|
THE ECC EXTRA
A YOGA CHANUKIAH
|
|
| NCJC Early Childhood Center 47 Old Schoolhouse Rd
New City, New York 10956
845 638-9600 x112 [email protected] |
|
|
We hope you enjoy seeing what's happening throughout the NCJC ECC. We'd love your feedback - let us know what you think and what else you'd like to see. Please feel free to pass this along to friends and family - we are very proud of our children's accomplishments and love to share. Enjoy!
|
|
|
 |
|
DIRECTOR'S NOTES
Jackie Binstock
As I write this, we have just finished celebraring Chanukah, going from Thanksgiving and "Albuquerque is a Turkey" to "I Have a Little Dreidel". Because children learn by repetition and examination, we do quick turnarounds from one holiday to the next, so we can maximize the time that we have to teach and explore. Yet we do not abandon the lessons so carefully passed along of the holiday or unit before. Thus gratefulness will carry over from Thanksgiving (and Sukkot before it) through Chanukah and beyond, just as the values of Chanukah (freedom, lighting the darkness) will infuse the rest of our year. The lessons spiral, one building on another. And while major themes repeat from year to year, the children's understanding changes as they mature and develop, so the meaning gains width and depth.
Thus, while a two-year-old understands that we light candles and spin a dreidel on Chanukah, a three-year-old will understand the story itself, and a four-year-old will get the concepts of being able to worship as you please and being the good in the world. This is how good education works, so even if a lesson repeats, the understanding is different every time, this iteration building on the ones before, going from concrete actions (lighting the candles) to adding on concepts and experiences as the learning spirals upward. There are many ways to achieve this, and every child does so differently, so we offer many different ways to experience and understand - through taste and smell, song, story, artwork, science, dramatic play and any which way you can think of. We try to ensure that every child gets the most out of every lesson that they can in their own way and on their own level.
Education is not a race. It is learning over time and development. When we rush children through, we defeat the very purpose that we are there for, robbing children of true and deep understanding, and leaving children behind, with gaps in their knowledge base. It would serve us all better if the people that create curriculum for our school systems would learn that simple, fundamental truth. Meanwhile, I'm so glad (and grateful) that I get to work in pre-school, and particularly in ours.
The 4's family quilt, every portrait unique, just like our children
|
|
|
TWOS
The Toddlers went full swing into Chanukah once Thanksgiving was over. We hope you all enjoyed the holiday cards, hand-print Menorahs and wooden Menorahs your children made for you - they worked very hard painting, gluing, coloring and using stickers. They also made fun things for our classroom: they water-colored a dreidel (see them "spinning" on our bulletin board) and all of the children made a classroom Menorah (also hanging on a bulletin board). We even made Chanukah things we could eat: latkes and dreidels! Yummy! We hope you all had fun at our NCJC Chanukah party. It's nice to share these parties together with the children and their families.
Our class also finished their Shabbat in a Bag. Inside was all things relating to Shabbat: candles, a Kiddush cup, challah and a Shabbat-themed placemat. We hope you are able to incorporate these things into your own Shabbat celebrations each week.
We started talking about Winter in our classroom and working on our Winter-themed bulletin boards so be on the lookout for those! Hint: it's getting cold outside! We made handprint snowmen, too! All of the activities we do are to keep Toddlers interested, thinking on their own, learning how to follow simple directions, having fun, learning, exploring and using their fine motor skills as much as possible. By the smiles on their faces, it seems like they are enjoying it all!
**If you haven't done so already, please return your snowmen projects. The children really love to see their own creations hanging in our room! **
**Please note, there is no school from Monday, December 25, 2017 through January 1, 2018. We'll see you either on Tuesday (January 2nd) or Wednesday (January 3rd) of 2018. Have a Happy and Healthy New Year and Winter Break. Enjoy the time spent with your families.**
 
Painting a menorah Making latkes
Our classroom bulletin boards
Making birthday cupcakes
|
|
|
THREES
We celebrated, created, cooked and sang our way through December. It was a festive Chanukah filled with light, love & happiness. Our school wide Chanukah party was a huge success and so much fun for all! The children used their handprints and more to design a beautiful menorah that can be used year after year, and treasured forever. We sang Chanukah songs, practiced spinning the dreidels, read Chanukah books, followed the recipe to make potato latkes, made the Star of David out of triangles, and worked together to decorate our class menorah which proudly hangs outside our door. It was a very special time for us.
Throughout December we continued adding to our word wall and learning how to spell our names. We practiced strengthening our fine motor skills with more scissor activities, and we began learning about the new season arriving this month. We discussed the change in temperature, clothing and activities once winter officially begins. We even brought the snow into the classroom so the children could touch it, observe it melting and use watercolor paints to make it change colors. This was also a great time to talk about hibernation and what the animals do to prepare for when winter is here.
We also discussed our new year arriving and all the wonderful things we have to look forward to in 2018!
We hope you enjoy the break, and we wish you all a Happy, Healthy New Year!
Finger painting "Investigating"
Counting dinosaurs Making our menorahs
|
|
FOURS
WOW! We can hardly believe 2017 is coming to end. The children have grown so much since the beginning of the school year. Thank you all for taking the time to meet with us to discuss your child's progress. We were happy to share with you their personal development and look forward to working towards individual goals.
December was an especially exciting month for the children as we celebrated Hanukkah in many ways! They worked very hard on creating their menorahs and were thrilled to bring them home as a gift to the family! Adding the bolts (candle holders) was a great math activity that included concepts such as counting, one-to-one correspondence, and spatial relationships. We certainly know all of the Hebrew letters on the dreidel from playing the dreidel game all week. We also learned the Hebrew letter PEY which is on a dreidel from Israel. It takes the place of SHIN. There were so many great dreidel projects such as painting with spinning dreidels and water coloring dreidels. Our DREIDEL BOOK was so much fun to make! The children were very creative with their verses and were able to show an understanding of rhyming words. Another group project included our collage menorah which is hanging on the front bulletin board. It was exciting for the children to see their work come together and form a menorah.
Next the children were introduced the letter "O" for OIL. We used our senses to learn more about oil. We predicted what would happen if we painted with oil on paper, crayon, chalk, and paint. Painting with oil allowed us to use our observation skills as changes occurred on the papers. It was a messy project, but loads of fun!
Another exciting event was our Hanukkah party. The children did a super job telling the story of Hanukkah to all of our friends and families.
We ended the month with the letter "N" for NUMBERS. We are all doing a great job recognizing single digit numbers and look forward to working on double digit numbers after the new year. Each child was introduced to their telephone number. It's a lot of digits, but we are doing our best at remembering the order. Together we read the book TEN BLACK DOTS by Donald Crews. Next the children created their own books titled FIVE BLACK DOTS. They really used their imaginations when making their own books. Sharing the books with our friends is always enjoyable!
We look forward to working with your children and preparing them for kindergarten.
Happy New Year and all the best in 2018!
|
Collaborative bulletin board Edible Dreidels!
Science experiment Playing dreidel
|
|
SHALOM YOGA
November and December have been busy months in yoga! The Toddlers have adjusted so well to the class and all are participating! We've transitioned from growing into tall Autumn tree poses and letting our leaves fall down, to holding cut out snowflakes and letting them fall to the ground. We practice our colors as we do butterfly pose and look at colorful butterfly pictures, and use yellow and red puppets while we do bumblebee and ladybug poses.
For Thanksgiving the 3's and 4's passed a "thankful kadur (ball)" around the circle with their feet and naming one thing they were thankful for. We spent at least one class on each day of creation, taking our time learning poses, movements and Hebrew words for so many things Hashem created! Eitzeem, pracheem and hareem (trees, flowers and mountains) on the third day, kochavim, shemesh and yareach (stars, sun & moon) on the fourth day. We did this by blasting off in rocketship pose and having an outer space adventure. We reviewed so many animal poses on day six - peel, namer, aryeh, kelev and chatool (elephant, tiger, lion, dog & cat) by playing a fun game that has the children taking turns spinning a large spinner on the white board that ends pointing to an animal picture in the circle. Hopefully you've seen the beautiful project the 4's made on the wall in our hallway of days 1 - 6. Adding an extra 15 minutes for an art project weekly reinforces our learning of new Hebrew words through another creative medium, as well as our skills of cooperation, sharing and turn-taking through a group project.
Hanukkah has brought fun and learning as the toddlers spun while holding colorful, laminated dreidels above their heads, then found the matching colored rectangle on the wall. The 3's & 4's played games with their colorful dreidel by identifying the letter (shin, nun, gimmel or hay) and learning the alef-bet pose for each letter. Freeze dance was a favorite - when the music stops I call out a letter "shin!" and the children freeze into a pose. We made a life size menorah with each child being a ner (candle pose) and then "melting" down to the floor. Everyone had a chance to be the shamash and "light the others", then stand on a box that made them taller. We had to remember to light the newest candle first, also. We learned to count all the way to nine in Hebrew as we counted all the nerot on the last night.
Hoping all had a wonderful Hanukkah and have a Happy New Year!
"Lighting" the yoga menorah
|
|
AFTERCARE...BECAUSE THE FUN NEVER ENDS!
What do you do with leftover marshmallows and chocolate kisses used for edible dreidels?
Turn them into S'mores of course!
With much excitement, we took two graham crackers, one marshmallow, and one Hershey kiss each and walked into the kitchen.
Your children's enthusiasm and joy while watching the marshmallow expand bigger and bigger while in the microwave oven was contagious.
In addition to creating S'mores for snack, your children enjoyed reading stories together, playing dreidel games, counting and listening games and playing "teacher" and "school. "
Some of your children played both cooperatively as well as independently with the small kinetic sand/sandbox. It was interesting to observe the many different designs your children created with blue glass stones in the sand.
We also talked about how the light reflected through the glass stones and that led to a discussion about the light we see from candles.
In addition, your children enjoyed Parachute play in the gym during aftercare. Trying to keep small balls bouncing on the parachute was a team effort and a lot of fun.
It's been another wonderful, fun month in Aftercare.
Wishing all of you a Happy Chanukah and promising New Year filled with light and love.
Playing dreidel for pretzels Making s'mores
|
|
YOGA AND ME
Our new program started in October and has been a wonderful success! The children and parents/caregivers spend half the time doing fun yoga movements, then go to the Big Room for play, snack and storytime. A wonderful program geared to 1-2 year-olds!
OUR NEW SESSION STARTS ON FEB. 2 - COME JOIN US!
|
|
Registration for the
2018-19 school year is starting after break! If you would like to schedule a tour or have any questions, please call Beth or Jackie 845 638-9600 x112 or x117.
Tell your friends and family - word of mouth is our best advertising!
WATCH FOR REGISTRATION MATERIALS FOR 2018-19, COMING IN EARLY JANUARY!
|
|
|
PARENTS' ASSOCIATION
The PA is an integral and important part of the ECC. It helps raise funds for special programs for the school and runs programs for the ECC families. We urge every family to join and participate.
If you'd like to be more involved in helping the ECC through the PA, please contact Rebecca Weiss, Susan Gudin or Sarah Fink. We'd love to have you!
|
UPCOMING EVENTS
Mon., Dec. 25-Mon., Jan. 1 Winter break
Sat. night, Jan. 6 Havdallah and Kids' Night Out 5:20-8:00
Mon., Jan. 15 MLK Day - school closed
Wed, Jan. 17 Picture Day
Wed., Jan. 31 Tu B'Shevat (in school celebration)
|
|
|
Help us spread the word! Your recommendation is our best advertising! Help us thrive and grow!
|
|
|
|
|
