First Grade News

Hello Families,

In Hebrew, we learned the letters gimel and zayin. We added lots of words to our word wall like: geshem (rain), gesher (bridge), ginah (garden), gezer (carrots), garbyim (socks), gamal (camel), zayit (olive) and zebra. We also added a new action word to our chart – gar (live for a boy) and gara (live for a girl).

In Tefila, we learned two new prayers from the Amidah.The first one called mevarech hashanim. We spoke about the importance of taking care of our Earth and what we can do to keep it a clean and safe place. The second one is called mikabetz nidchei amo yisrael, which is about community. We spoke about why it is so important to be part of a community.

This week Parasha is parashat shemot. We learned about the story of baby Moses and how he defended the Israelites despite the fact that he appeared to be an Egyptian. We spoke about the concept of slavery.  We also thought about how Moses got upset when we saw people being mistreated, and we discussed how we should treat other people.

First graders have been continuing to learn about how MLK helped to change segregation laws. We discovered that even though the laws were changed to make things fairer 60 years ago, the past still affects people’s jobs, housing, and opportunities today. People can still be judged by the color of their skin. We read the book “Change Sings” by Amanda Gorman which inspired us to be inclusive of all groups and active, thoughtful, change makers. We also brainstormed how we want to help solve the problems of today. For our MLK school tekkes, we presented in the style of being at a peaceful protest. In groups, first graders showed posters with a problem that still can affect people of color today and shouted the change they want for the future!

Check out our pics!

Shabbat Shalom,

Ilana and Liz