S/O Teaching 5 year olds alef Beis

Good Friend ↓

Wed, Dec 30 2020, 9:30 pm

The other thread of a mother of a 4 year old asking for help with her child learning alef Beis reminded me that I can ask this question on Imamother!

I run a small Hebrew school and the youngest class is 5 year olds. I don't have much experience teaching this age (I teach all ages being the only shlucha in my city, from 5 year olds to adults, so it's not like I was hired by a school to teach a 5 year old class without training, there's just no one else here to do it)
Anyway I'm having a hard time figuring out how to teach alef Beis. I started here when the kids were 4 and we learned about half of the letters through puppet shows and scrapbooking, the problem is these kids come twice a week for an hour and we also learn other things so that leaves about 20 minutes a week for learning alef Beis. Add to that the fact that kids miss Hebrew school average 1/4 classes for vacationing or other reasons, and add the fact that we keep having to switch to Zoom, and we end up with the quicker half of the class bored and ready to learn more letters and the slower half doesn't know the first 10 letters.
How can we actually make progress with every student under these circumstances? Any tips or curriculum suggestions from teachers who are actually trained and have skills with this age group?
Thanks for any advice!

tigerwife

Wed, Dec 30 2020, 9:55 pm

Wow, kudos to you for taking on this responsibility! I am not a teacher but my children are up to this stage. It seems like the key is repetition. Every single class should include reading a sheet of the aleph Bais they’ve already learned, at least once. I’m not sure if you can assign homework, but if you do, it should be a sheet of aleph beis or aleph beis flashcards. You can create a contest where if they complete their flash cards on their own X amount of times, they get a prize.

↑ Good Friend ↓

Thu, Dec 31 2020, 3:09 am

Thanks for the idea to give homework! I've hesitated to give homework because how can I know if they're reading it right, but the truth is all the kids have at least 1 parent who knows the alef bet so I can ask them to do it with a parent.

Also I didn't mean only teachers can respond when I said people who are actually trained, I meant as opposed to myself, so thanks for the response!

amother

Khaki

Thu, Dec 31 2020, 4:45 am

set up a drawer for individual study. worksheets and activities with every letter (sraw the letter in the sand, print it with potatoes, stick it on cardbard with string, lay it with glasspearls...

this way you camn learn /repeat/practice in a smal group while the others are occupied.

judos to you!!

↑ Good Friend ↓

Thu, Dec 31 2020, 6:47 am

amother [ Khaki ] wrote:

Thank you.

↑ Good Friend ↓

Thu, Dec 31 2020, 7:28 am

amother [ Natural ] wrote:

Have you heard about Alef Champ? It was created for Shluchim. It involves each kid progressing at his/her own pace. It mimics the Karate theme with its levels and colors.

Yes, so I do Aleph Champ with the older classes but I think these kids are a little young for it, so I created my own booklets for them copying the aleph Champ system, which they like, the problem is they do for like 10-15 minutes per class, and I need to give each kid instructions for each page and I need to watch and correct them on the reading pages and I can't be with each kid at the same time, so some of the time they're waiting for me and get distracted...

amother

Ruby

Thu, Dec 31 2020, 8:00 am

Most schools I've worked in, the children are learning 1:1 for alef beis, each child where they're up to with a specific alef beis teacher. It must be really hard to try and teach a group of different levels. Kudos to you.
Is there a way for the more advanced to pair up with the others and 'teach' them?
Or can you group them by where they're up to and do different challenge work for each group? Like all the ones who know the first 10 letters are in one group and they can practice those, the next group has their activity on the letters they know, and so on.
I don't know how your classroom is set up but at that age in my school we still have a lot of play-time. We let most of the class play and call over children in specific small groups or 1:1 to do work at the table. So you can do work with each child or group on their level. It also means the children on different levels aren't bored waiting for their turn.
Is there a support group for shluchim to pool resources and discuss the difficulties? It must be really hard out on your own. I am really impressed.

amother

↑ Natural

Thu, Dec 31 2020, 8:20 am

Good Friend wrote:

Yes, so I do Aleph Champ with the older classes but I think these kids are a little young for it, so I created my own booklets for them copying the aleph Champ system, which they like, the problem is they do for like 10-15 minutes per class, and I need to give each kyid instructions for each page and I need to watch and correct them on the reading pages and I can't be with each kid at the same time, so some of the time they're waiting for me and get distracted...

Neat. Can you have the more advanced students assist the others?
That way, your workload is lighter, and the advanced students won't be left bored.

↑ Good Friend

Thu, Dec 31 2020, 12:22 pm

I really appreciate the brainstorming help!
I'm going to try to adjust the schedule to work with them one on one while the others do maybe a parsha crafts. Right now we're virtual for yet another 2 weeks because of Covid, hopefully soon we'll be back in person and can try this.
Are 5 year olds mature enough to accept working in partners where one guides the other and not vice versa?

FranticFrummie

Thu, Dec 31 2020, 12:31 pm

I tutor early reading in English and Hebrew.

Each day I do a different letter, and slowly build on it. I bring lots of things that start with that letter, and coloring sheets. For Aleph, I would bring a small toy lion. For A, I would bring apples and almonds, etc.

I try to find as many items as I can for each letter, and keep a box for each set of items. It makes it really easy when you need to start a new class, because you already have all your materials assembled. With each new letter, do a really quick review of the previous letters before you introduce the new one.

Try to find something edible for each letter, if you can. Of course no one can eat a xylophone, but do your best.

It's actually a really fun challenge to do for yourself, as it gets your own creativity going. It's like your own personal treasure hunt.

I also do stickers and a scrapbook for each letter, so at the end of the alphabet the kids have an album they can be proud of. They can bring it home between classes, and if their parents don't know aleph bet, the kids can "teach" them using the album.

Another thing is you can give your kids an assignment that week to go around the house and see how many things they can find with the letter of the day. They can ask their parents to write in the album how many things their child found.