Although there are many unique days coming up in the next week and a half, we are going to concentrate on fun seasonal games before we leave on holiday break. I'll read some short books to go along with many of our games and the children will have a great time.
Today children played a dreidel game to celebrate the last day of Hanukkah, also know as the "Festival of Lights." Children had to spin a dreidel (a square shaped spinning top) and match the Hebrew letter to a fitness activity associated with that letter. They did activities like jumping jacks, mountain climbers, washing machines, blast-offs, toes touches, and jogging.
Today children played a dreidel game to celebrate the last day of Hanukkah, also know as the "Festival of Lights." Children had to spin a dreidel (a square shaped spinning top) and match the Hebrew letter to a fitness activity associated with that letter. They did activities like jumping jacks, mountain climbers, washing machines, blast-offs, toes touches, and jogging.
A student from Friends University helped the students with skills and read a book to them called "The Hanukkah Mice." We also discussed some of the other traditions of Hanukkah like latkes (potato pancakes), gelt (chocolate coins covered with gold foil), the menorah (the candle stick that holds the eight candles that are lit for the eight days of Hanukkah), the shamash candle (the candle in the middle used to light all the other candles), and the tradition of one gift per day during the eight days of Hanukkah. The children seemed very interested in this information and enjoyed our accompanying fitness activity.
Our student helper from Friends University shows us the cover of "The Hanukkah Mice."
The story of "The Hanukkah Mice" is read to students before beginning our activity.
Students worked on spinning a dreidel and matching it to the correct Hebrew letter.
This student has spun the dreidel and will match the Hebrew letter to the letter on the paper.
Kindergarten had different options for their activities.
A match is made and now this preschool student will jog one lap around half of the gym.
Landing on GIMEL required jumping jacks.
After spinning and landing on SHIN, kindergarten
students had to jog one lap around the entire gym.
Students practice jumping on blast-offs, which was one of the options for the HAY letter.
The second option for HAY was mountain climbers.
Students practice touching their toes which was an option for NUN.
A second option for NUN was an exercise called washing machines.
