The Week In Review

HAPPY PURIM KATAN !!

We are half way through the Makot and almost finished with Parshat Va’Ereh. Kol Hakoavod Kittah Hay on a great week of learning

This week we finished Perek Chet. As a summative assessment of the perek we used voice thread and blogging. Voice thread is a program that you could download pictures and record a comment for each slide. I downloaded pictures that related to the perek and then recorded certain questions based on those pictures. The students had to blog their responses. I will be giving them feedback on their blog posts.

We also started learning about the Arba Parshiot and Purim.

Enjoy the long weekend.
Rabbi Greenblatt

Jeopardy and a RAFT

Last week was a bit crazy in the fifth grade. On Monday and Tuesday I attended the North American Day School Day School conference. The conference was great! I learned and shared a lot with other educators from across the country.
On Wednesday I wanted to check and see what they learned with Rabbi Wittlin so I divided the class into two groups and each group got two topics and they had to make up a Jeopardy game based on their topic. The plan was to play the games they worked on in class on Thursday. However Thursday was a snow day so we reviewed and played the games on Friday.
Today we did a RAFT activity. RAFT stands for Role, Audience, Format, and Topic. The most popular one was making up a slogan that Avimelech would have used to convince the people of Shechem to appoint him as the ruler.
Some of the posters were very convincing.
I hope you all have a great week!
Rabbi Greenblatt

A virtual Tour of The Mishkan

Today we watched Artscroll’s Virtual Mishkan. We watched how each of the utensils was made and we took a virtual tour of the Mishkan. During our tour we walked up the ramp to the Mizbeach and we were able to enter the Kodesh Ha’Kidoshim something only the Kohen Gadol did on Yom Kippur.
It brought the life many of the details that are mentioned in this week’s parsha. The students had many questions like; how did they make the Menorah out of one piece of gold? why did the Aron have poles if it wasn’t really carried? and how was the Lechem Hapanim made? The video sparked all of these ideas and caused them to think.
Our Tour of the Mishkan was both educational and fun.
Have a Good Shabbos
Rabbi Greenblatt

21St Century Skills In Action

We often talk about having the students involved in the learning process and developing skills that they need for life. The last two days that is exactly what we did in our Chumash class. Yesterday before we started the Plague of Blood, I asked the students to come up with questions based on their prior knowledge and by reading the pesukim. As a class we came up with almost 15 questions. Last night I boiled down the questions to six main questions on the topic. Today the class was divided into three groups; each group had to answer two of the questions. I gave them some material and resources to help them answer the questions but not only did they have to answer the question but they had to then teach what they learned to the class. At the very end I asked the class to fill out exit cards with 3-5 facts that they learned from the two other groups.

This activity focused on questioning, analyzing, collaborating, and communicating just to name a few of the skills that the students used.
The students not only did the learning but they did the teaching as well.

Another Great Job by the Fifth Grade!!
Rabbi Greenblatt

A Collaborative Activity

In order to review the first 18 pesukim of Perek Zayin the fifth graders were divided into three groups.
The first group had to come up with 2 worksheets that focused on the shorashim (the roots) of some of the key words as well as the translations.

The second group came up with review questions about the content found in these pesukim while the third group focused on coming with worksheet to help us review the Rahis we learned as well as teaching the class a new Rashi.

Once they came up with a draft that was approved they had to type up their worksheets. Tomorrow we will work on these worksheets in class.
Each group had to brainstorm about what type of worksheet they wanted to do and assign different tasks to the members of the group.

They did a great job.

Here are some pictures for you all to enjoy

Kol Hakavod Kitah Hay !
Rabbi Greenblatt

Using Kidblog

Today we once again went to computer lab in order to blog. Today we blogged about the concept of Free Will which we have been discussing in Chumash class or about Gidon, the main character in Navi.
Below is a link to the blog post. I have created a guest username so that you can log in and see what we have been doing.

The username is parent99 and the password is parent1

http://kidblog.org/RabbiGreenblattsclass/

Enjoy

Rabbi Greenblatt

Tu B’Shvat in the Fifth Grade

My elementary school memory of Tu B’Shvat is of eating dried out figs and dates and breaking my teeth on Carob (Buxcer in Yiddish). We have come a long way since when I was in elementary school. This week the class worked on and presented PowerPoint presentations. Most of the presentations were about the Shivat HaMinim but we had one on Trees and one on recycling. Everyone did a great job.

Today Mrs. Wittlin and Yocheved did a Tu B’Shvat Seder with the class. Each student participated and had a part to play in the Seder. Thank you to Mrs. Wittlin and Yocheved for putting this together.

As you can see we have come a long way from dried figs and carob

Tu B’Shvat Sameach