My Jewish Year Celebration

Lay every holiday’s craft or photograph on the floor in a large circle, in order. Walk it together once. Then give each child their “My Jewish Year” book to carry to their family.

Children wonder and discover; you facilitate more than you lecture.

• What did we do all year?
• Which holiday lives in your heart?
• What will you show your family?

The enduring understanding of this year is that Jewish time is a circle, not a line. Children have lived that circle one holiday at a time; today they see its whole shape at once, which is a genuinely new idea for a five-year-old. Children SHOW their books — they do not perform. A child who points at a page has shared completely.

• Shanah — year
• Chag sameach — happy holiday
• Todah — thank you

“Does the year start over again?”

It does, and that is the best part. Rosh Hashanah comes back around and we do it all again — only next time you will be bigger.

• Children can walk the year in order and name what happens.
• Children can share their keepsake book with a grown-up.

Invite showing rather than speaking. Let families come to the child at their own book rather than seating children in front of an audience; the quietest child in the room may be the proudest.

Folktale. Honi and the Carob Tree (Talmud) — Honi plants a tree he will never sit under, because someone once planted one for him.

Changemaker. Marc Chagall — painted Jewish holidays and village life in floating colour, so joy is the first thing you see.

I wonder which part of the year you would like to do again first?

“We walked through our whole Jewish year today and your child brought home their keepsake book. Try at home: turn the pages together and let them tell you the year in their own order.”