Kol Hakavod and congratulations to 4th Grade student Ellie Brown who has been named the winner of the National Menorah Essay Contest (3rd/4th Grade Category)! Ellie will have the honor of reading her essay at the lighting ceremony of the National Menorah on Sunday night in front of millions of viewers in Washington, D.C. Ellie will join a wonderful lineup of presenters including senior Administration officials, United States Military Band, Dreidelman, and others! You can watch the livestream here. Ellie will be speaking around 4:15 PM EST.

This week we hosted our first ever school-wide Grandparents and Special Friends Day! It was so special for us to meet and host guests visiting our early childhood, lower school, and upper school divisions! The morning started with guests joining tefillah, which was followed by breakfast and a short program. Grandparents and special friends then visited our early childhood classrooms for activities, and our upper school classrooms for a partnered learning experience which showed a glimpse into our students' day and what an RMBA education is all about. The program culminated with our lower school students and guests learning a new song together, with the guidance of Rabbi Danny Gavin who assisted in both playing the guitar and teaching the lyrics. We can't wait to share the beautiful video we are putting together of the meaningful and unique day that it was. Thank you to all our guests for visiting. We hope we will be able to see you again soon! Click here to access the photo booth image album.

Students in Mrs. Traxler's high school Women's Seminar class baked, kneaded, braided and had a good time making challah together. They learned the deeper meaning of each ingredient and how challah is not only something that tastes good, but enhances our homes in a meaningful way. Special thanks to Alina and the Goldfine family for hosting.

This week our early childhood students were treated to a special visit from the Celebration Company. Students learned how to make their very own wax candles just in time for Chanukah!

This week students in Ms. Morrison's 4th grade class experimented with how energy is transferred from one object to another. They set up shapes, like dominoes, then pushed them down using their energy transferred to each shape. The students tried different shapes, a combination of 2 shapes, they even tried using their own breath instead of a finger to transfer the energy with. They were wonderful scientists. Way to go 4th grade!

This week students in Morah Aviva's ECE4 class wrapped up their Chanukah unit with many super fun activities! These included candle making with the Celebration Company, making Maccabee shields using the wax resist method and vibrant water colors, decorating sevivonim, dreidels, with special Chanukah symbol stamps and peeling and sticking on foam stickers, writing special messages for their Chanukah cards, and last but not least, spinning dreidels and dreidel number correspondence boards.

This week students in Morah Sandy's ECE3A class took time out of their Chanukah preparations to learn about Parshat Vayeshev. They learned that Yosef is Yaakov's favorite son, so Yaakov makes him a special colorful jacket. In addition to the gift from his father, Yosef recounts dreams to his brothers which make them hateful and jealous of him. The students made Yosef puppets with brightly colored jackets, learned about the letter J for jacket and Jewish, and learned about how important it is to practice gratitude instead of jealousy.

This week students in Rabbi Ouzzan's 8th grade Chumash class gave presentations to their peers.

Teamwork is an important skill to learn and work on! This week students in Ms. Sarah's upper elementary Montessori class worked on a cooperative game. The goal was to get everyone through the traffic jam. Thankfully, they were able to work together to get unstuck!

This week students in Ms. Morrison's 2nd grade class learned about Piet Mondrian's painting style. They were impressed with how he split his canvas into various sized squares. The students favorite part was painting the different squares.

This week early childhood students in Ms. Adriana's STEAM class continued with Chanukah celebrations making dreidel spin art, Chanukah tree houses, handmade puzzles and many colorful and wonderfully scented tea light candles.