MIVASERET MERCAZ
מבשרת מרכז
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Mercaz Academy is getting ready for Chanukah in so many ways--learning about the holiday, singing for others, creating beautiful decorations, and shining light everywhere. |
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A Message From Our Principal, Rabbi Kalman Fogel |
Last week, two large and unexpected boxes arrived at our school. Someone was so inspired by the news of the inauguration of Mercaz Academy that they anonymously sent every Mercaz student “Chanukah in a Box,'' a chanukiah (often called a menorah in the United States) and candles.
During our school line-up this morning, I explained a simple physics lesson to our students...Read more
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Strongman Jon Pritikin Encourages Mercaz Academy Students to Stand Up to Bullies |
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As School Counselor Stephanie Bobroff gathered grades four, five, and six to watch a video for the first assembly in our Mercaz Academy series on “Being an Upstander,” there was a steady hum of conversation punctuated by giggles. But then the video started, and the room went silent.
Produced by the Afikim Foundation, for which Mercaz parent Mor Keshet is Director of Special Projects, the video told the story of a boy who had speech and reading difficulties. He was teased by other children, told he would never amount to anything by a teacher, and always found himself eating alone at lunchtime. Finally asked to join a game at recess, he didn’t realize that the goal of the game was to hurt him...Read more
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Nursery Bet Learns About Emotions in Parshat Vayeishev |
When Nursery Bet learned about parshat Vayeishev, this week's Torah portion, Morah Jo Mlotok incorporated a spoonful of social-emotional development into the lesson. Students discovered that Yaakov had a favorite son named Yosef. When Morah Jo explained that Yaakov gave a colorful coat to Yosef and not to any of his eleven brothers, Nursery Bet students talked about how they would feel if they were Yosef’s brothers. They suggested emotions like angry and sad, and Morah Jo explained a new one: jealous. Yosef’s brothers threw him in a pit because of their negative emotions, but Nursery Bet learned that one of his brothers was able to overcome those feelings and tried to help. Nursery Bet students plan to focus on the positive if they ever feel anger, sadness, or even jealousy, and try not to let their negative emotions sweep them into a pit. They finished the lesson by making beautiful collages of Yosef's colorful coat.
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Kindergarten Participates in Hour of Code |
Like the elementary students at Mercaz Academy, kindergarteners also participated in the world-wide phenomenon of Hour of Code, in a suitably modified format (Half an Hour of Code). Director of Technology Mrs. Lynda Last helped Morah Batsheva’s students "program" a robot bee to visit a selection of words they have already learned to recognize (sight words).
Mrs. Last laid out a large grid on the floor, with sight words tucked into see-through pockets scattered throughout. Kindergarten students were each assigned a word, then calculated the number of blocks on the grid in each direction that the bee would have to travel to reach that word. Finally, they designed and implemented the algorithm by pressing the direction arrows on the robot bee in the correct pattern to direct it to the right word. The kindergarteners loved navigating the bee through the word grid, and can’t wait for their next opportunity to do some coding.
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Kitah Aleph Identifies Colors in Hebrew With Adon Ballon
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Kitah Alef had a wonderful time playing Adon Ballon (Mr. Balloon) with Morah Shani Kaufman and Morah Levana Gil. After Kitah Aleph read about the adventures of Adon Ballon, a balloon salesman who loses his stock to a gust of wind, Morah Shani produced a giant bag of colorful balloons. Students gleefully tossed them in the air and let them scatter, then gathered them, identifying the color of each balloon using complete sentences b’Ivrit, in Hebrew. The balloons “blew away” and were collected many times, allowing every student the chance to identify each color, practice conversational Hebrew, and get a lot of exercise along the way.
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A Sweet Literary Connection In the Third Grade |
Mrs. Paul’s third grade students are frequently asked to think about possible connections between things they read and their own experiences. When the class read Thank You, Mr. Falker, by Patricia Polacco, one student swiftly made a Torah-based connection that sweetened his teacher’s day. The book opens with a young girl’s parents dripping honey on her textbook as she starts school, teaching her that learning is sweet. This student immediately made the connection between this incident–a classic Chassidic introduction to the study of the Hebrew alphabet and the Torah–as well as the apple dipped in honey at Rosh Hashanah, symbolizing the hope for a sweet new year.
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Mindfulness in the Library: A Toe-ga Party |
Mrs. Francie Goldberg, our school librarian, has recently stretched herself, using her recent certification to teach yoga and mindfulness to nursery and elementary school students to enhance a visit to the Mercaz library. This week, Morah Francie led the second and fourth grade students in a special mindfulness activity.
She pulled her many skills together into a library Toe-Ga party. First, she instructed her students to remove their socks and shoes–an unusual way to begin a session in the library. Then, she asked them to pick up various colors, textures, and sizes of pom poms and put them in bowls–with their toes. With calming music in the background and complete focus on their task, her students concentrated on their smallest movements and the feel and texture of the pom poms between their toes. The fourth and second grade students emerged refreshed, reinvigorated, and ready to read calmly, with focus.
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Kitah Bet Plays Chumashland |
Kitah Bet enjoyed practicing their text decoding skills with a rousing game of Chumashland. This game, which bears a passing resemblance to Candyland, functions in much the same way: each of the four colors on the color cards represents either shorashim (roots), techiliot (prefixes), sofiyot (suffixes), or yachid/yechidah/rabim/rabot (singular and plural forms). When a Kitah Bet student draws a color, he or she must translate the root, prefix, suffix, or singular/plural form that accompanies the corresponding color. Whoever reaches the Chumash that lies at the end of the colorful path has practiced enough to start decoding words inside the text!
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Mercaz Academy’s GrowTorah Garden Beds Down for the Winter |
This week in the Mercaz GrowTorah garden was the last lesson until spring arrives. Farmer Menuchah took this opportunity to focus on the very important mitzvah of bal tashchit (do not destroy). The Torah tells us that fruit trees should not be cut down unnecessarily. Our rabbis have extrapolated this to apply to the waste of any beneficial resource.
Farmer Menuchah explained how composting can help us accomplish this mitzvah by recycling the nutrients from food scraps and plant materials to help our garden grow. Composting is also an activity we can do all year round, even when the garden is dormant for the winter. To solidify their understanding of composting, she taught students what materials can and cannot be composted by playing a sorting game. Finally, Mercaz Academy students explored the frosty garden, composting leaves from the ground and making brachot as they tasted and smelled the beautiful herbs that are still growing strong.
We look forward to resuming our GrowTorah lessons with the return of the growing season this spring!
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Sunday, December 18
Monday, December 19-Friday, December 23
- A whole week of Chanukah fun!
Tuesday, December 20
- PTA Chanukah Chagigah, 6:00-8:00 pm
Monday, December 26
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No school: Last day of Chanukah
Tuesday, December 27-Thursday, December 29
Tuesday, December 27
Wednesday, December 28
- Challah Baking/Tzitzit Making
Thursday, January 12
Monday, January 16
- Chag HaSiddur
- Basketball game at NSHA, 6:45 pm
Thursday, January 19-Sunday, January 27
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