My Room 2016-2017!

Hebrew School officially begins this Sunday! I cannot even begin to express my excitement :) 

I had the opportunity last week to set up my classroom! I thought I'd share a few photos with you all! 

This is an overview of my room! I found the small whiteboard thrown away on the side of the street, so I cleaned it off and shoved it into my car. I'm sure it will love its new home! 

Our class rug was actually donated by the Rabbi, which was so nice! 

I decorated the classroom with posters of the aleph bet. Also, I'll do a whole post about the bulletin boards when I actually get around to making them look pretty. 

This is a "play" shabbat table. It's actually a piano stool, but I thought I'd re-purpose it into something fun and useful. The kids can play at the shabbat table if they arrive early to Hebrew school or are finished their work! 

This is our independent learning center. The students can take a tub and go to an empty section of the room to work on the activity inside. Each activity relates to the Hebrew alphabet. When they're finished, they can clean up and put the tub back in its spot. I'll most likely write some posts about what is inside these bins at a later date! 

Our playdough workshop is set up and ready to go! I can't wait to see the creations my students make this year. 

Finally we have our makeshift cubby. Last year the classroom often became messy and overwhelming. I decided to put some hooks on the wall for coats and bags. The students can put their finished work and their folder in the little boxes with their names on it. Hopefully this will keep everything more organized. 

B'ahava, 

Elana 

Hebrew Write the Room

Writing in Kindergarten should be a fun event! Over the past couple months, I've heard a lot about an activity called write-the-room. Basically, write-the-room is a secular activity where students search the room for hidden words and then write them down on a piece of paper using a clipboard.

It sounds like a blast to me! It gets the kids up and moving and also helps them practice their writing skills. 

I decided to create a Hebrew version for my class. I figured that I would make a write-the-room activity for each letter learned. I may not use all of them, but being prepared is never a bad thing. 

For each letter, I created two pages of "Hebrew words." Most of these words are actually nonsense (but some of them are real). I feel that nonsense words are OK for this activity, because the objective is not to learn Hebrew vocabulary but just to practice writing Hebrew. 

Side note: I created these activities with the assumption that the students are learning the Hebrew letters in alphabetic order. For example, the activity for aleph only uses the letter aleph--- yet the activity for tav includes most of the Hebrew letters.  I created the activity this way because I didn't want to overwhelm the students by having them write letters they haven't officially learned yet. 

ACTIVITY SET UP: 

Print out the activity you would like to use and copies of the recording sheet

Cut out the words and tape them around the room

Set up the clipboards and pencils

Enjoy! 

Here is the link to the printable: Hebrew Write the Room

B'ahava,

Elana

Hebrew Letter Playdough

Some  of my kids are naturally drawn towards building structures. When giving a choice between doing an art/craft project, reading, writing, or building something---these kids will choose building every time.

It doesn't matter if it's Legos, lincoln logs, magnetic connectors or pipe cleaners-- the "builders" of your class will LOVE a structural challenge.

One of the main objectives we have for our Kindergarten class is learning each Hebrew letter and its corresponding sound.

How can my builders work on this objective?

Playdough. 

It's a pretty obvious solution. Playdough is malleable, and therefore lends itself well towards creating both rounded and angular letters. Obviously working with playdough helps students recognize/identify Hebrew letters.

But how can teachers use playdough to encourage students to recognize a letter's SOUND?

After thinking this problem through-- I finally came up an idea. I decided to create a year-long playdough binder that students can use week to week. On each page of the binder is both the Hebrew letter and a corresponding picture (beginning with the same sound as that letter).

For example, the letter bet is paired with a basketball, reinforcing that bet makes the sound /b/.
And so on....

It actually was a pretty easy fix.

While the students are making their play dough creations, prompt them to think of more words that begin with the designated letter.

Here is the resource I created: Hebrew Letter Playdough 

Basically, I put the packet in a binder and prop it up like so:

In terms of the actual center itself, I found a super cool playdough workshop at our local Goodwill.

 The inside of the workshop has these tools the kids can experiment around with!

Every week, I flip the page of the binder--so that the picture corresponds with the letter we are learning.

My builders love it :)

Side note: Varying materials is always a good thing.  Instead of only using playdough, I also use this resource when the students build with magnetic connectors and pipe-cleaners. Basically, this binder is useful for any manipulative material you want to use!

B'shalom, 
Elana 

Authentic Reading

On the first day of Hebrew school, I asked my students why it's important to read Hebrew.
Here are the answers we came up with:

• Our prayers are in Hebrew
• Praying helps us connect to G-d
• We can understand things around the synagogue
• Our parents and siblings can read Hebrew

After that conversation, the kindergartners wanted to skip the practice and just READ Hebrew already. They understood why it was important. And they wanted to do it ASAP. 

Only, how can a kindergartner (who is just starting Religious School) actually read Hebrew? At our shul, the kindergartners only learn the letters and their corresponding sounds. The vowels are taught next year, in first grade. 

But I was determined to find a way! 

 I wanted my students to feel like they really were reading Hebrew, even though they hadn't learned the vowels yet. 

So I created a resource for my independent reading center. I made two copies so that two kids can use it at the same time! 

This resource can be used all throughout the year. Basically, this resource helps students "read" Hebrew by giving them the opportunity to practice the Hebrew letters out loud. 

For example, let's say you just learned the letter Kaf. You would flip the book to the letter Kaf section. The first page has the Hebrew letter and two picture reminders of letter's sound (car and cat).  Then, the student practices reading the letter (and letters learned previously) on the following pages. 

The student keeps his/her place with a Popsicle stick with a googly eye attached to the end.

To keep the students organized, I used two dividers (one green and one red). The students know to start with the pages after the green divider and stop when you get to the red. You don't have to use those colors, but make sure the students know which color represents begin and stop.

I store my Popsicle stick in the inside pocket of the binder!

 Here is what you need to put it together. I used only materials I found stashed in my basement :) 

 A Binder

My binder was only 1 inch. 

A printed copy of my resource (entitled I can Read Hebrew)

The document is about 90 pages in length  

 A Popsicle stick and a googly eye

The student can use this Popsicle stick to keep their place while reading. They move the stick from letter to letter as they read. 

Page Protectors

Keeps the pages nice and kid friendly.  

Two plastic dividers  

I used green for start and red for stop.

Here is the link to download the resource: 

Hebrew Independent Reading Book


Have a great day,
Elana