The Little Shofar - Winter/Khoreff 2010/5770

The Little Shofar Winter/Khoreff 2010/5770 Jewish Family Congregation Early Childhood Center Newsletter Dear Parents, What brings 87 parents and children together as one big happy family? The answer, of course, is our JFC Children’s Service, which I lovingly call the “Pizza Shabbat.” Last month I stood in amazement at our happy crowd of guests. Why were there so many? The music with Cantor Kerry and me was lively, and Rabbi Carla as always gave us a warm and wonderful service, just right for our smallest children. The pizza was also a family pleaser and a Shabbat rest from cooking, yet I believe it was more than that. The animated conversations between the parents and the happy friendships the children shared were what made this event more than just a gathering, but a big family celebration. Thank you to the Blue Room Class Parents and families for your help in making this a truly successful and fun-filled event. JFC ECC is the place to be, so if you missed the last one, please come to our next Children’s Service on March 19 th. I am looking forward to joining all of our ECC families for another wonderful Shabbat!

As you know, we celebrate Shabbat every week at our school service and in each classroom. The children love participating in Shabbat and recently they had a very special Shabbat experience. Each class made their own individual Challah.

Through the sensory experience of mixing the dough, kneading it, watching it rise, smelling the Challah bake and tasting it, the children learned the science of baking bread. The Yellow Room enjoyed this activity so much they created a special Challah for the next week to use for our school Shabbat service. At Shabbat Services, the Rabbi always asks the children whether the round object under the cover is a “Challah or a turtle?” This time when she uncovered the Challah to say the blessing it was indeed a turtle! The children had fashioned the Challah into the shape of a turtle. You should have seen the surprise on Rabbi Carla’s face!

The children are not the only ones who have been busy at the ECC. Many parents have been attending parenting workshops and are learning about raising their children with the guidance of professionals. Our well-attended Wise Parenting series given by Alexis Johnson, Ph.D., has covered “Give Your Child Self-

ECC Little Shofar

Winter/Khoreff 2010 / 5770 Confidence” and “Build Your Child’s Self-Control.” The next and last session will cover “Saying No and Meaning It.” Dr. Johnson’s workshops have received glowing reports from the parents who attended. If you are not signed up and would like to come to the last session on March 19th, please let me know. In addition, the presentation and coffee on “The Thrilling Three’s” given by Ellen Weisberg, MSW, M.Ed., was very enlightening as it opened up pertinent questions from the parents.

The next presentation and coffee on March 1 st will cover the “Fantastic Fours and Kindergarten Readiness.” This will be an opportunity to learn about what is expected in Kindergarten and what skills a soon-to-be Kindergartner needs.

So much has been happening at the ECC for your children and for you. The children are learning, developing skills, making friendships and growing more competent every day. The teachers and I are extremely grateful for your involvement and partnership. With your participation in the parenting classes, the support you give the teachers and the wonderful love and care you give your children at home, we are working together to help your children reach their greatest potential. I also want to offer a special thank you from the entire school to all those who contributed to the ECC Fundraiser. Because of your generous donations, our children are enjoying beautiful new play kitchen furniture, new career costumes and new toys.

Please note that Purim will be studied over the next week, but our celebration on February 24th is just for the children. You can participate by joining JFC on Sunday, February 28th, for the exciting Purim Carnival from 12:00 – 2:00 P.M. and the wonderful Purim Service at 6:30 P.M. Both are great for kids and adults of all ages!

Wishing you a Chag Purim Sameach!

(Happy Purim)

Fern

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ECC Little Shofar

Winter/Khoreff 2010 / 5770 FROM THE RABBI’S DESK

The Jewish calendar has lots of holidays and holy days on it…and many of them are really serious by nature…Yom Kippur, even Chanukah and Pesakh. But the next holiday we will celebrate is an entirely different matter.

The holiday in question is of course Purim. And Purim is a silly holiday.

How so? Well, we are supposed to dress up in costumes (originally these were to represent the characters in the Purim story in the Book of Esther, but now…it seems that anything goes!), come to the service at which the Purim story is retold, and we are required…required! to interrupt the story each time the name of the villain is mentioned, to drown out that name with noise-makers and shouts. Compared to our usually decorous services, that is silly!

Not only that, but we are supposed to turn things upside down…and this begets some irreverence. And that is encouraged!

So our 7th grade students, those preparing for Bar and Bat Mitzvah this year, will prepare a bunch of games for little people, and our building will become the site of the annual JFC Purim Carnival. Imagine: toss-the-chicken and (wet) sponge throw…in the sanctuary!

This year, to add to the silliness, we have rented a GIANT CATERPILLAR for little kids to climb through…and we hope that you will bring your children and their friends (and visitors are welcome too!) to the carnival to celebrate this silly holiday.

The Carnival is Sunday, February 28, from noon till 2 pm. There will be games, food, arts and crafts…and that caterpillar!

That same day, at 6:30 pm, we will hold our (silly) Purim service. The JFC Players (!) will present the Purim story using the music of My Fair Lady…and Ruth Ossher will intersperse some very brief excerpts of the Megillah (Scroll of Esther) so that the kids can drown out the name of the villain. Then, in his honour, we’ll provide Hamantashen for all the kids (and their accompanying adults). We hope you’ll come in costume to the service, which will be brief, and we’ll be done in about an hour so kids can get ready for school the next day.

While the celebration of Purim is really all about being silly, there is some merit to this.

The story told in the Book of Esther cannot be linked to any factual, historical events. Beyond that, there are some problems with the story. First, the name of God is never mentioned…so what is this book doing in the Bible? And how come Esther’s uncle is willing to marry off his nice Jewish niece to the non-Jewish king? One part of the story that we do not emphasize when telling it to kids is that Haman and his sons are all hung at the end of the story; we avoid this because we do not value revenge, and don’t want to teach aggression towards even our enemies. Nor do we focus on the fact that the Jews in the story celebrated this turn of events.

So Purim is best taken as a silly holiday. Come be silly with us…and have lots of fun!

Happy Purim.

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ECC Little Shofar

Winter/Khoreff 2010 / 5770 News from the Green Room Snow, snow and more snow. This month we were very busy watching it fall down outside and enjoying winter-related activities inside. One of the highlights was collecting snow from the playground and bringing it into the classroom.

-We touched it and talked about how cold it was -We made sculptures out of it using our bare hands and classroom gloves -We used sandbox shovels and trowels to scoop it up -We watched it change forms and melt Tu B’Shevat was celebrated with a childmade fruit salad and by planting seeds.

We are examining them every school day to see how much they have grown. As in all experiments, some plants are doing better than others.

We had a small group for Pajama Day, but we had fun parading downstairs with our big friends in the Yellow and Blue Rooms while hugging our “lovies.” The children were asked, “Who came to school with you today? “ Below are the answers: Kayla and Madison Jordan and Chocolate Owen, Teddy and Buzz Light Year Jason and Froggie Jodi and special slippers Dinah and Peppy The children are currently learning about the story of Purim through storytelling, songs, art projects and dress-up. We are so proud of how they are exhibiting self control while waiting to boo when they hear Haman’s name. We are all looking forward to our schoolwide celebration in which the teachers act out the story.

We can’t wait to start sharing Shabbat with the Green Room families at the end of the month. Have a restful President’s week.

B’Shalom Dinah and Jodi

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ECC Little Shofar

Winter/Khoreff 2010 / 5770

Snow, snow and more snow!

It’s PAJAMA DAY! ….and Shabbat…

Learning about Purim and making groggers...

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ECC Little Shofar

Winter/Khoreff 2010 / 5770 News from the Blue Room We Are the World * The World Around Us The Blue Room children have had a very busy past few months. We started our exploration with the supermarket. What child doesn’t love food shopping with Mommy? Our supermarket was filled with containers and boxes of healthy food where the children shopped every day to make a beautiful picnic. They pretended to “check out” and “bag” their groceries. What a fun and busy place our “Princess Supermarket” was.

These shopping expeditions led us to a week on healthy foods and eating. We explored the food pyramid, learned what foods keep us feeling well and what we should and shouldn’t eat. You would be surprised to know that at snack your children are very aware of what they are eating and often remark how “healthy and delicious” their snack is.

After our exploration of nutrition, we all became doctors and nurses. We turned our class into a doctor’s office, complete with several new dress up outfits and assorted medical equipment. The children all shared their doctor office visit experiences and decided that it is important to take care of themselves and even get a shot once in a while. We were lucky enough to have Dr. Donna (Zach’s Mom) come and tell us all about being a doctor. She showed us her all her doctor equipment and we even got to see how our lungs expand when we breathe.

After all this, we now had to save the world and what better way to start than by recycling. The children made a recycling center in the room, learned about different metals and glass, and then proceeded to recycle the items they brought in by turning them, via art, into something new and beautiful. They all agreed they need to take care of the earth and all the living things that inhabit it.

Our next course of study was to develop an awareness of nature by studying birds. Birds are a big part of our classroom as we often see them flying past our beautiful windows. We read about all different types of birds from flamingos (ask your child why they are pink) to seagulls, robins and bluebirds. First we built our nests, then made the bird eggs, and last we created Mommy birds to sit on the nests. Our study of birds will culminate in making bird feeders to hang up at home so that the children can watch and identify their feathered visitors.

We look forward to much more learning and exploration in the coming months!

Ellen & Laura Page 6

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Winter/Khoreff 2010 / 5770

Grocery shopping..

Nutrition….

Recycling….

Music...

… and the Nature of Things

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ECC Little Shofar

Winter/Khoreff 2010 / 5770 News from The Yellow Room January has been a very exciting month for the Yellow Room. We have welcomed a new friend into our class, and the children have started signing in using their first and last names. For some of us that is a lot of writing!

We have started observing weather patterns in February and will compare and contrast them to March’s weather patterns. We are also keeping track of how many days we have snow. We then did a science experiment with snow. We collected three bags of snow, one was put in the freezer, one in the refrigerator and one was put on the science table. Afterwards we made a guess as to what would happen to the three bags. One of the books we read was A Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats in which Peter put a snowball in his pocket and was sad when he woke up the next day and it had melted. After reading this book we decided to do our experiment. We also made a lot of snow pictures.

We planted parsley and green beans and are watching them grow. Our question for the science table is “Which one will grow faster?” We have a plant of each on the table and the children have been using the magnifying glasses to check them every day. At this point they have just started to sprout.

The Nature of Things came to visit and we saw many interesting animals. Everyone was very brave and petted the animals gently. On Pajama Day we had lots of fun. We made cinnamon toast and hot chocolate and had a parade with our friends. Even Rabbi Carla had her pajamas on.

The groundhogs came out in The Yellow Room last week. Everyone wrote on a piece of paper either winter or spring. Then they crawled out from under the table and held up their signs. It was an even split.

We also made Challah. It was yummy. The first week we made it everyone made his or her own individual ones, the next week the Yellow Room decided to trick Rabbi Carla. We made one big Challah in the shape of a turtle. Fern switched our turtle Challah for the one that was under the Challah cover. Rabbi Carla and the other classes were very surprised.

We will be starting to learn our addresses so please tell your child what their address is. We will then have the children draw pictures of their houses and write their house numbers.

Thank you for being so supportive of what we do in the Yellow Room!

Debra and Alison

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Winter/Khoreff 2010 / 5770

Weather…. weather....

IT’S A PAJAMA PARTY!!!

OOOOOOH! AAAAAAH! The Nature Of Things

IS IT A CHALLAH ……… OR A TURTLE?

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First-Year Dues For Young Families Lowered by 50% Thinking of joining JFC? If your oldest child is in Kindergarten in 2009/10 or younger, first-year JFC dues are now only half the annual dues amount!

And, if your children are (or will be) enrolled in the Jewish Family Congregation Early Childhood Center, your JFC membership entitles you to a

JFC Congregant Discount on tuition!

For more information or to join JFC, call (914) 763-3028 Or visit us on-line at: www.jewishfamilycongregation.org You’ll feel at home when you’re part of our family…

Jewish Family Congregation

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Jewish Family Congregation Early Childhood Center Priority________________ Date received___________ Check #_______________ Application for 2010-2011 School Year Child’s Name __________________________________________________ Sex ___________________ Date of Birth _________________________ Home Address_________________________________________________ Home Phone_________________ Parent /Guardian Name__________________________________________ Parent/Guardian Occupation______________________________________ Business Address___________________ Business Phone_______________ Cell Phone___________________

E-mail_____________________

Parent /Guardian Name__________________________________________ Parent/Guardian Occupation______________________________________ Business Address___________________ Business Phone_______________ Cell Phone___________________ Other Children: Names/Ages

E-mail_____________________

__________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________

1) My child is presently enrolled at JFC Early Childhood Center ____Yes If yes, name of child__________________________________ 2) I am a member of Jewish Family Congregation ____Yes 3) I am presently participating in the Parenting Center ____Yes Program/Dates______________________________________ 4) I am interested in being a class parent ____Yes 5) I am available to help ____Yes

____No ____No ____No ____No ____No

2-Year Old Class (3-day): _____ Monday, Wednesday, Friday 9:30-11:45

3-Year Old Class: ______ Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday 9:15-12:00

Child must be 2 by child’s school district cut-off date for Kindergarten

Child must be 3 by child’s school district cut-off date for Kindergarten

2-Year Old Class (2-day): _____

4-Year Old Class: ______

Wednesday, Friday 9:30-11:45

Child must be 2 by child’s school district cut-off date for Kindergarten

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday 9:15-12:00

Child must be 4 by child’s school district cut-off date for Kindergarten

Please attach a non-refundable $350 registration fee made payable to Jewish Family Congregation to this registration form ($300 will be applied to tuition)

Tuitions for 2010-2011: mem/non age Days Member 2-year-old 2 day Member 2-year-old 3 day

tuition $ 2,450 $ 3,555

Member

3-year-old 4 day

$ 4,730

Member

4-year-old 4 day

$ 4,730

Non Member 2-year-old 2 day

$ 2,720

Non Member 2-year-old 3 day

$ 4,060

Non Member 3-year-old 4 day

$ 5,410

Non Member 4-year-old 4 day

$ 5,410

Please note: Registration fee will be returned only if we cannot offer your child a space.

Return this form to: Jewish Family Congregation Early Childhood Center P.O. Box 249 111 Smith Ridge Rd. South Salem, NY 10590

Summer Fun At Jewish Family Congregation REGISTRATION FORM Summer 2010

Child’s Name:________________________Gender M/F_________Nickname:_______________________ Birth date:_______________________ Street Address:____________________________________________________________________ Mailing Address:___________________________________________________________________ Home Phone:________________________________ E-mail:_______________________________ Fall 2010 my child will be attending: (check one) 3 year old class:________ 4 year old class: _______ Kindergarten: _______ School :______________________ Parent name:____________________ Daytime Phone:__________________ Cell:_____________ Parent name:____________________ Daytime Phone:__________________ Cell:_____________ Siblings

Name:_________________________birthdate:________________________________ Name:_________________________birthdate:________________________________ Name:_________________________birthdate:________________________________

Local emergency contacts: Name:__________________________ Phone#_____________________ Cell:_________________ Name:__________________________ Phone#_____________________ Cell:_________________ Child’s Doctor_______________________________________Phone#_______________________ Allergies:_________________________________________________________________________ Special Needs/Services (past or present): ______________________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________________ My child will attend JFC Summer Fun: Week of 6/28: _____________ Week of 7/5: _____________ Week of 7/12: _____________ Week of 7/19: _____________ Week of 7/26: _____________ Week of 8/2: _____________

3 day/5 day 3 day/5 day 3 day/5 day 3 day/5 day 3 day/5 day 3 day/5 day

(circle one) (circle one) (circle one) (circle one) (circle one) (circle one)

If we run camp week of 8/9 would you be interested?_____________ The fee for JFC Summer Fun is $210 per week/ 5 day, $180/3 day. A $50 per week non-refundable deposit is required with this form. The balance must be paid no later than April 15, 2009.

If you have any questions, or would like more information please call: Jane Emmer (camp director) 914-325-9065

Creation Station