At the Yeshiva Ktana named after Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson, a leading educational institution of the Jewish Community of Dnipro for boys, a large program of preparation for the approaching holiday of Rosh Hashanah took place. It combined spiritual, educational, and creative components and enabled the students not only to learn more about the meaning and traditions of the Jewish New Year but also to become active participants in preparing for it.
The festive program gathered the yeshiva students in the assembly hall, where separate tables were prepared for each class for the upcoming creative work. However, the gathering began with the spiritual component – the boys watched a video of the leader of our generation, the Seventh Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, and then together recited the 12 Pesukim that the Rebbe instructed every Jewish child to learn. Thus, from the very first minutes of the event, the preparation for Rosh Hashanah was connected to the foundations of Jewish and Chassidic education and to each child’s personal connection with the Rebbe.
A significant portion of the program was dedicated to the children preparing gifts for those closest to them – their parents. Under the guidance of mentors and teachers, the yeshiva students handcrafted festive cards, various crafts, and appliqués with greetings for Rosh Hashanah. The tasks were selected according to the children’s ages: each class worked at its own level of difficulty, so that both the youngest students and the older pupils could invest their own efforts, imagination, and warmth into the gift they would bring home to their parents.
Thus, the creative work became an important part of the yeshiva’s educational program: the children were not merely making beautiful festive items, but preparing to greet their parents and, together with their families, to welcome the arrival of the new Jewish year. It is through such actions, understandable to a child, that the traditions of Rosh Hashanah become part of their own experience, connecting the knowledge gained at the yeshiva with family life and the atmosphere of a Jewish home.
The program concluded with a pre-New Year farbrengen, during which the boys gathered together with their mentors and teachers over refreshments, sharing a common sense of awe before the approaching Rosh Hashanah. And at the end, another festive surprise awaited each student – a pre-New Year gift from the yeshiva: a package with three apples and honey, so that the traditional symbols of the wish for a good and sweet year could be brought home by the children.
“It is very important to us that the preparation for Rosh Hashanah not be limited to telling about the traditions of the holiday, but that every child be able to feel them as part of their own life – to hear the words of the Rebbe, recite pesukim, handcraft a gift for their parents, participate in a farbrengen together with friends and mentors, and bring home apples and honey as a wish for a good and sweet year,” said Rabbanit Chana Segal, director of the Yeshiva Ktana. “This is how knowledge combines with actions, Jewish tradition with family warmth, and spiritual education becomes a child’s personal experience. We are happy to create such an atmosphere of authentic Yiddishkeit for our students thanks to the ongoing support, attention, and care of the united and cohesive Jewish Community of Dnipro under the leadership of Chief Rabbi Shmuel Kaminezki.”
