Join your kids in creating a Kotel together as a symbol of achdut.
We have a book that my kids enjoy called “The Travels and Tales of Dr. Emanuel J. Mitzva: Doctor of Mostly Everything” by Yaffa Ganz. One of my youngest daughter’s favorite stories is about a girl named Julie, who gets the chicken pox and can’t go to school to complete her Sukkah project with the class. When Dr. Mitzva suggests she just do the project at home, she explains that it’s a “do-it-together project” as the puzzle pieces they are making need to fit together. In a truly Corona-friendly twist, Dr. Mitzva brings the class over to her yard and they hold up their drawings to the window so they can each see them and complete the project properly. Of course he explains that bikkur cholim, visiting the sick, is a “do-it-together mitzva” as you need both the healthy and sick person to do the mitzva and both are impacted by it.
Now we are approaching Tisha B’av, not Sukkot, but I loved the idea of the “do-it-together project” and “do-it-together mitzva.” We learn that the Beit Hamikdash was destroyed because of baseless hatred. There is nothing better than a “do-it-together” to rejoin us all, in our case by both doing a project and learning about a mitzva.
If you have more than one kid, or a group of kids in camp, this is a great collaborative craft. We are planning to go big and have each kids do a few pages that will be assembled as a mural on the wall. If you don’t have either the manpower or the space, if you and your child can each paint one page, and that will be more than enough to reassemble on a sheet of paper.
You can add anything you find meaningful to your Kotel on top of the watercolor blocks. A picture of your family, a note you want to put in the wall or anything else.
I hope that by all of Jewish people joining together in achdut, we can rebuild the real Beit Hamikdash!
Looking for more Tisha B’av projects?
Rebuilding Yerushalayim (in paper)
Yerushalayim Puzzle for Tisha B’av
Peek-a-boo Yerushalayim
Stained Glass Yerushalayim
Do-It-Together Kotel
Time:
Active: 20 minutes
Age: 3-10
Materials:
Watercolor paints
Paint brushes
Paper
Scissors
Tape or glue
Process:
Give each participant a piece of paper and brush and have them fill the page with watercolor painting. No need to make any specific design or shape. You can assign each kids a few colors, so they will recognize “their” pieces once it is cut up. Or just have them all use just lots of colors!
When the pages have dried, cut them up into rectangles and squares. I stacked the pages and cut strips, and them stacked the strips to cut the smaller squares and rectangles – we don’t need to be precise! Glue or tape the squares in rows onto a piece of paper or if you are doing this on a larger scale, on the wall. Overlap some smaller pieces in between the bricks to simulate the greenery growing on the Kotel.
Did you do this project? Share your pictures on our facebook page!
Jewish Kids create 