We’ve started a Co-op Cheder where we live while the local Rabbi is away and working out whether or not he and his family will stay. Of course, no matter what other people in the Jewish community are doing, my own kids need to keep learning about Judaism and studying Hebrew! I figured while I was teaching my kids I may as well teach other kids who are keen! So this is what we did this week:
Important Day Re-cap
Today is a fast day – the 17th of Tammuz. Last week we spoke about this fast day in preparation, as well as the three weeks. So we just had a discussion talking about the 5 terrible things that happened on this day in history, as well as what we do or don’t do on a fast day. Prizes (a single M&M!) for each thing a child contributed.
13 Principles of Faith Activity
We did an introduction to the 13 Principles of Jewish Faith last week, so this was a follow on, consolidating activity. On strips of paper the students had 18 different “principles” they had to read and sort through. Some were ridiculous and funny (Hashem’s favourite food is ice-cream), and others were there to throw them off course like listing some of the 10 commandments! Once they chose what they thought was right I would check and tell them how many they needed to swap. And we continued this until everyone had it correct.
Together we talked about how the principles can be grouped into sections, and we put them in the right order and they glued them on their paper.
I instructed my children to put it on their bedroom walls so that they could check it regularly and commit it to memory.
I expect to do another activity on this topic next week to continue their learning.
You can download this activity for free here.
Shema Activity
This was primarily a translation activity. All the students in the group are familiar with this prayer, but this activity would also be appropriate for students that were unfamiliar with it. All the students in our group were also able to sound out the Hebrew (at least the letters if not the nikud).
I had cut out all the transliterated and English words, and the students had to sort them and connect them to the right Hebrew words. I encouraged students to first match the transliteration, then the English.