First grade 1.14.2011

1-14-11

Dear Parents,

This week we went outside and fed the birds. Please read about our parasha to understand why.

Hebrew Sentence of the week: לעץ יש..."” – La’etz yesh (the tree has….) Ask your child to sing and tell you all about the tree parts.

Cursive Hebrew letters:

On Monday, we started to learn how to write cursive Hebrew letters. In this unit, we are focusing on forming the letters correctly and reading words written in cursive script. This week, we were practicing the letters: א=א, ב=ב, ג=ג, ד=ד .

I know the students are very excited about writing their words in cursive,  but it is extremely important not to let them write it yet! The students are allowed to use Hebrew cursive letters only for the letters we have learned in the class. The students may think they know how to form the letters,  but if they are forming it incorrectly,  it will be very hard to fix their mistakes later.

We finished our reading program .

This week, we finished our workbook with the last sound “OO”. This program has strengthened everyone’s reading skills and taught the important skill of sounding out and writing Hebrew words. Every student can now read any Hebrew word with all of the vowels as well as write any Hebrew word with any vowel! Wow!

We started “Ariot 2 workbook” and “Ariot 2 CD”:

We started “Ariot 2” workbook, and Ariot 2 program on the computers.

Even though “Ariot 2” is more challenging,  it is even more fun to figure out the words in the  “Hachtava” (the spelling test at the end of each unit) and we are still able to figure out the words without help.

Parashat Hashavua:

This Shabbat is Shabbat Shirah, (The Shabbat of Song). The Shabbat on which the parsha of Beshalach is read is called Shabbat Shirah, because it contains the song sung by Israel after the splitting of the Red Sea.

 

One of the customs associated with this Shabbat is to place crumbs outside for the birds to eat. We read in the Torah on this week about G-d giving the "מן" (“Maan”) to the nation of Israel, for their sustenance. Moshe told the nation of Israel that the Maan would not fall on Shabbat,  and therefore they should collect a double portion on Friday.  Datan and Aviram, who wanted to embarrass Moshe and weaken his authority, took Maan they had collected on Friday, and after dark placed it out on the ground. When morning came, they hoped that people would think that the Maan did indeed fall on Shabbat, and Moshe was wrong.  However, no Maan was found on Shabbat morning. Why?  Because the birds carried it away before the nation awoke. Therefore, the nation indeed trusted  Moshe and respected the sanctity of the Shabbat. To reward the birds for this noble deed, we feed them the week on which we read of the surrounding incident, the week of Beshalach.

  There is an additional reason why we feed the birds this week. The chirping of birds is not just idle song. It is the way that birds praise G-d for providing them with their needs. Because, this week, we too sing praises of G-d for providing for us in the desert, we recognize the constant song of praise chirped by the birds by providing for their needs.

Tu B’Shvat:

We are learning the Tal-Am unit for Tu-B’Shvat. We are singing songs and reading Hebrew stories. We started to learn the tree’s parts.

Homework:

Please make sure your child is writing his/her homework with pencil only!

Please make sure the homework notebook in placed  back into your child’s  backpack.

Please make sure your child is not writing the words in cursive.

Vocabulary words:

 This week’s  words will be on the tree parts.

The test will be on Thursday, 1-20-11.

Trunk  גֶזַע-      

    Fruits –  פֵּרוֹת  

   Fruit -  פְּרִי

Flower   פֶּרַח-  

Roots-   שוֹרָשִים   

Branches-    עֲנָפִים

You can practice with flash card at:

 http://www.flashcardmachine.com/1121822/z2b8

Shabbat Shalom,

Morah Irit