Meets weekly on Sundays from 10 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
As students are starting to gain interest in the world around them beyond their family and home, kindergartners will go on a journey through Jewish life in their synagogue community. The focus of the year is to develop our appreciation for the earth and all God’s creations within it, while learning our place in the world as helpers. This overarching theme will be explored through learning about three main areas.
Students will be using the “Let’s Discover” curriculum materials to actively practice building a Jewish life. Each unit (synagogue life, mitzvot, and God) will often connect to and overlap with the other topics. Continued learning of the holidays will be explored through these three themes as well.
In Let’s Discover The Synagogue: Students will explore who and what special ritual objects we find in the synagogue, all the different types of things we do in a synagogue, and how we are a part of it and make it a special place.
In Let’s Discover Mitzvot: Students will develop an understanding of some of the most significant Jewish values and work their muscles of doing mitzvot that are age appropriate and empowering to their emerging sense as an independent self who has the power to create and help others.
In Let’s Discover God: Without limiting or trying to define God, students will begin to develop a language for exploring what a Divine presence can be. Students will explore concepts such as developing gratitude for all God’s creations, our special uniqueness being made in God’s image, and being partners with God to care for the earth.
Prayers
Through our God-discovery, prayer will emerge as a way of expressing thanks, awe, and gratitude, as well as a way to talk about or ask for the things we need.
We will master the first of our “gratitude prayers”:
Modeh Ani
Shema
Hebrew
In addition to learning all about those 2 prayers, students will continue to engage in meaningful input of the Hebrew language through our Hebrew Through Movement program, which utilizes games and movement to internalize and learn basic common Hebrew words and phrases. This sets the foundation in a fun and active way for later Hebrew decoding and prayer skills.