Curious George Pre-K Friends: Chanukah Fun !

After we'd used all the corn kernels for our Thanksgiving centerpieces, the sensory table was empty. In went some white rice.....not so exciting. The children helped mix liquid watercolors into several bags of rice. Noor and Saul are working together to blend in the color.

You can see how Briana is holding the bag firmly for Govind so he can do the mixing work.

More teamwork, smiles and good fine motor exercising too.

The children loved the brightness of this color!

After mixing in the color, the rice has to be spread out so it will dry completely.

Our rainbow rice table is always busy!

We paired the children up for this next activity.

Everyone cut out a latke and then counted out how many letters were in their partner's name.

Alex had Charlotte....the longest name in our class. He was really a great sport about counting out all the stickers!

The girls are checking to make sure they are placing the letters in the correct order. It was good exposure to the lower case letters that may not be in your own name.

Come in and see the full documentation and Curious George frying pan....we are building community, one latke at a time!

What would Chanukah be without dreidels? We watch to see the spinning techniques our friends use,

sort them by colors we love,

and practice and practice till we are expert spinners!

Can you make a chanukiah out of animals? Of course!

Each child could select a material to use to make their own chanukiah. After visiting the Temple gift shop and looking at all the chanukiahs in the store, the children realized the shamash candle needed to look different than the other candles. Alex hunted until he found the longest piece of rope for his shamash.

Amelia added extra dreidels to make her shamash longer.

Suri is carefully counting to see if she has enough candles for each night before adding her shamash. Finding a workable material, counting out and placing all of the individual pieces, and problem solving to make the shamash candle unique were all important components of this multi-step activity.

A new question mark game, this time involving rolling a die and determining what number you have rolled. Then the child must find the candle that matches that number. We have stressed that throwing a die is based on luck, and if they do not make a match it is OK. This allows the children to focus on the math concepts and to understand that they are successful even if they do not make a match.

This art was made by spreading paint on foil and then folding the foil in half. The resulting art is not only visually interesting but a good example of symmetry. The class loved learning this "grown-up" math word!