Dear Early Childhood Parents, 

So you helped to create the oh-so-perfect Purim costume and sent your child off to school for a day of celebration and fun. But did you realize all that had been happening in our classrooms since our return from February break and leading up to this very special day? 

For sure we were sharing the story of King Achashverosh, Mordecai, Esther, and Haman in a developmentally appropriate way, but within the storytelling, singing, and dramatic play were deep discussions about meaningful concepts for our 3-6-year-olds such as kindness, bravery, and heroism. The experience of cooking and baking Hamantaschen helped to develop the disposition of caring for others as these gifts were shared with community members throughout our school and added to hand-crafted Mishloach Manot bags to be given to classmates. The dressing up and role-playing led to thoughtful conversations about what it means to be brave and what heroes do, as well as connections to our own actions and abilities to embody and strive towards such characteristics. Recognizing kindness in our classrooms and becoming more aware of others and how they feel were also areas of focus that were given new meaning as the children revisited the Purim story and related their personal experiences to those of the characters. 

So, yes, the children had a joyful time on the actual day of Purim but, just like everything we do at Bernard Zell, our experience as an Early Childhood community was much richer due to the process of learning and exploration we participated in before the culminating celebration!

With warm regards and great appreciation for your partnership,

Abby Aloni
Head of Early Childhood