Skills Vs. Knowledge: Darchai Launches New Standardized Curriculum
Most Yeshivas look at the beginning of the school year as a fresh start. New supplies are purchased, walls are given a fresh coat of paint, and books are dusted off – ready to greet a whole new group of eager students.
This year, Yeshiva Darchai Menachem is unrolling something brand new as well, a curriculum based on a set of vigorous Limudei Kodesh standards that the teachers will be able to use to optimize their classroom experience and reach each student’s maximum learning potential.
The “Standards”, as they have become known, is the result of the collaborative efforts of Darchai Menachem, the Menachem Education Foundation and five other Yeshivas, located throughout the United States. It started over a year ago, when Chabad principals attended the New York City Leadership Academy, a course led by the Menachem Education Foundation. A major focus of the course was the creation of a standards-based education, a system that Jewish schools could universally adopt to clearly determine the outcomes of a students academic journey through school. The gathered principals realized that whereas in secular studies there were a host of schools using this concept, with it thoroughly integrated into the schools academic structure, in Judaic studies nothing has been created and even less implemented. What existed were only pockets of excellence – there was nothing streamlined or bringing everything together.
They came to the conclusion that their only option was to develop a system in Judaic Studies, train the teachers, and have it implemented throughout their schools. “It’s about clearly outlining where we want our students to go and to determine how to get there,” said Rabbi Bension, Principal at Yeshiva Darchai Menachem, and one of the participating principals. “We all saw the value in a standards based approach to education, the next step was to make it a reality”.
Soon after, a weekly Thursday night teleconference was initiated between the schools, with Rabbi Perelstein, Academic Director at Darchai Menachem, tasked with spearheading the monumental project. “The goal of our work is to combine the resources and wisdom of our experienced teachers and principals,” said Rabbi Perelstein, “With the innovation and the technological savvy of the younger ones, to create an interactive, organized system that will optimize every classroom experience.”
This September, the team is proud to unveil the Standards, a cohesive system that utilizes a combination of standards, with a focus on skills acquired rather than amount of information covered, that each child is required to master, coupled with metric based assessment that gives the child, teachers, and parents an exact understanding of each student’s progress within specific skill sets.
This year, the group is focused on testing and refining the Standards, so it will ready for formal publication and available for all Yeshivas, by the start of the 2012 – 2013 school year.
Darchei Menachem is special and unique!
Wow!! May your amazing efforts bear fruits way above your imaginations and capabilities!!
to # 1
correct so if you have a special or unique! student then you send to this school. otherwise if your kid is normal and average you send your child to OT or ULY
to #2
Arent all children special and unique? and if a child is not, do you really think that is “normal and average”?
I am glad OT and ULY are also conected with the Menachem Foundation, this way the “Special & Unique” children there also will get the benifits of skill based learning.
Oh one more thing, get your head out from between your legs..
ceo
BH, BH for these Chabad Chasidim, they are wonderful, they really care for the kids and they get such amazing results…using Chassidus, love, and their best talents.
Zalman
Way to go Meir
Go dearchei
To #2 in ot or uly 75 percent of the kids struggle and learnt nothing that year that the other 25 succeed in darchei they learn how to learn not just learning the entire day and 95 percent end up succeeding and by the end of the school year the could open up a Gemara and start learning by them self.the only reason people send the kids to ot and uly is beacse it’s the system.darchei is an amazing school,
to #2
Is it possible to delete comment #2. it’s simply disgusting!
Darchei, way to go, keep up the great work!!
RS
the Darchai staff are just a unique bunch, their first priority is to help the child find his self esteem, and they are really succeeding, way beyond what one would expect.
to # 3
we all have heads there:)
Way 2 go
special needs is not a bad thing all learning institutions are geared to different things and people B”H if any child has a social or learning disability there is a good place for them!
kol hakavod DM
Go mendy
Go r’ hershkop your the best
darchai rocks!
wohooo go darchai and ayal and all the staff!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Dear editor & negative comments,
Please think before you comment/post, imagine you were a student in drchei with people labeling you like this! how would you feel? do you know how much it can effect a student?
This is a beautiful article about darchei, why the negativity? why do people feel they have to mention other schools and start comparing them? how does it fit in with how nice darchei is?
If you want to mention how other schools are doing well, then make your own article!
Same goes for when there’s a nice article about other schools and you have people bashing that school, think how much a student (especially with low self esteem) will feel? when someone asks him “what school do you go to?” how he would feel answering when he knows thousands of people saw those negative comments about what type of kid he is because he’s part of a certain school…
Darchei, keep it up!
A gut gebenchte yar!!
educator
does standardizing education cause further issues for the individuality of students and each ones strengths???
SHMUILK FORTA
RABBI BENSION IS in MY desk :P
Concerned Parent
Finally! LIGHT at the end of the tunnel.
Kol Hakavod to Zalmi Schnuer and co.
G-d bless!
stay put #2!
# 2: yes! please stay in ot and uly…where u belong.
rabbi dr fried told me (what anyone with a little common sense knows) that they are the worst of all frum schools in nyc…so do us all a favor and stay there. may your children grow up to be the wild chayos that those schools produce.
kudos darchei menachem…kol hakavod…it is so refreshing to see and read about your great work!
4rmer Melamed
as a teacher who could not meet his own standards of excellence and quit, i think darkei menachem is one of the best things that happened to chinuch in the frum world in the last decade.
we were taught in OT by rabbi Marozov, Zalmanov Faitel Levin and others that knowledge was not enough, we were taught the skills to acquire the knowledge independantly.
my one complaint to the school is that not enough focus was placed on why we were not to have secular education before bar mitzva so many of us were self taught to some extent by the age of 8-11 which sort of counter balanced the main advantage an OT education used to give us in those days.
in my day school were not yet equipped to deal with Learning dificutlies as they are today, and some of only came out with knowledge and not skills.
today when all lubavitch schol I know focus on skills and attemot to cater to special needs children, not only average children who might have learning difficulties, iit is a special brocho to have darkei menachem push us all foward.
may we have a school exclusively for higher abilites children too.
eventually we will all be in one general system where everyone is catered for in a way that suits him but until then it seems those of higher abilities are suffering by not being oushed to their max, while those with difficulties are sometimes thought of as less able when they can achieve so much more in other ways, torah is RICH, chasidus is REICH
4rmer Melamed
#17, dunno why u feel the need to answer one sily comment with an even sillier one.
rabbi fried is not an unknown entity who can be qouted to say what u would like him to say, most of us teachers have heard him express his admiration for lubavitch schools and specificaly the ones in ch.
even if he would think otherwiase it would not matter, OT and ULY were built by rabbi hodakov, while he has made mistakes often despite his brriliance as an educator, he had the luxury of being reviewed by the rebbe. the reason they have succeded with some many graduates around the world modeling what a chosid or just a yid should look like is thatnks to this inout despite the difficulties they have in adjusting to years when they need to adapt to the current situation like al lubavitchers especiallly in ch.
if u feel they have not served your particular need, it is truly a shame that amongst the 100’s of parents u are of the few unhappy ones, and i am glad u found darkei menachem.