School News - January 2005
From the Director of Education
Continuing with the theme of sharing and exploring the Religious and Hebrew school curriculum, I have devoted this month's article to giving you an overview of our Hebrew school curriculum.
Congregation Albert's Hebrew program has been developed around a prayer-based curriculum which progressively builds from year to year beginning with the simplest and most common grammatical structures for students working towards achieving prayer literacy.
Prayer links us not only to Jewish communities in the present, but also to generations past and future. When we recite prayers like the Shema, Aleynu, or the Kaddish, we connect with Jews in other places and at other times who recite and have recited the very same words.
Students practice the reading of key prayers to build siddur (prayerbook) fluency while developing an understanding of the underlying meaning of the prayers while continuing to learn about Jewish values. Activities in the classroom facilitate translation and comprehension of key siddur words and additional prayer exercises reinforce pronunciation and rhythmic reading. While reading exercises promote fluency, grammar exercises bolster vocabulary comprehension with an emphasis on understanding the roots, suffixes and prefixes.
It is our goal that students will feel a sense of comfort and confidence when participating in Shabbat services and when reciting blessings at home. We want to give them the opportunity to deepen their Jewish experience in order to strengthen their love of Torah.
If you are interested in further information, I invite you to call me with any questions.
B'shalom,
Leah SchaerPlease remember to register for our annual Family Camp
(see registration form enclosed in this month's bulletin).
From the E.C.C.
Shalom from the early Childhood Center,The 12 staff members and 56 families of Congregation Albert's Early Childhood Center would like to begin a monthly greeting to the congregation. For those of you who are not familiar with us, the Early Childhood Center has been in operation for 24 years. I have been fortunate enough to be teacher and supervisor for 21 of those years.
Our Center includes pre-school programming for 2 year olds through kindergarten. We also offer toddler and parent groups for children not yet ready for pre-school. We offer full day child care as well as many enrichment activities.
Each month I would like to spotlight a particular facet of our busy programming, and I'll begin by having Dale Cooperman talk about some of the special events in her kindergarten class.
Shalom from Bonnie Joy Evnetzky
Allow me to introduce myself and our kindergarten program. My name is Dale Cooperman and I have been teaching kindergarten for 22 years, the past 5 at Congregation Albert. I've earned several degrees in early childhood education that have helped me in creating a wonderfully enriched kindergarten program. I represent Congregation Albert at the annual CAJE conference, where I present an early childhood curriculum that I have written, called "Drops of Honey."
Our unique kindergarten expresses itself in integrating both Judaic and secular curricula.
These two aspects of the curriculum support each other with the implementation of a theme based program. As an example, we studied Matisse because of his emphasis on line and form, which is the basis for letter recognition. Our final project was a simple (yet sophisticated) black and white sketch of a table, vase and flowers.
Our subsequent unit of the 7 days of creation was enhanced by our focus on Matisse as the children wrote and illustrated their own books of creation, with an extra emphasis on Shabbat. As an extra treat to our weekly Shabbat celebration, each child had the opportunity to bake his own challah to share with his family at home.
As historians we learned about the first Thanksgiving; we studied maps, read stories and made our own corn husk dolls, much like the first Pilgrim children did. We wrote an original menu and recipe book; individual copies went home to be enjoyed by families. As an example, did you know that in order to cook a turkey we have to "…go into the forest, catch and grab a turkey and kill it with an arrow?"
As scientists, we have observed the changes in nature and painted a tree in our yard, noting the transformations as the seasons change. As a theme for Hanukkah, we will be examining light and dark and wondering about the question, "What is Jewish about light?"
Just two weeks ago we attended a live performance of Hansel and Gretel at the Kimo Theatre.
Do we sound like busy and happy learners? You bet!
Shalom from Dale Cooperman
Tuesday, January 18 - 6:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.
Please join us for an informational meeting about next year's kindergarten program.
Attention all Religious School Families
If you have any changes in your contact information
(address, phone numbers, email addresses, etc.)
please let the school office know as soon as possible.
8th Grade Empty Bowls Project
Congregation Albert Religious School's 8th grade class shown
here holding bowls they designed and donated, assisted by their t
eacher, Diane Palley, as a Tzedakah project benefiting the "
Empty Bowls Project" which is Project Share's largest fundraiser.
L'Taken Seminar
Congregation Albert students visited our senators in Washington D.C.
during the L'Taken Seminar.
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