Hebrew resources

I was searching for some hebrew handwriting practice and came across some great hebrew language resources from the place that is most logical - Israel!

Summer work - http://kaye7.school.org.il/seasons_summer.htm#c2

http://halachayomit.com/rabassummer.html

http://kaye7.school.org.il/reading.htm - links to Israeli websites that have kriyah resources

http://kaye7.school.org.il/eng/welcome.htm - Resources for Israeli teachers for reading, chumash, etc.

http://www.kaleykaluli.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&catid=21&id=34&Itemid=11 - stories for each new vowel and letter. printable

http://www.etze.co.il/ - Lesson plans – Hebrew language vocabulary

http://myfamilythoughts.wordpress.com/activitypages/ - Lesson plans – Look for the handwriting sheets in particular

http://www.izmargadsys.com/ - Enrichment sheets – on science, yomim tovim, food, in hebrew

http://www.yetzira.com/

June 11-19

It's a week after school let out and I realized in all the excitement I didn't post anything online. So I will hit the highlights of an awesome end of school year. Things really came together in a big way.

Monday June 11
The General Studies teacher, a parent, an aide and I took the kids to Corning Museum of Glass. Mrs. S. is an awesome teacher. Back in January, the kids wrote her persuasive letters about what they would like changed in the classroom. One student wanted to go on a field trip. She helped the class organize an ice cream sale and they raised over $100. They then took a series of votes narrowing the field trip down to a realistic option of Corning - the students get in free and the adults are chaperones. Each student got to make one glass project and we had a docent that gave us a free tour for an hour.

The kids were great. They asked a million questions and were as equally enthusiastic at the museum as in the classroom. There is one part of the museum that was devoted to the history of glass. There is a large map next to each time period section. Somehow, as the docent was talking the kids were studying the map more than the glass. "Mrs. H... do you see France was called Gaul!!!!" Look here's Rome!" The gedolim unit has made them very aware about the change in Europe.

We drove straight home from the museum. The one downer - I forgot benchers and water. Thank G-d for Ipods.

Tuesday June 12
We finished Vayeitzei. We did an inner/outer review

Here is how I set up my inner/outer reviews.  The desks are set up as a U. Every other student takes his chair puts it on the inside of the U  and sits with his chumash facing his neighbor facing . I set my stopwatch for 2 minutes. The outer student reads the hebrew, the inner student translates. If either of them don't know a work, they put a light pencil dot next to the word. After two minutes, I poll the class about what is the average pasuk completed. We start from there with the inner student reading and the outer student translating. After two minutes the inner student gets up and moves to the left. They now have a new partner to read with.

If the class has an odd partner, I am the partner. This gives me a chance to test a number of students.



Wednesday June 13
Our last test of the year! After the test we had our major nightmare. The students went to their portfolios to compile all of their linear translation sheets. I forgot I was dealing with third graders. Papers went flying everywhere. After some stress, I managed to help all the students compile their work in easily referenced packets.

Each student was assigned one perek for which they would create a summer review packet. The class brainstormed what should be in the packet and how students should review over the summer. Man, were they strict. They said students needed to read and translate from a chumash for 10 minutes a day, complete a perek a week minimum, complete one section of the review packet daily, and try not to ask an adult for help.

Each student was responsible for writing a summary of the perek, including events, characters and location, 5-10 על מי נאמר, מי אמר למי, fill in the blank, riddles and minimum of 15 level 2 and up שרשים and עבר הווה עתיד questions.


The class also cleaned out their binders and began to take some of their things home.


Thursday June 14


After davening, we went on our siyum trip. The sky was a gorgeous blue and the weather could not have been better for a trop to Springdale Farms.

After learning all about Yaakov and his sheep and goats, what could be better than seeing live sheep and goats, donkeys and horses  during the spring. The farm is run as a day hab for developmentally disable adults who work there. It is free with a small fee for a petting zoo. We started the day by touring the farm. We were introduced to spotted!! and speckled! goats. We saw brown! sheep, a black sheep with a white mother, a black goat with a brown mother and other combinations mentioned in the chumash. We saw a pig with his hooves stretched out proclaiming that he was kosher. We saw turkeys and chickens with their four toes.  We went to a barn where the students got to feed the goats. We saw sheared sheep.

Then we went to the petting zoo. There were the cutest kid goats and their mothers. Our kids got to climb this three level hay structure with the kids. They held them and petted them. They got to play with sheep.

After the kids and kids got tired of each other, we went to the pond where the students caught frogs. Did I mention that my class is 3/4 boys? The frogs were in the process of changing from tadpoles so it was cool to catch frogs with tails, without tails, on the ground and in the water. Luckily, we convinced the kids that they couldn't bring the frogs home. The pond was also filled with fish and waater fowl. We even  found a goose egg hiding in the grass next to the pond.

We then went on a nature trail in the woods nearby. The general studies teacher came and the students saw decomposers and a years worth of science come to life.

After the hike, and hearing a few growling stomaches, we headed to the lunch pavilion. Of course, our class found a garter snake in the grass - if you are counting, that means they saw mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds, insects, and fish in one day.

To cap off the day, I made my sheep cupcakes using big and small marshmallows. We got back to school in time for the afternoon class.


Friday June 15
In the morning, the class worked on writing their end of year packet. After the students finished their summary, they put their name on the board and I checked over their work.

We then learned the parshas Shelach. Parsha Cakes shelach

Monday June 18
The students finished writing their review packets. They also worked on their chayenu, we reviewed vocabulary words to earn extra dollars and read the last few stories in our ivrit book. They packed up their chayenu and ivrit books to bring home

Tuesday 19
The last day of school. We started the day by davening to themselves. I explained to the class how during the summer I wouldn't be there to tell them to daven. We practiced staying focused on the words by davening the whole tefilla to themselves.


We then learned Parshas Korach followed by the big faculty/student game of machanayim (girls) or baseball (boys) When we got back, it was time to pack up. I had my final store and final raffle. I gave out the review booklets. To end off the year, we said the first perek of tehillim together which talks about the results of good choices.  


Chazak, Chazak, V'nischazeik!

Chumash tip: Portfolios

The students learn a lot of new skills and vocabulary each perek. But what happens at the end of the perek? What do they need to remember and what can they forget? This is a process of learning that students must develop as they mature. New knowledge must be stored in the brain in an  easily accessible place. One way to help students understand the process that their  brain is doing  is to have them replicate this process physically in the classroom. After each perek, we empty the chumash section of the binder. The students discard the worksheets and staple the translation sheets together. They put their saved work in their Judaic Studies portfolio (Moving from short term knowledge to long term storage). It is important that the students understand that they must put the new packet into the portfolio in the proper order. Otherwise, they will not be able to find it quickly and easily when they need it. At the end of the year, all the students  have resources to review what they learned during the year. They  can reflect on how much they have learned and use the sheets to review their material over the summer.

Chumash tip: Create Grading Sheets for after the test

Many chumash test questions are short answer and fill in the blank. I create grading stations in the back of the room for students to self-check their work. The reason I do this is I have found that the students take greater ownership when they are faced with their own mistakes. Some students are prone to skip questions, when they face the disappointment of grading a skipped question, they are less likely to do so in the future.

The grading table is set up with answer keys and pens. Students come to the table with their test paper and that is all. I stand near the table to monitor their grading. It gives them immediate feedback which helps them learn and makes sure they get their tests back right away

Chumash tip: Inner Outer Reviews

Inner/outer reviews are a great way to review a perek of learning.

The desks in my class are set up as a U. Every other student takes his chair puts it on the inside of the U. He sits with his chumash facing his neighbor facing . I set my stopwatch for 2 minutes. The outer student reads the hebrew, the inner student translates. If either of them don't know a word, they put a light pencil dot next to the word. After two minutes, the timer beeps (or quacks in my case). I poll the class about what was the average pasuk completed. I reset my timer and we start from that pasuk with the inner student reading and the outer student translating. After two minutes the inner student gets up and moves to the left. They now have a new partner with whom to read,

If the class has an odd partner, I am the partner. This gives me a chance to test a number of students on both reading and translating

June 8, 2011 recap

Today was one of those days that teachers dream about. A chance to see all my efforts over the year come full circle.

Here is how it happened.  

We only had three pesukim left to learn in Parshas Vayeitzei. I had the class read the pasukim aloud without teaching them at all. Of course, as we were reading about Yaakov meeting up with the melachim, the class exploded with questions. Was Yaakov in Eretz Yisrael? How could the melachim of Eretz Yisrael come to greet him as Rashi says? Which malachim did he send to Har Seir? Surely not the melachim of Eretz Yisrael. In the beginning of Vayeitzei, he saw the melachim in a dream. Was this in a dream?  The class started flipping forward to Vayishlach to discover more information about the melachim and their journey. 

Finally, we finished the parsha with fifteen minutes to spare before recess. I was in a quandary. The day before, I had quizzed the class on the 30 shorashim in the perek, and they had done review work. I figured we could squeeze in the exciting parsha of behaalosecha in the extra time. Unfortunately, my parsha worksheets were in the office. 

When I told the class my plan they asked if they could learn the next parsha while I was out of the room. I agreed if they kept the noise to a dull roar. I left and got sidetracked at the copier for a few minutes.  When I returned, the students were sitting at the table and at their desks with chavrusas. They excitedly shouted "We finished to Pasuk יא - the eleventh verse!" I asked what that meant. They informed me that they had read and translated seven pasukim and were now asking questions about those pasukim. 

Their eyes shone. They love to learn and know how to learn.

What nachas! 

One of my theories of education is that students need to do the real thing. They don't have Chumash class. They learn Chumash - just like their fathers and mothers do.  As a teacher, my job is to provide them with supports so they can act like the adults. 

A perfect model for this method of education is training wheels on a bicycle. With training wheels, a child learns to ride his bike and the feel of bike riding. Then the training wheels come off, and the parent holds on to the back, providing less support, but still helping the child learn how to ride. Finally, the parent lets go. The child begins to peddle on his own. He may fall a few times, he may wobble at first, but very quickly he rides off on his own. His legs are strong enough, and his sense of balance has been developed so he no longer needs his parents to help him at all. And then a wonderful thing happens, the child begins to bike ride with the parents and they explore new paths together. 

The same thing happens in school. My students know what it means to learn Torah. They see their  parents do it, they see older students do it and they want to do it too. Nebach, they don't have the vocabulary or the maturity  to learn as their parents do. So like the training wheels, they learn with a little help keeping them upright and moving forward.  At first, they got a lot of help with vocabulary and reading. Later, in the year, once they had mastered the basic vocabulary, they only need help with the hard words. Then, the training wheels can come off so they can learn on their own. The final stage is when parent and child, teacher and student begin to learn together as partners in discovering the Torah. The progression must be gradual and deliberate to ensure that the child will get stronger and stronger until they are ready to be independent. 

Today, I saw my theory vindicated. These kids are learning like real masmidim acting like they are sitting in a beis Medrash. They approach learning Torah with a sense of ownership and pride. 

Teaching like this requires a change of mindset.  A teacher can view himself like he is pulling a horse to water, as if he is doing all the hard work in the relationship. But with this attitude, when he is not around, his students won't want to learn. He can view himself like the driver of a car, who determines the roads yet to be travelled. But again, no student wants to go down a path that is determined by others. 

Or, a teacher can view himself like he is that parent, holding on to the back of a bicycle without training wheels. His most fervent hope is that the child will pedal off, leaving the parent waving as he watches his child disappear around the corner with new-found independence. When a teacher teaches with this mindset, the child senses that he is the master of his learning. The child will take ownership for his learning as he is able to set his own course in life and blaze new trails. 

June 7, 2011

This week we have been finishing Vayeitzei, our ivrit curriculum and independent yedios klalios study.

But since it is Thursday here is our weekly biography.  Today it is for  Reb Shraga Feivel. I want my students to really appreciate the education they have and the effort spent to allow them to sit in a classroom with their peers. Reb Shraga Feivel

June 1 recap

Today was a great day -

Chumash: how far we have come this year. In the beginning of the year, the students needed me to get them to learn new information. Now they are learning study skills. First, I had the students cover the English in their linear for pesukim כה-ל, read it and underline any words they didn't know. Then we identified the עבר,הווה,עתיד and the שם גוף (pronoun) for all the verbs in pesukim לא-לה. We started to learn the pesukim but quickly got sidetracked by some very interesting discussions of the pesukim and Lavan and whether yaakov and Rochel had spoken lashon hara. Every student participated and were responding to each other about the topic. I can't wait to see this group when they can learn on their own. There will be no holding
them back.
Improve study skills, word attack skills, listening and responding to peers

For parsha, we did the rabbi balsam sheets for naso .

Word Find: http://www.scribd.com/doc/95720126/Naso-Word-Find
Rabbi Balsam for Parshas Naso: http://www.scribd.com/doc/95720128/Naso-Sheets#page=1

We then filled out the chart of which korbanos each nasi brought. I have learned that karbonos are interesting for little kids if you make it concrete. Plus, after yaakov and his sheep, my class knew what עתודים ואילים are. Here is the board example of our chart.
Goal: make a very abstract part of Torah clear, motivation, graphic organizer

And the chart before it was filled in

Chart Korbanos Nesiim 

I then showed the class my parsha cakes from a few years ago. One student went home and made some with his family.