Jewish Learning – Just in time or Just in case?
Just how relevant is Jewish Education? One of the solutions advanced to solve the Jewish Diaspora’s continuity crisis, is the strengthening and improvement of Jewish Education. While it is true that the quality of Jewish Education can stand improvement, focusing on the pedagogical quality alone will not be sufficient. Even the best teachers, with the best resources, and the best schools are not able to answer, “Why is this relevant to me?”
As Jewish Educators I think we need to take a step back and ask ourselves, “Why are our students learning this material?” If the students become stars at Hebrew school, what happens? Sadly, the answer all too often is not much. Families rarely attend services. When they do, the services are hard to follow. The new prayer books with their alternate readings mean that no matter how educated a congregant is, they are still going to be dependent on the Rabbi or Cantor to announce the pages.
Once the congregation turns to the right page what happens? The high water mark for Jewish Supplementary School education is decoding. The ability to mumble along incomprehensible syllables is the sole goal for Jewish education. One masters decoding to perform adequately at a Bnei Mitzah. Afterwards, that information can be forgotten. And, If you think those schools that ignore decoding actually focus on real content you are sorely mistaken. The Bnei Mizvot without skills do not suddenly bloom with meaning and spiritual content. The quality of Jewish education barely qualifies as a third grade level experience.
On Birthright this past winter, one of our staff rabbis threw out all of the great theme material we prepared for him. The reason? The student’s had no foundational knowledge. The Rabbi reported,“I asked on the first day, who know’s Abraham? Who is familiar with his story? Not one student answered.”
We could wring our hands and say, “How can someone go through Hebrew school and not know who Abraham was?” But, the real problem is that there is no relevance. Why be Jewish? Why master the skills of prayer and knowledge of ritual? If no one does these things any more, doesn’t studying Judasim become like studying Assyrian culture? Ok, there is some vague value to ethnic identification and nostalgia. But, how many Huguenots are present in America? Should the Judaism that America has created and espoused cause a child to actually care? Why should the student’s care when no one else does.
This is not to say that the Jewish endeavor should be forsaken. There are very important relevant questions that religion can answer in a person’s life. “Why am I here?”, “What is life’s purpose?”, How do I decide what to do?”, “Is there a right and wrong?”.
There are hard questions. “Does G-d exist?”, “Does prayer work?”, “Do we have free choice?”, “Why do bad things happen to good people?”. These questions are hard, but, meaningful. Unless we are prepared to answer these questions, we should stay home. Today’s Jewish students do not need more drills in Adon Olam just in case they ever go to services. Let’s forget ‘Just in case’ and bring some real relevance to the classroom.
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7 comments:
Hi:
I couldn't agree more with your last comment about education.
You ask: "Why are our students learning this material?”
I would ask it differently: How are my students using this material. If we search for the facts or skills that we think our students will need i think we will always be spinning our wheels. If we look at our students and ask what experiences we want them to have--what do we want them to "do"--then we will be better able to target the learning moments we create.
Great blog post! Yashar Koah!
I also could not agree more. The question, though is - can we get Religious School teachers and directors (not to mention synagogue boards) to completely change what we have been doing so far? Can we change the concept of learning synagogue skills (which in reality has come to mean decoding and being ready to put on a 60 minute show when you turn 13)into learning how to think and act Jewishly? I am sure any of us who write a curriculum that teaches relevant Judaism to children and teenagers. Are synagogues and parents ready and willing to go ahead with something like this?
Getting people to think and act Jewishly can be done, but, it will take a total restructuring of Jewish communal norms.
Today the individual reigns supreme. How can we speak about acting Jewishly when autonomy is the name of the game. The community can't even agree to support endogamy as a goal.
Wonderful post. Your comment about what happens after someone gains the ability to open a siddur and daven or read from a sefer is SO very important. As we all know, "doing" and "understanding" are two very different things. One of our primary goals as educators is to get students to the understanding stage. Without it, as you point out, the information has no real depth of meaning to identify with long term, and will be quickly lost.
I enjoyed your post and the subsequent exchanged. You have articulated one of the key weaknesses of the current system - while it presumes to be concrete and goal oriented (Bar/Bat Mitzvah), ultimately the lack of family engagement in prayer and ritual make it irrelevant.
I want to add, though, that Hebrew schools do not always fail and are not the only institutions that can fail their students. I know many Yeshiva graduates who are religiously alienated and/or poorly Jewishly educated. If there is to be a revolution we will need to think outside of the bowl.
I agree, yeshiva and day school are not panaceas. The question of why be Jewish has to be answered anew for each population.
The difference, however, between an alienated day school student and an alienated supplementary school student is huge. The day school student has ingrained skills related to language, content, and ritual. They may not decide to use them, but, they are there.
Supplementary school students have that are alienated have no content base to fall back on.
The amount of students that have any judaic knowledge whatsoever is frighteningly small.
At the end of your piece, you offer some really compelling questions that most educators are afraid to ask. The reason may be that they haven't asked themselves those questions. So, where to begin? How do we possibly confront the huge mountain in front of us?
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