APPLE PICKING
Learning Objective
To learn all about various Rosh Hashanah customs including
with a focus on eating apples and honey.
Activity Objective
To be the first team to spell out the mystery phrase on the
apple cards by opening apples and accumulating the letters.
Tapuach U’Devash
Apple and Honey
APPLE PICKING
RH-3B
Materials
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Plastic Apples
Basket
Mystery Phrase Apple Cards
Rosh Hashanah Fact Cards
Bonus Card
Hive Box with Board
Honey Packets
Grass Patch
Quantity
15
1
17 (x4 groups)
24
1
1
10
2
Set-Up
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Divide the participants into 4 even teams and assign
them a team colour – red, yellow, orange, green. These
colours are the coloured apples they will be receiving
throughout the game.
At the front of the room, place an apple basket with 15
apples inside on top of the grass patch.
In the apples in the basket, the following is inside the
apples:
 9 Apples - Rosh Hashanah Fact (need to insert
and swap Fact Card each round)
 4 Apples – Labelled Mystery Phrase Letter
 2 Apples – Empty
APPLE PICKING
RH-3B
Instructions
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Each team sends 1 representative to the Basket to pick an
Apple. All 3 teams do this simultaneously.
If they reveal a Rosh Hashanah Fact, they get to pick a
Honey Packet from the Hive.
If they reveal a Mystery Phrase Apple, they get a Letter
Apple from their team pile (colour coordinated by team) and
save it to start building their mystery phrase.
If they reveal an empty apple, nothing happens.
Once a team accumulates 3 Honey Packets, they get to
trade them in for a Mystery Letter and the packets are
returned to the hive.
The game continues with each round 3 new participants
picking apples.
The first team to spell out the Mystery Phrase wins.
The mystery phrase for all teams is: “Shana Tova U’metukah”
APPLE PICKING
RH-3B
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BLESSINGS FOR A SWEET YEAR
Many people have the custom of eating different foods to
represent different things on Rosh Hashanah. For example, a
round challah reminds us of the round world. A pomegranate
has many seeds like the mitzvot in the Torah. But, the most
popular of all the foods we eat on Rosh Hashanah is dipping
apples into honey to represent a blessing for a sweet year.
The main greeting around the time of Rosh Hashanah is
“L’Shana Tova U’metuka” – ‘To a good and sweet year’.
Honey is very sweet. Since Rosh Hashanah is the beginning of
the New Year, we want to start our year off with a blessing of
sweetness so that all our experiences throughout the coming
year should be sweet.
But why do we dip an apple? If it is because it is sweet then
surely there are fruits that are even sweeter. The apple
specifically represents Gan Eden/The Garden of Eden. Gan
Eden was the first place people lived in the world when the
earth was created. It was a perfect place where the food grew
without needing to be planted or harvested and was always
perfectly delicious. It was a place of perfection. We try, each
year, to gain some of that perfection back. We try to be able to
enjoy our lives as if we lived in Gan Eden. The apple is a
symbol of Gan Eden. Gan Eden is described to have the scent
of an apple orchard.
So, on Rosh Hashanah, we take a little symbol of perfection
and dip it in sweetness and hope for a piece of this for the year
to come.
If you had to choose a sweet food to eat instead of apple and
honey, what would you choose? What does it mean to have a
‘sweet’ year?
APPLE PICKING
RH-3B