Rosh Hashanah Children's Activities
- Hand drawn greeting cards stimulate a child's creative and artistic abilities. Teach your children about the symbols of Rosh Hashanah, such as apples, honey and the Shofar, and then have them choose one of the symbols they like and draw a picture of it on the front of a homemade greeting card. Help the children choose a traditional Rosh Hashanah greeting for the New Year and write it inside the card in Hebrew or English.
- Have your children make a special honey jar for Rosh Hashanah, decorated to look like a bee. Paint a glass jar with yellow craft paint and wrap bands of black electrical tape around it to represent the bee's black and yellow abdomen. Glue half of a Styrofoam sphere to the lid to make the bee's head. Paint the head yellow with a black smiley face. Make antennae for the bee by poking lengths of wire into the Styrofoam head.
- Sweets are a big part of the appeal of Rosh Hashanah for children. Involve your children in baking holiday sweets. Young children can help in the kitchen by stirring batter and shaping cookies on a baking sheet. Older kids can help by measuring ingredients and setting the timer for baking times. Explain the use of traditional Rosh Hashanah foods like apples, pomegranates and honey to represent the wish for a sweet upcoming year.
- Teach children about Rosh Hashanah by having them accompany you for the Tashlich ceremony. Explain the significance of the ceremony and lead them in prayer. Throw bread or pebbles into natural running water and talk about how they represent one's sins during the previous year. Explain that by casting the stones or crumbs into the water, where they are washed away, it symbolizes starting the New Year with a clean slate.
