At Jewish Education Conference, Teachers Study Today’s Child
A child born into a world saturated by the wonders of the internet makes for a student who feels entitled to a highly individualized environment. At a back-to-school conference hosted last week by the Chabad-Lubavitch Office of Education roughly 200 educators explored strategies for transmitting Jewish knowledge and values to today’s children.
Education professionals from New York, Chicago, Jerusalem, and beyond addressed other issues such as school-wide positive communication and teaching to multiple developmental levels. The goal of the annual conference, held this year in Piscataway, NJ, is to “refocus and reenergize Chabad educators for the next school year,” according to Rabbi Nochem Kaplan, Office of Education director.
Classic lessons where one child reads and translates a part of the Torah risks losing the attention of the rest of the class. In one highly regarded presentation, Rabbi Dovid Jacobson, Ph.D., of Los Angeles, shared methods to surmount this challenge via the active participation model.
Adding their own fresh ideas to the dialogue were 22 directors of Chabad’s new bumper crop of early childhood centers. Funded with grants from the Machne Israel Development Fund, underwritten by philanthropists David and Lara Slager, this new generation of educators is facing the birth pangs of starting preschools, together.
MIDF is “invested in making the schools the best they can be,” said Batya Lisker, the fund’s Early Childhood Initiative Project Administrator. An exclusive early childhood Director’s workshop and one-on-one mentoring sessions were led by Mrs. Lisker at the Conference. On-site visits, web conferences, online groups, and conference calls to address issues specific to preschools are planned to keep MIDF grant recipients collaborating from their schools in 46 locations from tropical Kula, HI, to frigid Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
Preschool and high school teachers alike flocked to a session on protecting children in and out of the classroom. Debbie Fox, founding director of Aleinu Family Resource Center in California identified telltale signs of abuse and characteristics of an endangered child.
“She provided us with a greater awareness of details to look out for,” said Chavie Bendet of Lubavitch Cheder Day School in Minnesota.
School prayer, a staple of Jewish life and practice was reexamined by Rabbi Shimmy Weinbaum, Tzivos Hashem program director who presented solutions that help 21st century children relate to ancient words and remove the rote out of recitation.
Chabad representative Itta Marcus of Los Alamitos, a fourth grade teacher with 30 years of experience, found Rabbi Weinbaum’s focus on quality versus quantity of prayer to be thought provoking.
“It’s worth remembering that children come to our schools not just to pray, but to learn how to pray.”
Mrs. Marcus said she came away from the conference her “mind buzzing about how I could incorporate what I learned.”
Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, Chairman of Merkos and Machne Israel, the educational and social services divisions of Chabad-Lubavitch, addressed the conference.
“Beyond curriculum, teaching methodology, techniques and pedagogic skills, an educator is ultimately, a role model for her students. The teacher’s conduct, demeanor, interactions, genuine concern for each student and attitude profoundly influence the development of the student’s character over and beyond the subject matter taught.”
The annual conference, Rabbi Krinsky said later, which followed a parallel conference earlier this summer for the men’s division of Chabad educators, is illustrative of “Chabad’s focus on education as the cornerstone of Jewish continuity. Our schools must strive to provide Jewish children with a Jewish education that inspires a rich, meaningful and practicable Jewish commitment.”
Binyamin
A serious pnimiusdik event (conferece), for serious pnimi people (our mechanchim) organized by serious pnimi people (Rabbi Krinsky, Kaplan).
Like the mishna says: beautiful for them and beautiful for the world.
Let’s have more such events and reporting.
BABY SITTING!
We have to stop the “baby sitting” approach used in CH Yeshivos and motivate the kids to learn with geshmak. I am very dissapointed that the last 3 weeks of the school year (early elementary) no real learning and no homework occurred, that there is no real learning for 2 months during yeshiva day camp and that an enormous amount of time (2-3 hours/day) were spent in niggunin and stories during the entire school year.
Also, if the yeshiva wants the kids to speak Yiddish, why there is not a method or textbook to teach Yidish properly? If the hanchala believes that Yiddish is apoken at home ala 30 years ago, they are disconnected from reality.
Always your students
Mrs Lisker….seriously rad. Super cool.
We love you.
The time has come
Our Jewish educators must recognize and embrace the role of computers and the Internet.
Bring the Internet into the classroom and explain to students the benefits and evils of it.
Banning the use of the Internet only makes its attraction more desirable and disregards the guidance that is required to use it.
Chabad Lubavitch years ago advanced itself and separated from the arcane and head in the sand way of life of the Satmars and others now its time to take the next step and accept the 21st century technology and let its children benefit from it.
RG
groise yasher koach to Batya Lisker for the good work she does, and b’emunah
local friend
ok Batya now maybe you can come upstate?
really wonderful work that you are doing but
when in new york do like new yorkers –
long weekends upstate. proud of you!
Comment
Nice to see the development in Chinuch. This is the real frontier of 2011. Teachers at the front row..
Well done Batya!
Restored
This is so very exciting! It gives me a trust in the educational system here that I have never had. The leaders are the leaders for a reason, and now I see that reason. G-d bless you for leading the way.
Miryum M
I traveled from far to attend this conference and it was a first for me. I gained an incredible amount. Specifically from a round table discussion led by Batya Lisker for the Machne Israel Development Fund recipients. We had the opportunity to share challenges and successes and learn tremendously from each other. Thank you to all the organizers.
Yocheved
Rabbi Krinsky statement regarding the teachers being a living example forn their students, is so important that it should be publicized to all yeshivas and schools, Lubavitch and not.
In today’s day and age this is far more important than the information imparted from teacher to child.
If all educator’s would heed Rabbi Krinsky’s message we would raise a new generation of mentchen.
Mendy
Thank you so much Batya for coming out to Burbank and helping out our preschool and for all the work you do. My son loves the school and all the parents that I speak with have only praise.
May you continue to help other communities have a school like ours.
Jewish Educ8r
This conference has identified and conceptualized tremendous advances in education that will produce caring, competent Jewish leaders of the future.
The additional focus on early childhood education training workshops and one-on-one conferences is a terrific concept, especially when spearheaded by Batya Lisker, an unparalleled knowledgeable, capable leader in education.
Yasher Koach MIDF!!
A perspective
To “Babysitting”- I do think that if you read some information about effective practices in education, including the developmental stages of children, you would gain insight into certain practices in school settings. I also understand your concern for the “music/stories/last 3weeks” scenarios. As one in the profession, I offer a response: In the early grades especially, music and stories deepen knowledge for most,and offer another access for children who may not be as traditional a learner as you were. If it is ALL they do, of course that isn’t considered appropriate in most schools; however, if these are minimized, children miss very important educational needs. As for the last 3 weeks of school, I think those on staff should abide by an articulated understanding as to what is appropriate therein. If a teacher has pretty much had a successful year with minimal behavioral issues in the class, then those last weeks can be productive in every way. If, on the other hand, there were frequent behavioral and/or academic issues during the year, then the last 3 weeks can present additional challenges due to the hot weather, excitement of coming vacation,or modeling peer behavior. A teacher might need to be creative and responsive to the impending end of the school year, but never should it look like a camp instead of a school, in my opinion. As to the speaking of Yiddish: I agree that a planned and carried out method would be great! I was immersed for 45 minutes a day for 5 years in another language. The first year was all conversation, no books. The rest was with books. What fun! It can be done if there is agreement that this is a priority. From a look at what the above conference included, I see many, many excellent examples of people and ideas that support high standards and a keen sense of integrity for the process of bringing the best to our schools. Most importantly, in my opinion, is having an open mind to where improvement is needed, while acknowledging the effective methods in place. From your message, I see that you really care about this important issue, and this makes me feel grateful that adults like you take the time to express their concerns.