuty to start helping to set the Shabbos table.

4- We will go through our library and take out a bunch of books about Shabbos to read this week. Also, we have Hebrew and English flashcards and will take the words out that relate to Shabbos and practice reading them

5- In regards to the Mishkan, it may be a bit too complex for Cuty but I think we can really bring it down to his level and go through each thing that was used… Ah! We will MAKE playdough and use it to make the different things used in the Mishkan, will let you know how that turns out!

For Parshas Lech Lecha, we made a bag out of felt to re-enact Avraham having to leave his home. We went around the house and packed a few important things in the bag- Cuty loved the fact that he made his own bag and got to pack it himself.

Here it is!

Here is a cute project we did when learning about Eisav-

I traced the outline of a man and Cuty glued orange yarn onto his body (we didnt have any red yarn which would have been more appropriate given that Eisav is described as “red”).

Check it out:

Since my son is only 3, I go through the weekly parshah and just take out the things that he can understand. This parshah is a bit complex and the main thing that he would understand is learning about keeping Milk and Meat seperate. 

We made a “Meat and Milk” lap book. One side of the lap book we glued a piece of red construction paper for meat and on the other side, we glued blue for milk. We then took food magazines and cut out pictures of dairy products to glue on the milk side and meat products to glue on the meat side. This made it very clear to him how we keep meat and dairy seperate as well as what foods belong in the meat group and what foods belong in the dairy group!

Here is a copy of a sheet I made of meat and dairy products to add to his lap book- meatmilk.pdf as well as a photo of the completed project!

Here is a project we did of Yakovs dream. We collected 12 rocks (stones) and surrounded “Yakov” with them. Although it is supposed to be around his head, we just put it around him. We then made a ladder out of popsicle sticks symbolizing the ladder in his dream.