Newsletters

Pre-K	Fourth Grade
Kindergarten	Fifth Grade
First Grade	Sixth Grade
Second Grade	Seventh Grade
Third Grade	Eighth Grade

Pre-K

Dear Pre-K Parents,

We have been talking about the meaning of Shabbat. We made Shabbat place mats that can be used to put your candles on, on Friday nights. Today, we painted with Shabbat candles. Your children enjoyed using candles instead of a paintbrush. We will send home the project next week because it was too wet to send home this week. Next week we will paint with grape juice to represent the Kiddush cup. Your children have enjoyed learning about Shabbat and all the different parts of it. Thank you for always remembering Tzedakah and being on time each week.

We will see you next week.

Shalom,

Suzanne Shanoff, Lauren Laderman, Evan Rauch, and Eliza Wile

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Kindergarten

Dear Parents,

Last week we finished the Torah portion relating to Creation. The children drew birds in the sky and used fish stickers to depict the fifth day. For the sixth day they used a picture of a boy and a girl and animal stickers. Day seven was shown by a Xerox copy of all the Shabbat symbols. The children colored this in with markers. Today some of the children finished their Shabbat page and we colored our front cover for our Creation book.

They were all very intrigued when we read the story of Adam and Eve and many questions were asked. Next week we will learn about Noah and the Ark.

Merle Bloch and Ashley Mills

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First Grade

The First graders have had two fun filled yet very educational Sundays. Last week we continued talking about Shabbat. The students were very interested to talk about how different Jewish people celebrate Shabbat and that no matter what country you live in Shabbat is important to all Jewish people.

Josh and Jesse taught the students a new song which they enjoyed. In Hebrew Morah Yaffa added another letter to the Aleph Bet. Hay was the new letter of the week.

This past Sunday the students finished the Shabbat candlestick art project with Marla. The candlesticks were very pretty. During Hebrew Morah Yaffa introduced the letter vav and showed the students where it fits in the family. Please send your child with a thin sweater to use during Chapel.

Have a good week.

Karen and Nikki

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Second Grade

The second graders have been busy learning about Shabbat and Havdalah. They remembered so much from last year however the majority of the children knew that there was a closing to Shabbat but did not know much about Havdalah. Ms. Powers went over the blessings, lite the candle and passed around the spice box. They love the twisted candle and were thrilled when she put it out in the "wine", other wise known as water. They were able to hear the hissing sound and were able to smell the spices. We also made Challah for the children to take home and share with their families. In Hebrew the children started putting together the sounds of the letters they have learned and started forming simple words. Yes they are beginning to read Hebrew. How very exciting for our second graders!

Sharon Cohen and Marcy Powers

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Third Grade

Dear 3rd Grade Parents:

This past week we discussed how far Israel is from Houston, and estimated it was around 7000 miles to Israel. We discussed how it would feel to arrive in Israel by plane on El AL airlines and how Israel's airports have such strict security. We learned that Israels airport is named after David Ben Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel, this is why the airport is named Ben Gurion Airport. We spoke about how Hebrew is the first language of Israel, and how Hebrew is used for prayer as well as everyday conversations. We learned that Modern hebrew uses some english words to form hebrew words - like radio, America, choclolate, these all sound similar in English. We discussed whether we have family that live in other countries, or know of people that do. We discussed where are grandparents were born, and how Jews came to live in America from other countries. We also discussed when Israel became a state in 1948 which meant that Jews know had their own homeland and could never again be turned away.

Thank you,

Shelley Weitz

3rd Grade Israel

Dear 3^rd Grade Parents,

On Sunday, October 10, we talked about parsha Lech Lecha (Genesis 12 – 17). The portion is about Abraham, the first Jew. Ten generations (300 years) passed since Noah and the flood. People began worshipping idols. There was an idol for everything: the sun, the wind, the rain, and so on. Abraham knew that idol worship was wrong. He knew that there was only one God. He saw Abraham’s devotion. God loved Abraham. So, God told Abraham to leave his home and go to “a land I will show you”. Abraham was so committed to God that he left his home and wandered from his family and home to a new land. He did not know where he was going but he would know when he arrived. This is a story of courage. Abraham was probably not the most popular guy in town. Can you imagine how confident he was to declare to everyone, “There is only one God!” He knew that idols were just stone or wood. Abraham knew that only God (our God) had the power to make our lives good.

We learn from Abraham that sometimes we have to believe in spite of everyone around us telling us differently. For example, there might be a time in your lives when friends will ask you to do something you know you should not do because it is wrong. Your friends might ask you for answers to a test, they might ask you to smoke a cigarette; they might ask you to lie to your parents. It takes courage to say no. This kind of courage is what Abraham showed so many years ago. When Abraham left his home, because God asked him that took courage! So be strong! Do the right thing, always! Be like Abraham!

In parsha Vayeira (Genesis: 18 -22), Abraham negotiates with God. God wants to destroy the cities Sodom and Gomorrah because all of the people living in these cities were evil. Abraham believed differently. He believed that if there were good people living there that God should spare the cities. So they negotiated. Abraham finally convinced God to save the cities if there are ten good people. We learn that when we want to accomplish a goal we should set small goals. For example, if we want to make all “A”s in school, we should recognize that we need to make an “A” in each subject. So we study each subject to reach that goal. We begin by making small steps.

Let’s say you want to run a mile in eight minutes. Right now you run a mile in 12 minutes. So you train each day and gradually reduce the time it takes to reach your goal. In that way, you can achieve your goal and not get so frustrated that you give up reaching the goal. The goal becomes reachable. The same can be true of saving money to buy something big or any other goal you might consider. Can you think of a goal? How about learning a musical instrument? Reading a long book like any of the last Harry Potter books? How about learning a foreign language, like Hebrew?

We learned that we break big tasks down into small ones. We learned that God wants us to succeed and to be a partner in our successes.

Thanks for your support.

Dolph Simon

C: 713-259-9607

dolphsimon@mac.com

Dear Third Grade Parents,

All of the students are gaining in Hebrew reading skills each and every week. Thank you for your great attendance! Since we add new material each week after we review, this is a big boon to the program. We get so excited for the students to come to us to learn Hebrew and we hope they feel the same way! We feel that providing them with a small class size learning environment is also ensuring success this year. Have a great week.

Debbie Wizig and the Hebrew Team

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Fourth Grade

Dear Parents:

This week we began our Hebrew studies on chapter 6 of the text. The students were introduuced to one of our most beautiful Hebrew words: V'ahavta, which means, "And you shall love." It is found in the first paragraph after the Shema.

We find the Shema and V'ahavtah not only in the Torah but also in every mezuzah and also in Tefillin. The V'ahavtah paragraph contains many beautiful mitzvot for us to follow. Among them are the mitzvot telling us to love God, to teach our children about Judaism, to wear Tefillin, and to place a mezuzah on our door posts.

Next Sunday i am bringing a mezuzah to class. I will take out the "Klaf" (parchment) and show the students the Shema and V'ahavta prayer that is found in all mezuzot. They will be able to feel the parchment and also see the beautiful Hebrew script that was written by hand by a Sofer (Scribe). I am also going to bring a set of Tefillin and show them the various kosher parchments which are found in the Tefillin. Parents are welcome to join us. I will be explaining the mezuzah and Tefillin during the first 10 minutes of each class period.

The students learned that a mezuzzah on the door post without the parchment inside is nothing more than a decoration. It is the kosher parchment inside which makes it a mezuzzah.

Each class session will end with a "field trip" to our wonderful gift shop so that we can see the beautiful mezuzot they have.

Another reminder: Class begins promptly at 9 a.m. Students who come late miss a lot!

B'shalom

Debbie Ostroff

Parents:

Over the past two classes, we have finished up the Baby Naming lesson. We talked about when we receive our Hebrew names and some reasons as to why parents might have chosen those names for us. We learned the form of the Hebrew name

(my Hebrew name ben/bat my father’s Hebrew name v’ my mother’s Hebrew name)

We discussed the Pirke Avot, the Ethics of the Fathers, and how it teaches that there are three crowns: the crown of the priesthood, the crown of Torah, and the crown of kingship. But the crown of ha a good name is better than them all. We brainstormed as to how we can make our name a “shem tov” (good name).

I have asked the children to discuss with you the following:

Who were they named after? What was it about that person that made you choose the name for your child.

If your child hasn’t discussed this with you yet, please bring it up with them. This coming Sunday Rabbi Scott will be joining both of my classes. I hope to see all of you then.

Aron Schneider

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Fifth Grade

Dear 5^th Grade Parents,

These past two Sundays were filled with many fun activities designed to enhance your children’s learning about Jewish history. We focused our learning on the struggles Moses and the Israelites faced during and after being freed from slavery. Students were assigned to groups and each group received cards with specific verses from the Book of Exodus (i.e. Exodus 1: 1-10). Each group member read the texts, discussed the texts (there were guiding questions to help them focus their discussions), and began to work on acting out the biblical scenes they were given. The children had wonderful discussions, and they really enjoyed making special props for their skits. I encourage your children to bring in items from home next week that they can use in their class presentations.

Before beginning the activity mentioned above, we first played a game where each child learned to locate specific books, chapters, and verses in the TaNaKh. This served to prepare them to find the specific Exodus verses they were given. We also discussed what the term TaNaKh means—Torah (5 Books of Moses), Neviim (Prophets), Ketuvim (Writings).

It is really a pleasure for me to teach your children this year.

Sincerely,

Elyse Bell

Dear Parents,

During the last two weeks we learned about the Shabbat. God created the world in six days and he rested at the seventh. Shabbat started on Friday afternoon when the sun sets. We practiced the blessing of the kindle, wine, Kiddush and the bread. These are the four major blessing of Shabbat.

Reading Practice: We continue reading the book. I'm pleased with the students who had followed my recommendation and practiced 5-10 min's twice a week, they show better progress.

Please remember that we need the folder with the book for next class.

Michal Ravid-Avraham

5th Grade Hebrew teacher

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Sixth Grade

Dear Parents,

For the past two weeks, we have been exploring the two main cultures of Sephardic and Ashkenazic within the Jewish people. We have discussed that the Ashkenazic culture comes from Eastern Europe primarily and that the Sephardic culture originated in Spain. We have also discussed how the Jewish people were expelled from Spain in 1492 and Sephardic Jews emigrated around the world.

As a way to understand how different the Ashkenazic and Sephardic cultures can be, we examined haroset recipes. You would really be amazed at how haroset varies among cultures around the world. The whole class was used to the Ashkenazic haroset recipe, but we would not have imagined some of the ingredients in the different varieties of haroset. Haroset from Surinam, which is in South America, contains cherry preserves. We found a haroset recipe that contained a whole unpeeled orange and the recipe called for it to be put through the food processor.

We also discussed language differences between Askenazic and Sephardic cultures and viewed two videos – one of a Ladino Chanukah song and one Yiddish lullaby. We were all pleased that we recognized so many Spanish words in the Ladino song.

We created a display of what we have learned about the Ashkenazic and Sephardic cultures that hangs in our hallway. Please check it out as you drop your child off.

We had not determined where to send our tzedakah, but we shared a lesson on tzedakah and the kids determined that they wanted to send their tzedakah to support bomb dogs in Afghanistan and Iraq.

It’s been a pleasure teaching your children!

Thank you so much for the opportunity to teach your child!

Kara Schneider

Dear Parents,

During the last 2 weeks in my Sunday morning and Wednesday afternoon class we continued working on the “Avot” prayer. In conversational Hebrew they have been working on “family words” like Mom, Dad, brother, sister, son, and daughter. On Wednesdays we have flash cards that the students wrote themselves to use and practice. They can make simple sentences and are really excited about their progress. They can also read and translate sentences like: Daniel stands with a siddur, Daniel eats bread, Sara stands next to her grandmother, Sara loves her dog. In regards to the “family tree”, first we learned the Biblical family tree of Abraham and Isaac. Then we read the family tree of a modern family in Israel, and then, they created their own family tree in Hebrew. They also did a crossword puzzle in Hebrew with the family tree of the patriarchs and the matriarchs. I read them a story about “family ties”. We also stood up and did “prayerobics” with the Amidah prayer. We spoke about ideas like, “Tell me 3 things that make you proud of your family” and “What makes your family proud of you?”.

I also thought it would be fun for them to learn their colors in Hebrew, so I brought in a “color palette” for each student and they colored in the colors and wrote them in Hebrew. My first group starts learning Hebrew at 9:00am when the bell rings, so I am delighted that the students are arriving on time. They are so much fun to work with and eager to learn. Some students want more Hebrew outside of class. One source of additional study is free through the Houston Public Library. Click on the research button, go to alphabetical listings, and click on “Mango”. You have to have a library card number, but it is a great basic Hebrew lesson.

Shalom and Lehitraot,

Dianna Shapiro

Dear Parents,

In the past couple of weeks we learned about the structure of the Amidah prayer section. We learned about the difference between a prayer and a blessing and that there are different types of prayers such as a prayer of praise, gratitude or petition.

We also studied in detail the prayer G’vurot, We learned that it is a prayer of praise to God and talked about the possible reasons to have a prayer of praise at this point in the Amidah service. We also discussed what it means to be a hero as a Jewish value. The students learned about the story of the rescue of Jewish hostages from terrorists in Entebe. We then discussed other examples of everyday heroism and they realize that they can be heroes by standing up for injustice at school and the world. In reading we continue to practice fluency, and play Hebrew reading games.

Naomi Shenker, Wednesday and Thursday 6^th Grade

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Seventh Grade

Hello parents and students.

We had a very busy day on Sunday in our class. We began with a short follow up on the previous weeks lesson. Then we heard from Brandon Olifant on how his Bar Mtizvah went. Mazel Tov to him and his family on a job well done.

We began class discussing what the Torah portion was for that week. After receiving several questions about Torah portions, Haftarah portions, etc… I gave the students an outline of the Tanakah. We quickly charted the 5 books of the Torah, the Haftarah and the prophets within it and the third part of the Tanakah, the writings. I think it was helpful for them to see the outline in a visual way.

The Torah portion we focused on was Vayera, Welcoming Guests/Hospitality. We discussed the portions in the Bible that showed two different examples of welcoming guests. Abraham’s welcoming of the three strangers and Lot with the angels coming to Sodom. We talked about what it means to be a good host and to treat strangers as equals.

We then “welcomed” a guest. Dr, Urbach came for the last 20 minutes. He spoke about growing up Jewish in Tyler, becoming a dentist like his father and how Judaism has encouraged him to go out into the community and be hospitable, by way of being a clown. He talked about community service and caring for others.

Thank you again for sending your students to class. We had a huge turn out and they were all really excited to be there.

Next week:

MEET AT THE JCC at 10am until noon to volunteer at the Chili Cookoff. Please wear jeans, tennis shoes, and a polo shirt. Long hair will need to be pulled back or a baseball cap can be worn. Parents you may come back at noon, buy a chili cookoff ticket and have a nice lunch with your student. We are helping out Meals On Wheels on Sunday. Please drop off your student near the gymnastics entrance. I will be there. My cell number is 832-607-3673. Please send them with money in case they want to eat something.

Thank you all again!

See you Sunday.