1. family and parenting
2. children

May/June 2015
www.FELSkids.org
Iyar / Sivan / Tammuz
Dear Parents,
Spring has finally arrived and the children are enjoying the sights and sounds of the season. They
are learning about the environment through sensory exploration. Connecting children with nature
and the environment has a myriad of benefits and our goal is to inspire children to love nature and
understand how the world around them works. According to research, children who spend time in
nature are more creative, less stressed and better able to concentrate. Most activities that can also
be done indoors can be done outdoors. Nature-based learning happens naturally whenever children
are outdoors. The outdoor classroom evolves from the real needs of children and offers activities
that are personally meaningful to them.
Outdoor space offers a balance of areas for physically active and less active play. During Buerger’s
outdoor learning experiences, children are connecting with the many elements in their
surroundings.
Warmly,
Andi Miller
Center Director
Enrichment Programs & Special Events
May
Wednesday, May 6th & 20th
Yoga
Thursday, May 7th
Cantor Frankel
Tuesday, May 12th
Parent Association Meeting: 5:00pm
Thursday, May 14th & 28th
Jewish Enrichment with Amy Jo
Sunday, May 17th
Dedication for Rodeph Shalom
Tuesday, May 19th
Upper School: Please Touch Museum
Friday mornings
Shabbat: Upper School 10:30am
Lower School 11:00am
June
Teacher Appreciation Week
May 4 —May 8
Tuesday, June 2nd
Parent Association Meeting 5:00pm
Week of June 1st-12th
Upper School : 1st –5t
Lower School Conference : 8th—17th
Wednesday, June 3rd & 17th
Yoga
Monday, June 8th
Upper School: Academy of Natural
Sciences
Thursday, June 11th & June 25th
Jewish Enrichment with Amy Jo
Thursday, June 18th
Music with Cantor Frankel
Friday, June 19th
GRADUATION
Friday mornings
Shabbat: Upper School 10:30am
Lower School 11:00am
Help us honor the wonderful
teaching staff at the Buerger ELC!
Teacher Appreciation Week is a
great opportunity for parents to
express their gratitude toward the
caregivers who are helping them
to shape and mold the minds of
their children!
Closings
Monday, May 25, 2015
Memorial Day
A Message from Rabbi Maderer:
Have you noticed we have some construction going on
outside? It has been so exciting to see the expansion go
up. And now here we are, almost complete, with the May
17 Dedication happening this month! Please attend! 5/17
@12:30pm) Every step of the way, our leadership’s
decisions have been purpose-driven, fueled by our vision
of the people and purpose who will fill its space, who will
expand our impact.
In the past year, our congregation has set out to select a
Jewish text to appear on the external Broad Street wall.
When we asked the congregation to submit ideas, we
collected a beautiful variety of Jewish texts and brought
them to Torah Study sessions and Officers meetings to
interpret them in depth.
The text that emerged as a clear favorite and will be
inscribed on the external Broad Street wall comes from
Pirke Avot, Ethics of Our Sages: Ohev shalom v’rodeph
shalom -- Love peace and pursue it. When we reach out to
our neighbors to join hands in the work of social justice
with POWER, the Farmer’s Market, tutoring students, we
are loving peace and pursuing it. When we support
connection for our youth in programs such as the Buerger
Early Learning Center, we are loving peace and pursuing
it. When we gather in prayer to turn inward to our souls,
we are loving peace and pursuing it. And then there’s the
meaningful connection of the Hebrew. Ohev shalom
v’rodeph shalom. Rodeph shalom, embedded in the
Hebrew, reminds us that the universal notion to love
peace and pursue it, in this text is at its heart, our very
own identity.
In the next couple of weeks we will prepare to dedicate
our glorious new space. Bricks and mortar are not the
ends but the means for our purpose. And our purpose is
to create profound connections and to expand our reach
that we might fill our new sacred space. The elimination of
our fence will welcome the stranger. The glass walls will
help us to embrace the guest. The accessibility will support those with mobility challenges. The exposed exterior
to our original building will root us in our past. The courtyard will root us in nature. The Jewish text on our wall will
root us in Torah.
Our social media campaign on twitter and facebook bears
the hashtag #rsgrows. Fueled by purpose, may RS
grow. May we grow in our impact. May we grow in our
reach. May we grow in our souls.
Dedication Ceremony to Celebrate
Opening of the Newly Renovated
Rodeph Shalom
“Honoring Our Past . . .
Opening the Door to Our Future”
(PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania) On Sunday, May 17 at
12:30pm Rodeph Shalom will dedicate our newly
renovated building. The 17,500 square foot addition
designed by Kiernan Timeberlake has created a 21st
century building offering accessibility improvements
and increased security, additional meeting and classroom spaces while retaining the grandeur of its
original 1927 building.
On hand for the ribbon dedication will be the RS
President, Lloyd Brotman, the RS clergy as well as
state and local dignitaries. Governor Wolf and
Mayor Nutter have been invited. A crowd of 400
people will be in attendance, made up of
congregants, donors and community leaders. After a
brief ceremony, tours of the new building will be
available as well as tastings at the Common Ground
Farmer’s Market on Broad & Mount Vernon Streets.
The Grand Opening of the Market will be on Sunday,
July 12 and open until Thanksgiving every Sunday
from 12 – 4pm.
Save the Date:
It’s Graduation!
Friday, June 19th at 5:00PM in Rodeph Shalom
The Power of Play and How it Promotes
Physical and Emotional Development
Welcome to Buerger’s
Outdoor Learning Experience
Studies have shown that outdoor play supports the physical and
emotional development of children. Here is an excerpt from education.com on play and physical and emotional development.
For many, play is epitomized by children running, climbing, jumping, and moving. The pure joy of these simple physical activities is
warmly remembered. Children using their large muscles in these
activities are strengthening their gross motor development
(Gallahue, 1982). Beginning in infancy, children improve neuromuscular coordination through repeated use of their large muscles. Batting at a mobile as an infant, walking during early toddlerhood, running and climbing at the preschool level, and swinging and skipping in the primary years are all examples of how play
enhances gross motor development.
Play activities also include use of smaller muscles for a variety of
tasks. Fine motor development is refined through cutting, lacing,
buttoning, painting, and writing experiences in play. Building with
Legos, putting together puzzles, sand and water play, woodworking projects, play dough, and dressing dolls are additional examples of play activities that promote fine motor development.
The Young Toddlers enjoy a circle time outside reading The Sun is
My Favorite Star by Frank Asch. Morah Becki incorporates words
in Hebrew while identifying objects in their surroundings. We
continue to build literacy everywhere we go!
As children mature, they use their muscles in continually more
complex ways, integrating large and fine muscle movements with
visual perception. Play allows frequent practice of these complicated actions. Hitting and catching a ball, jumping rope, playing
hopscotch, and using the monkey bars are all examples of these
more difficult coordinated movements. In addition, play allows
children to develop a better awareness of body, space, and direction. As they move their bodies, children learn about up, down,
in, out, over, under, left, right, and more as they climb, swing,
crawl, and run. Playing in the gym or outdoors is particularly good
for body awareness learning.
Play is an excellent vehicle for helping children with their emotional (also called affective) development (Johnson, Christie, &
Wardle, 2005). In their play, children can master emotional issues
such as anxiety, frustration, normal developmental conflicts, traumatic situations, unfamiliar concepts, and overwhelming experiences.
Four-year-old Raul just had a very exciting trip to the museum,
although his initial experience was a bit overwhelming. Just inside
the door to the museum was a huge skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus
rex. When his father told Raul that this was once a living animal,
he was shocked. How could anything that big ever have lived?
During the days and weeks that follow in preschool, Raul plays
out his wonderment by making dinosaurs with play dough, drawing dinosaurs, building dinosaur cages with the blocks, and
fighting dinosaurs on the playground. It will take him many weeks
to play through this interest, but when it is completed, Raul will
have mastered a complex emotional issue.
Source: http://www.education.com/reference/article/playphysical-emotional-development/
Did you know water play promotes problem solving skills, math
and language development, and encourages physical development? As children manipulate water play materials, they begin
to learn how things happen. They learn the process of sinking
and floating and discover new ideas! They also learn the
concept of more or less, as well as building new vocabulary.
Buerger’s Special Events
Make sure to “like” the Buerger Early
Learning Center on Facebook to see
more of our activities!
https://www.facebook.com/BuergerELC
Philadelphia Zoo’s
Zoo on Wheels
Buerger Summer Camp
Our program officially begins on
Monday, June 22, 2015 and
continues through Friday,
August 28, 2015. Each week
your child will participate in a
thematic based camp program.
Since the majority of the children’s time will be spent
outdoors, please remember to send the following labeled
items with your child:
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Nature Jack
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Tote bag / backpack for all of their belongings
Plastic bag for wet items
Sunscreen (must have consent form signed)
Bathing suit (All children must wear their suit on Tuesday and Friday)
Hat
Towel
Change of clothes (in addition: shoes for the day)
Water shoes (no flip-flops!)
Preschool classes will be taking turns using the bikes and
the bike path as all children need to wear them at the
center. Please be sure your child has a helmet at Buerger
with their name on the inside. Safety first!
Your child also needs appropriate changes of clothing for
the weather as well. As a reminder we follow the
Department of Human Services’ regulation that “weather
permitting, all children shall be taken out doors daily.”
We ask that you bring your child to school with a fresh
application of sunscreen. However, the teachers will
reapply prior to going outside. We also ask that wet
bathing suits and towels be taken home daily. We are all
looking forward to a fun-filled summer!