The Gan- Garrett Jewish Preschool

This has been our study for the last several months: it’s the journey from leaving Egypt, and arriving at Mt. Sinai: building a tree at Tu B’Shvat, taping the mitzvah “fruit” to it that the parents have written about the kind and helpful things their young ones have done for others, counting a footstep a day on the journey from freedom to receiving the Torah, and finally, taking down the “fruit” and gluing them into their own Torahs full of mitzvahs in time to celebrate Shavuot.

Each day at the Gan, we have the opportunity to do the mitzvah of giving Tzedakah to help others. After we had filled 3 arks with money, Morah R collected and counted all of it; we had is we had almost $37.00. She then explained to the children that we needed to make a decision as to where to send it, and after giving a few suggestions, the children voted, and this time the decision was made to donate food. Morah R sent the money to the local food bank. Today we received this thank you note. I got choked up reading the card to the children, because you can feel the deep need and the deep appreciation!

One day when we were feeding our worms some food scraps, a child wondered if worms were good for anything. So we turned to our books about worms and gardens, and enlisted our resident worm and garden expert, Morah Renita to come and teach us about the essential job that worms do to keep the soil loose, aerated and full of nutrients, so that flowers, trees, fruits and vegetables can get all they need from the soil to help them thrive. The children feed the worms, put the worm castings in the soil, plant the vegetables, fruit and herbs, and help tend the garden. Without worms, growth of plants would take an extremely long, long time. We need worms! We’re thankful to Hashem for worms!

We explored rocks in a variety of ways, developing all learning domains over time: painting on rocks, with paint brushes, which is a great way to explore the textures of them,
We held onto rocks, painting with them, which gives sensory information to the brain, and allows children to explore size and weight, while creating an interesting and unique painting,
We dipped rocks in paint, transferring them to and from cups and paper, using spoons, which provided lots of exploration of the movement required to move those rocks around while creating paintings, which is a cognitive multi step, language activity as well as a fine and gross motor activity,
And finally, we studied volcanic rocks and had an experiment which mimicked volcanoes erupting- a great science activity.

Combing our rock and gem study with paint and paper: how it began to how it ended. Our student spent 45 minutes at this activity, making decisions as she went along, about what she wanted to do and how she wanted her painting to look.

Today the children made their own crayons (unique shapes with a variety of colors) in a fun multi-step activity. They worked fine motor skills while peeling the wrappers and snapping them into pieces. They engaged their imaginations when deciding how to group the colors, and then again, after the crayons had melted and hardened, to create artwork.

Yesterday we had a bouquet of white roses. The children filled jars with water and food coloring, snipped white roses and set them in the different jars. We kept one white roses in clear water for comparison. Then we waited and watched, as the roses began to drink the colorful water. The children are so excited to see each jar of roses take on the color of the water, noticing that the blue and green seem to be deeper colors than the others.

The children created their beautiful Seder plates and wrapped them. They learned about the history of the Jewish people in Egypt and why we celebrate Passover. The 4 questions have been asked, the matzah explored, and then the children dipped vegetables in maror and charoset. We’re ready for Passover!

Today, using picture cards and finger puppets, Morah Tzivie taught the 4 questions: Why is this night so different from all other nights? 1) On all other nights, we don’t eat food that drips, but tonight we dip our food 2x, in salty water and charoset, to remember the bitter tears. 2) On all other nights, we eat any bread we like, but on this night, we eat crunchy matzah to remember the Jewish people had to flee quickly and bread didn’t have time to rise. 3) On all other nights, we eat any vegetables we like, but on this night we eat bitter maror to remember the bitterness of Egypt. 4) On all other nights, we sit straight in our seats to eat, but on this night we relax and recline to remember that we are free!

We’ve been learning about Passover and the children have been celebrating the Seder dinner in their House Center. Later, each child took a turn hiding the Afikommen, and they all had great fun finding it! jewishpreschool

The Gan is grateful to have been gifted this marvelous outdoor table and all these accessories. So many opportunities for experiments, inquiries, exploration, making discoveries and developing skills in every learning domain area. #thegan #jewishpreschool #vancouverwa #chabad #science #exploration #inquiry #nature #waterplay #learning #communication #discoveries #openendedlearning #watertable