Shalom and shalom green room families,

Best of blessings to you all and your loving children. It has been my honor and privilege to serve, know and love your child. I believe the CJP leadership follows the intent of what is best for the children everyday and into 2019. I appreciate all that you do, who you are and your willingness to entrust your child to myself and morah Devora. I love your child and have experienced the love from your child in return. Thank you, they are each unique and beautiful and every one of them occupy a space in my heart. Many thanks and much appreciation to Morah Devora. She will remain the constant  in the green room. It has been my pleasure to meet and get acquainted with you and your family members. Sincere gratitude to all of you and the parents you are, involved in your children's lives and futures and for your generous support and contributions. 

Today will be Sarah's last day. We wish her and her family well. 

We have been exploring the 5 senses. The children enjoyed seeking outdoors what they sensed around them, multiple days of sensory identification: sights, sounds,smells, textures and tastes, etc. Thanks to all for sending in items to share and sense. Alice, Bubby and Shannon for cups and plates, Ava's family for bird sounds and miniatures, temperature changing color items, a doll and grapes.  Tzippi shared her doll. Thanks Rachel. 

We spoke about taking care of ourselves, others and things. Gentleness towards children and baby dolls and pets. Levi brought in pine cones and silly putty, thanks Skye. Ari and Jenna brought in sea shells and colored craft sticks. Morah Ora and the peach room, thanks for allowing your bird to be our guest. Mason, Ally and Eric sent the recipes and ingredients for the class to make slime and fluffy slime. It was the highlight of Thursdays activities. Thank you all. 

Many have learned to slice a banana and juice an orange during the last few weeks, also "tag to the tummy" putting on their own jackets and sweaters. They were surprised and delighted to flip their coats over there heads, slipping their arms into their sleeves, in victory. Each week there are more of them opening and closing their own lunch containers...they did it ALL BY MYSELF! 

The sensory journey was a lot of fun seeing those little feet and and people figure out what they were walking on blindfolded and later taking such joy in seeing it and repeating it after the reveal. 

The green room will have a new morah when they return from break. Thank you for welcoming me this year. I will miss the community and especially the children. 

Con mucho amor,

Morah Cindy and morah Devora

Shalom Parents and Families,

The cool weather has arrived! We have been and will continue exploring our 5 Senses and Emotions for the next two weeks until break. 

Seeing and hearing the children is a wonder to behold, such small humans with such BIG emotions. They are learning the skills of self calming and I see incredible progress each day. Under the loft they may take time to find their peace. With part of our 5 Senses each child selected an essential oil and applied it to a cotton ball which they may request to smell and help soothe themselves. 

They continue to identify their names and their classmates names written in Hebrew and English along with exposure to sight words: I, see, a, the. Next week we will add: my, like, and, end. They have enjoyed choosing rhyming words in books and verbally as pre-literacy skills to reading. Brand and letter recognition games and sound games are a fun way parents can encourage these skills while traveling in the car. Do you emember playing license plate/travel alphabet?

We've added the Spanish version of our "Hello Friend Song".

Hello friends!

How are you?

I'm very happy to see you

Greet your neighbor.

Boogie on down!

Give a bump 

And turn around,

Hola amigos!

Como esta usted?

Estoy muy feliz de verlo a usted.

Salude a su vecino.

Boogie para abajo.

Dese un tope

y de la vuelta.

Language is such a wonderful gift to share with your child at these tender ages and stages.I encourage you and your extended families to share and expose your children to rich vocabulary conversations and foreign languages. Their minds take in all in. Their brain has the capacity to absorb it and store it. 

The Sensory Journey was a big hit! First the children were led with a barefoot and blindfold over many textiles and natural materials. Later they felt the same items with 2 bare feet, eyes open. They got a kick out of it! Ava's family brought in grapes to share: they looked at them, smelled them, listened and later tasted them. It was like a new discovery taking time to slow down a recognize the  fruit fully in the present moment.  

Many children readily identified water, the towel and sand, the other things.  Each day they have been touching something inside the "Mystery Box" and challenged to identify it by touch. The peace and blue rooms shared their sensory tables with us. The water beads Hailey and Hammond's family shared were a huge highlight among all ages!

The older children wrote their names out with Wickie Sticks. 

Thank you for all you do and how much you love and care for your children and contribute to our class. Thank you to Alice and her Bubby for supplying us with cups and plates for our food preparation works, and  Hammond, Erin and family for allowing the children to experience wooden foods and Jemma, and the Goldman's for bringing babies into our dramatic play area and enriching all of our lives. We appreciate all that you are and contribute to our school family

. 

Shalom,

Morahs Cindy and Devora

Shalom Parents and Happy Chanukah!

Thank you for allowing us to serve your children. They have remained busy, worker bees: making latkes, menorahs, cards, polishing gelt and more. It is fascinating to see their brains, bodies and hands at work refining their skills. 

The children are learning the spelling of their Hebrew names and letter names. We have all enjoyed The Chanukah Story and activities. They are adapting to socially interact and demonstrating:

1. They take care of themselves. 

     It is sweet seeing them all play together and run across the playground or gather in the sandbox  or mud kitchen, taking turns and beginning to work things out among themselves. 

2. They take care of others. They offer hugs to those that are sad.

3. Take care of things. They each have a job or two in our classroom and most take it seriously, some are moving into seeing a need and taking care of it without direction.  

We continue word exposure: I, see, and a. We practice phonics skills verbally using rhymes discussing picture cards. Many of the children have been self appointed guest teachers and are able to present Ants on an Apple to the other children. It's adorable to observe their imitation of the morahs and the expectations for the students. 

The menorahs are beautiful and I hope they enjoy a long and happy life. Fine motor skills, fragility, pouring, quantity are all skills they are working with. All the festivities have been wonderful, a special thanks to Masha and the Deitsches for the Touch a Truck and our community volunteers supporting CJP,

We continue with lessons on Grace and Courtesy such as how to Welcome Guests and How to Blow Our Nose, before the real season hits. They are practicing  how to ask for a turn and what to say when someone says they can't come to their house or they would like to join into play. 

We made cards and gave Gavi a birthday call in North Carolina. We miss having him in our class!  It was also Morah Devorahs birthday! The children helped make and eat Morah Devora's birthday cake this week! 

Devora introduced Chanukah items and the concept of small, medium and large and taught the children to play dreidels as well as paint with them! 

We read the big book called If Candles Could Speak The Chanukah Story The children request it over and over again and enjoyed using felt board stories to portray the story of Chanukah.  

Happy Chanukah!

Morahs Cindy and Devora

PS: Thanks to all the parents and care givers supporting the children's independence and transition time by doing door drop off and knocking to wait for your child's pick up and departing hugs to their classmates so the rest of the children may stay at circle. The water cart will be placed in the hallway for pick up time. Please remember your child's water bottle each day so they have water to drink and stay hydrated.  Thank you!