One Potato, Two Potato, Sweet Potato, Rude Potato

As fall nears, I am bringing some plants indoors for the winter and making mental plans for next year’s garden. Indoor plants help shorten the bleak Minnesota winter, and my new project is growing Sweet Potato Vine.

This is an excellent project for kids. The supplies are cheap—sweet potatoes (ask your grocery store for a “sprouted” bag and you might even score them free), toothpicks, glass jars and water, and the steps are simple:

·         cut a sweet potato in half

·          push toothpicks around its middle

·         suspend it over a jar filled with water (cut-side down) and wait

·         in a few days, you’ll see sprouts (change your water every week or so)

·         eventually, you’ll get bright chartreuse and purplish leaves

Along with reading the new book Talia and the Rude Vegetables, growing a sweet potato vine is an excellent Rosh Hashanah project. Just like the book’s protagonist, kids will learn what a root (not rude!) vegetable is, and get a little experience growing something themselves. Build anticipation for Rosh Hashanah by checking the plant’s growth every day. Try sampling some sweet potatoes and talking about how they are the perfect choice for a sweet new year.

Jews at the Zoo

When is the last time you visited a zoo? It’s a terrific place for stimulating curiosity and learning  since there’s so much to see. Maybe your kids love watching the lions, the orangutans or tropical fish (my  favorites are the prairie dogs).  When you think about it, a zoo is actually quite incredible, with its diversity of animals and the range of ecosystems we rarely encounter. In fact, the modern zoo is not completely unlike the biblical story of Noah and his animals! 

Author Tami Lehman-Wilzig challenges all of us to understand Bible stories through the lens of the natural world in her new book Green Bible Stories for Children, in which she presents eight Bible stories and provides kids with neat activities and experiments for them to try. In one story, she explores Noah and the Ark by introducing the idea of biodiversity.  She suggests visiting the zoo and asking the zookeeper:

·         Are different animals paired in the same habitats?

·         What and when do they eat? Do they graze on their own or are they given animal feed?

And she also suggests bringing along art supplies to sketch animals in an open habitat so children can notice animals, insects, birds, feeding spots, trees, shrubbery and more.  This is a great basis for talking to kids about how the Bible teaches us to respect the earth and all its inhabitants!

If you can’t get to the zoo, check out The National Zoo’s “virtual zoo” with cameras in the animals’ habitats. See the flamingo cam.  See the gorilla cam.  See the panda cam.

Need Activities to Entertain the Kids?

In the picture book Picnic at Camp Shalom by Jacqueline Jules, the two main characters learn that they have something in common. They share slightly unusual last names: Hamburger and Frankfurter.

If you are planning activities for camp (or are making your own camp at home), try these:

·         Read Picnic at Camp Shalom and then turn it into a play.

·         Learn the history of your last name by doing a little research.

o   Does it have a meaning?

o   What language is it from?

o   Does it connect to a particular ethnicity?

·        Write an acrostic poem using your last name. Each letter of your last name will begin a new line of your poem.

·        Explain a little about heraldry and family coats of arms. Have everyone imagine what their family’s should be, then draw them with crayons on newsprint or with chalk on the sidewalk.

Teachers: Plan Ahead for Rosh Hashanah Events

In What’s the Buzz: Honey for a Sweet New Year, learn how the honey is extracted from the combs and makes its way from the hive to the table, to be enjoyed with slices of apples for a Rosh Hashanah treat from the perspective of a young Israeli girl on a class field trip.

Unique Rosh Hashanah program ideas for your school: This book offers cross-curricular tie-ins with science, including: studying insects such as bees, the recent threat to the bee population (called colony collapse disorder) as well as the benefits of symbiosis. Students can visit a bee farm or schools can invite a beekeeper to speak to an assembly.

This book is the third in Kar-Ben’s “Nature in Israel” series, and can be part of student learning about Israel, including its terrain and habitat and why it is called the land of milk and honey!

Storybook Characters Blossom in Holon’s Gardens

Imagine you are five years old and in a beautiful park.

Now imagine you see your favorite storybook characters in that park. How excited would you be?

In Holon, a suburb of Tel Aviv, there are, incredibly, thirty one different story book gardens with sculptures, figures and playground equipment featuring characters from Israeli children’s books. No wonder Holon is nicknamed “the Children’s City!” View the amazing sculptures.

While the gardens are a fun place to play, their greatest benefit is imparting a love of books and reading to young children. For more information about kid-friendly sites in Israel, check out Zvuvi’s Israel with its fun “Where’s Waldo?” format! Children can search for the fun fly hiding on the slopes of Mt. Hermon, in the salty waters of the Dead Sea, and among the models in the Mini-Israel theme park.  Zvuvi even has his own blog.Check it out! 

How does your community make reading exciting for kids?

Sending Kids to Visit Their Grandparents? Ideas for Activities

How many of you are sending your children off to visit grandparents before school begins, or, if you are grandparents, anxiously awaiting the arrival of your favorite little people? Maybe your family is the highly active type that plans outings, maybe hiking or visiting museums. Or, maybe you like more low-key amusements like going to the movies or out for a bite to eat. Sometimes grandparents feel like they have to entertain grandchildren (or grandchildren expect it), so visits become chock filled with moving from one programmed activity to the next. Finding activities that have real value and can deepen relationships can be difficult, and yet another trip to the pizza-token-arcade place might not be it. On the other hand, some families are the exact opposite, where children need to entertain themselves when visiting grandparents.

If you have the opportunity to spend time with grandchildren, especially with kids in that tricky tween age range, a terrific project is creating a memory book. Grandparents and grandchildren can work together to complete the book’s thoughtful questionnaires and to fill in the family tree. You might talk about what your bar or mat mitzvah was like and what your grandchild hopes his or hers is like. You might explain where special Rosh Hashanah recipes were handed down from, and what your own favorite parts of holidays are. Learn more about the Grandparent's Memory Book for Jewish Families.

If your grandchild doesn’t have the attention for project that requires writing, try doing an interview and recording it. If you have smaller grandchildren, videotape yourself reading books with them. I highly recommend A Grandma Like Yours/A Grandpa Like Yours, in which a whimsical collection of animal grandparents illustrate the characteristics of Jewish grandparents. Then, talk about what kind of grandparent your grandchild thinks you are!

Are you off to grandma’s this summer?

Books and Baseball

My inaugural blog post as the new publicity coordinator for Kar-Ben is inspired by the people I’ve seen in the neighborhood where our building is located. Kar-Ben’s office is located just a couple blocks away from where the Minnesota Twins play Major League baseball, Target field. Each afternoon as I’ve made my way home, hordes of ardent baseball fans have been swarming off the light rail trains as I’m stepping on virtually empty trains to go the opposite direction. These must be some loyal and dedicated fans, since lately here in the Midwest we’ve had the most oppressive heat and humidity that this area has seen in decades. Heat and baseball do share summer in common, as does an important activity: keeping kids reading during summer break.  

Keeping children actively engaged in reading helps avoid the summer slide and keeps up important skills like reading comprehension and building vocabulary. Some children see summer as a time free from academic demands and haven’t yet realized that reading can be pleasurable. Have a reluctant reader but an avid sports fan? Encourage your child to read books about subjects—like baseball—about which he or she truly cares. You (and they) may be surprised by how they devour books on these topics.

All-Star Season by T.S. Yavin is a book about baseball that will appeal to readers ages 10 and up. Brothers Reuven and Avi have two strong bonds – the solidity of their Jewish family life and their passionate love of baseball. Reuven, a pitcher, is desperately working for a spot on the end-of-season All-Star team and is willing to ignore the advice of his parents and even involve his younger brother in his campaign to succeed. The tensions leading to the big game and its surprise outcome will satisfy all young baseball fans.

Do you have a favorite book about sports?

Try these:
Jewish Sports Stars
Sasha Cohen