השפה העברית

A discussion about my name

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Excuse me, what is your name? You may enjoy discussing your names: Why were you, parents, named so? And what has made you choose the names you have chosen for your children? Do you have any nicknames? How did you come by them?

Moving along with Yoyo

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Yoyo jumps, sits, climbs… Each illustration depicts Yoyo in a different posture. You may want to act out what Yoyo does, and have the rest of your family members look for the page in the book that shows him in the same position. Were you able to do so? Then it’s time for another member of your family to have a go.

I’m always me – Datia Ben Dor

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Are you sometimes happy and at other times sad? So is Datia, who wrote the book, and also wrote the lyrics of the well-known children’s song I’m Always Me, the music of which was composed by Uzzi Hitman. Scan the QR code and sing along!

Arts & crafts – A front door sign

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How about getting the following – a cardboard rectangle, crayons, stickers, and some plasticine, if you like – to make a sign for your front door or bedroom door? Write your name at the center of it, color it, decorate it, and hang it on the door! And how about this idea – print out a photograph of yourselves, add it to the sign, and write your names too.

Pinterest

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Pinterest
Find more inspiration and creative activity in our Pinterest page

Look Together

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You may want to look at the illustrations together, and compare Gal’s home and kindergarten to the area in which Grandpa Raphael lived so many years ago. Together you may enjoy imagining what your life would have been like had you lived in another place, at another time. If you happen to have old pictures documenting the roots of your own family, you could show them to your child, and try to identify your family members together, as well as the places in which they lived back then, and now.

The Meaning of My Name

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Does your child know why they were so named? Having read this book together, you may want to share the meaning of their name with them, and the story leading up to choosing it for them. You could also tell them what made your parents so name you.

Our Village Todgha

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Do you know the tune to the song Our Village Todgha by Yehoshua Sobol performed by music group Habreira Hativ’it (The Natural Selection)? Perhaps you would like to sing it together with your child

Remember Together

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Just like Gal, many children enjoy listening to stories about the past. Do you remember any festive occasion from your days in kindergarten and school? Perhaps you could share your learning-related childhood memories and family traditions with your child.

Fun with letters

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Young children learn from enjoyable activities, such as licking honey-dripping letters. There are many ways of teaching the alphabet: you could put names and words together from various materials, cut out letters from newspapers, identify familiar letters that appear on signs and packages, play word games, and so on. The most important thing is to have fun while you learn!

Have a Great Summer!

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Sweet Aleph-Bet is the last book on the PJ Library books list for this year. We hope you have enjoyed the books, and wish you an enjoyable summer, and a smooth beginning in your new kindergarten or school!

A recipe for sweet Aleph-Bet letters

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Ingredients:

2/3 cup of soft butter

2/3 cup of sugar

1 egg

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

2 cups of flour

1 teaspoon of baking powder

½ teaspoon of salt

Method:

1. Whisk the butter and sugar until you get a somewhat fluffy batter. Fold in the egg and vanilla extract.
2. In a separate bowl, mix the flour, baking powder and salt.
3. Combine the two mixtures and knead until dough is crumbly. Knead crumbs into a ball, cover it with saran wrap, and keep refrigerated for an hour.
4. Pre-heat oven to medium heat (180°C).
5. Flour your worktop and use a rolling pin to flatten your doughball. Use letter-shaped cookie cutters to cut cookies out of the dough.
6. Place the cookies on a baking pan, and bake in the oven for 10 to 12 minutes, until edges turn golden.

Family Activities

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• Ben-Tzion made up the word “s’vivon” (dreidle) for a toy that spun around. Your children, too, can invent Hebrew names for their toys! Try to think together of Hebrew names for some of their toys and games at home such as Lego, Playmobile or dominoes – or any other toy or game that doesn’t yet have a Hebrew name. We would be happy to hear your ideas!

• Even adults continue to learn new words. If you read or heard a new word recently, you can share it with your children and ask them about new words that they have learned.

• The toys that Ben-Tzion played with were different from those that children play with today. This is an opportunity for you to tell your children about the toys with which you liked to play when you were a child. You can also describe the s’vivonim (plural) that you had when you were young, and compare them with those of

• Preparing a s’vivon: Just like Dvora, the mother of Ben-Tzion, you too can make a s’vivon at home. Take an old disk or cut out a circle from cardboard and paint it with pretty colors. Push a pencil through a hole in the center, and you have the “first” s’vivon that Ben-Tzion played

• The little s’vivon brought a lot of light and joy to the life of Ben-Tzion during times of difficulty and loneliness. The winter season is particularly suitable for family fun at home. You might want to organize a family gathering one evening and enjoy playing together with simple games and toys – just as during the time of Ben-Tzion Ben- Yehuda.

Family Activities:

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– Have you or your child ever misconstrued certain words in poems or songs, just like Lily did? You may enjoy sharing these amusing memories with one another.

– Lily and her classmates learned this poem by heart. You may also want to try and learn the words to Kan Zippor, Yossi Bakinor, or a poem in English by heart. Did you find memorizing the words difficult? Sometimes it is easier to memorize song lyrics than verses of poetry.

– When Lily does not understand something, she is not ashamed to admit it and asks for help. Perhaps you would like to read the story together and encourage your child to ask about anything that is not clear to them (why does Bialik not reply to Lily himself? What do other difficult words in the poems mean?). Be sure to tell your child never to stop asking questions.

–  In this day and age it seems everything is done online, and we rarely write letters anymore. Inspired by Lily’s letter to Bialik, you may want to let your child write a letter and send it by mail. Maybe there is a question your child wants to ask their grandparent, aunt or uncle in a letter, which you can then slip into an addressed envelope, just like Lily did. You may enjoy going to the post box together and putting the letter in. your child will surely get a reply too.

– Nitzan writes the following to Lily: “Whoever reads or hears a poem can decide for themselves what it’s about and what things look like… Think and decide for yourself what the lestoyouwakeit looks like.” You might want to ask your child whether they would have been happy to receive such a response, or what they would have written back to Lily had they received her letter.

– You may enjoy looking at the illustration depicting Lily’s drawing of the poem entitled Yossi Bakinor. Do you find it amusing? (Did you notice the sleepy car?) How would you illustrate this poem? You may want to look for various illustrations of the same poem together, and search for similarities and differences between them.

• Bialik wrote many other children’s poems, such as Rutz Ben Susi, Nad Ned, and Tzilly VeGilly. You may want to look for them at home or in the local library, and read them together. Perhaps you could choose some of the ones your child likes best, have them draw them as they see fit, and create their very own, personally-illustrated Bialik poetry collection.
  –  Next time you’re in Tel Aviv, you may enjoy visiting Israel’s national poet’s home, Beit Bialik, which has since been converted into a museum. Until then you can go there online, and take a look around Hayim Nahman Bialik’s house.      http://www.shimur.org/Bialik

Enjoy reading and discussing the book together!

לילי Hayim Nahman Bialik (1873–1936) כיתתה לומדים לדקלם שיר בעל-פה

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National poet and author, Hayim Nahman Bialik, was engaged in a variety of literary practices: he wrote essays, stories, and poems for both children and adults; translated classics into Hebrew; adapted and edited the Aggadah stories found throughout the Talmud, and more. Among his books are Sefer HaAggadah (co-edited with Y.H. Ravnitzky), Vayehi Hayom, and the children’s poetry collection entitled Shirim Ufizmonot Layeladim.
Bialik’s work had formed a bridge between ancient Hebrew, not spoken for thousands of years, and the reborn language that started to be spoken in the Land of Israel during the late 19th century. By doing so, he greatly impacted Jewish modern culture. Although Bialik and his wife bore no children of their own, the national poet wrote many verses for children, of whom he was famously fond.

Family Activities

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You don’t have to stand on your head to see the world upside down! You may want to think together with your child what makes each of us different than others, even “upside-down” in relation to others (appearance, pastimes, opinions, talents, etc.)? How do your family members’ uniqueness and various perspectives contribute to the family as a whole?

You may like to think about the various characters together, and how each one reacts when they discover Shufon’s difficulty. Perhaps you would enjoy creating a dialog between two owls in different points along the book, and discuss with your child the change undergone by the entire owl community.

Sometimes what one person finds hard, another achieves with ease. In order to experience backward reading, you may want to write a word on a piece of paper and put it against a mirror. Look at the word’s reflection. Can you figure out what it says?

Following the story, you may enjoy having a reading ball at home! Each family member can bring their favorite book to the ball, and explain why they had chosen it. You can read the books together, relish the wordplay, and even feast on special refreshments (such as letter-shaped cookies or food associated with one of the books).

Wordplay:

You could look through the book and search for the blue words. Ask your child what sets them apart from the other words in the book, and why they think they were printed in a different color.

You may want to explain to your child that words that read the same left to right and right to left are called palindromes. You may like to think of other palindromes together (such as mom, dad, eye) and enjoy some wordplay.

Some of the words in the book have different meanings when read backwards. You may want to look for these examples and think of other words that create new words when read backwards.