The Kohelet Prize Database
Development of Critical and / or Creative Thinking
Awarded for excellence in facilitating student success at the upper three echelons of Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy: Analysis, Evaluation, and Creation. Preference will be given to approaches that are scalable across multiple developmental levels and replicable across multiple disciplines.
Explore the Kohelet Prize Database
Prize Categories
- Interdisciplinary Integration (79)
- Real-World Learning (105)
- Learning Environment (30)
- Differentiated Instruction (45)
- Development of Critical and / or Creative Thinking (56)
- Risk Taking and Failure (12)
Pedagogy
- Blended Learning (112)
- Constructivist (195)
- Design Thinking (41)
- Experiential Education (65)
- Flipped Learning (13)
- Gamification (6)
- Hevruta (31)
- IBL - Inquiry Based Learning (135)
- Language Immersion (13)
- Montessori (21)
- PBL - Project Based Learning (238)
- Social Emotional Learning (54)
- Socratic Method (10)
- Soulful Education (17)
- Whole Brain Teaching (27)
- UBD - Understanding By Design (105)
- 21st Century Skills (273)
Subjects
- Art (149)
- Computer Science (73)
- Economics (8)
- Engineering (28)
- English/ Writing/ Language Arts (181)
- Gemara (65)
- Halacha (104)
- History (173)
- Ivrit (118)
- Literature (159)
- Math (102)
- Mishnah (73)
- Music (56)
- Philosophy (46)
- Physical Education/ Health (11)
- Science (151)
- Social Emotional Learning (53)
- Social Studies (44)
- Tanach (177)
- Technology (40)
- Tefila (19)
Grades
- Elementary School (156)
- Middle School (213)
- High School (213)
- Kindergarten (79)
- 1st Grade (89)
- 2nd Grade (101)
- 3rd Grade (117)
- 4th Grade (129)
- 5th Grade (155)
- 6th Grade (151)
- 7th Grade (142)
- 8th Grade (138)
- 9th Grade (104)
- 10th Grade (110)
- 11th Grade (110)
- 12th Grade (109)
בכל דור ודור – B’chol Dor Va’dor
“B’chol Dor Va’dor” is an independent anchor activity for accelerated Tanakh students that encourages meaningful inter-textual exploration of Tanakh requiring creativity and reflection. Students identified underlying themes of Pessach by analyzing eighteen events in Tanakh that took place on the dates of Pessach. Their work culminated in the creation of their own Seder Symbols which were then used at their family sedarim to help enhance the experience of these themes on Pessach.
צער בעלי חיים Compassion towards animals – Examining an ancient Jewish value through a modern real life question: Should Zoos exist or not?
Should Zoos exist or not? This was the question that led a Jewish Values course section that dealt with the value of "״צער חיים בעלי , Compassion towards Animals. Students were encouraged to dive into the subject searching for various pieces of evidence to support their claims and eventually present their argument in a "court".
Note: all attachments are products of students' work, except for the following: "Argument document", "Jewish texts" and "curriculum".
20th Century Multi-genre Research Paper
While discovering the events from 1920s-1940s, students focused on the lens of a particular individual that may have lived during the time period and experienced the events that occurred. Each student was asked to reflect on social, political, and economic events from the lens/perspective of the assigned individual to synthesize the information learned.
21st Century Personal Mishkan
Students collaborate to design/build a modern, personal Mishkan & furnishings, incorporating motifs, imagery from the ancient Mishkan, and applying wisdom gained from interviews with senior citizens, exploring: "What makes a quality life, and how can we make life better?" Students then return to Senior Center, using their completed designs as springboard for deeper reflection on how to heal after trauma and how to reach our deepest Human potential.
A Trial of Error: A Project Based Learning (PBL) Approach to Student Self Reflection through the Lens of Repentance
In an effort to develop their critical thinking skills, the students staged a mock trial, demonstrating the process of reflection and repentance outlined in Jewish law. The process included analyzing the laws, reflecting on their actions, implementing the steps of repentance, evaluating how to prove each step and creating admissible evidence.
Abstract, Bridge, Create- Using the ABC’s of literature and language to manifest concrete connections in learning
Literature and language are difficult ideas for students to grasp. My students translate these ambiguous concepts into tangible projects requiring them to explore abstract ideas, bridge their connections, and create symbolic representations with technologies and strategies that commit their analyses to long-term memory and store them as knowledge.
Accessing Artistic Intuition Through the Study of Chumash
Second grade students designed Chumash covers based on individual pasukim from Lech Lecha or Vayera. They brainstormed ideas and charted their creative thinking, making the steps of their process visible. The final image they designed and embroidered into their Chumash cover synthesizes symbols they generated based on words from the pasuk and colors the words represented to them.
Alternative Energy Exploration Unit
This integrated writing and science unit focuses on energy, and asks the driving question “How and why should we use energy wisely?” Students investigate what energy is, where it comes from, and how we use it. They conduct research on sustainable fuels, write persuasive essays advocating for the use of a particular source of energy, design billboard advertisements for their chosen energy source, and participate in a debate judged by industry experts on different forms of sustainable energy. Finally, students design and create their own tikkun olam service-learning projects to make a positive difference in our community’s use of energy.
American Values in American Texts
Students learned the concept of a value and discussed different American values that exist in society. In groups they extracted various values from certain American texts (such as "The Gettysburg Address") and then connected the values they discerned from the text to values they could infer in a short piece of American fiction. The students had to then devise a lesson plan to teach the short piece of fiction and the value to a high school class. My students presented their work to the class and also wrote individual reflective papers about the entire learning experience.
Art & Tefillah Minyan
In this minyan, students use art as a medium for exploring and more deeply engaging with tefillah. Students study the themes of traditional Jewish prayers and create original works of art through which students can express their own feelings and ideas on these themes, using their art as an extension of their tefillah.
Baby Moshe’s Basket 2.0 and Domino Designs: Shemot 2:3 and 2:5 Reinvisioned through the Lens of STEAM and Design Thinking
Harnessing the power of STEAM and Design Thinking, students built and attempted to float a tevah to garner insight into Moshe’s birth mother’s attempt to save him from death, and designed and executed a domino formation based on the significance of the actions of Bat Paroah and other characters central to the early experiences of the Jews in Egypt.
Are You ‘Board’ with Traditional Lesson Plans? GAME ON!
GameOn! provides students with innovative skills they use to create board games based on their mastery of a particular topic. Students transform their knowledge of any subject into a tool used by other students. Creating a website, we connected classrooms across the globe through educational game play and development.
Am I My Brother’s Keeper? From The Torah to S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders
You Be The Judge: What does Jewish Law say should happen to Ponyboy Curtis? An exploration and analysis of S.E. Hinton’s American Classic, The Outsiders
Canada 150 School-Wide Inquiry Project
The Hamilton Hebrew Academy set out to provide our students with an outstanding learning experience in celebration of Canada 150. Every student conducted an inquiry project, which facilitated the development of their critical and creative thinking skills. The event culminated in a community wide learning showcase at a Canadian historical site.
Carpe Diem – How do you Seize your Day?
In my AP Language and Composition class, which combines grades 11-12 at our girl's campus, there is a pervasive theme in each of our texts this year. It is carpe diem, seize the day, or a lack of carpe diem. In order to truly understand this theme my class worked on a project to describe, create, and share their thoughts about this concept.
Collaborative technology in the classroom: pilot project
In a ground-breaking incorporation of collaborative technology in the classroom, fourth grade boys and seventh grade girls piloted an integrated multi-week project in language arts and history respectively. Students were provided with project guidelines and a bank of iPads and worked in teams to share their findings in an original video using script writing, costuming, set design, acting, videography, and audio-video editing.
Crash Helmet Design, Prototyping, and Testing: An Egg-Citing Physics and Engineering Design PBL
In this authentic project, high school students develop crash helmets with a goal of protecting a population of people from traumatic head (brain) injury. Using eggs to simulate human heads, students employ the design thinking process by engaging in real-world research, scientific data collection, engineering prototyping, and performance testing.
Creators of Content: How Students Can Co-Design Their Understanding of Their World
Students at Pressman Academy from grades K-5th participate in STEAM twice a week for 45 minutes. During this time they are presented with a variety of options to explore a given content area. Ultimately they create prototypes to solve complex problems and models to represent how they understand the world using tools from cardboard to CNC machines.
Critical Thinking in a Bible Studies Class
This entry highlights five different techniques that are used to design a class while focusing on critical and higher order thinking skills.
Critical Thinking in the study of Navi
The attached curriculum is part of a project in our school to ask higher level questions in our Navi program, instead of focusing on just translating the words on the page. Our curriculum spans Grades 10, 11, and 12 – and focuses on different areas of critical thinking at different grades. The attached curriculum focuses on the grade 10 portion of the project.
The Cyber Path to Critical and Creative Thinking
This is a revolutionary approach which incorporates innovative technology to engage students in using higher order thinking in Jewish texts. Using the platform of Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy, students are guided to create their own content as a means of presenting their understanding of the texts. This approach is also being used by secular studies teachers in our school.
Developing Critical Thinking in a High School Statistics Class
Our submission, “Developing Critical Thinking in a High School Statistics Class,” aims to teach students the necessary tools and help them develop the perspective to critically analyze and evaluate numerical and statistical information. Teaching critical reading and critical thinking and creating opportunities for students to practice and develop these skills are key components of the unit. There are many possibilities for interdisciplinary integration and multi-level adaptations.
Enhancing STEM Enrichment Curricula
To increase student passion and development in STEM, I have designed and crafted new and innovative enrichment courses in both computer science and high-level physics. This includes an on-ramp course in computer science principles, a second-year computer science course, and a two-year rotation of four semester long physics courses.
Escape Room Learning 2.0: Rethinking the rules of learning and assessment
I created a series of week long escape rooms, to teach different topics in Halacha. I used Google Classroom and other apps/websites to transform my class into an exciting Escape the Room for the week. In this new iteration of my previous submission, I have extended the games to include a summative assessment that replaced a final test.
EVERlab
The 9th grade EVERlab unit focuses on the integration of the concepts, themes and structures from two different courses: Tanach I and Ancient World Civilizations. The unit begins with students brainstorming the overlapping content from eachcourse and moves through scaffolded design, collaboration, and critical thinking exercises in order for students to refine and deepen integrated topics they have chosen themselves. Students ultimately develop projects that demonstrate this integrated thinking.
Facilitating Critical Thinking through Reflection and Problem-Solving
I facilitate critical thinking through a steady practice of reflection and problem-solving with my students. I believe that these social and emotional practices help them think creatively about themselves and, ultimately, their learning.
Fascism in Megillat Esther
This was a lesson where my history teacher colleague, Barry Kirzner, taught the basic ideas of fascism, and we compared Haman in Megillat Esther to that model. We spoke about the relevance of fascism and of the megillah in modern times and what they mean to us today.
Film Festival in Bloom
The goal of the fifth grade film festival project is to develop critical thinking across the curriculum by integrating the use of Bloom’s taxonomy in a project that encompasses writing, researching, technology, math, environmental science, and service.
Flipped Learning: Promoting Critical and Creative Study of Tanach and Jewish Law
Powered by video instruction and analytics, this 21st century approach to teaching Tanach and Jewish Law helps students master storylines and basic concepts before coming to class. Teachers use repurposed instructional time for higher-order thinking activities (analysis, evaluation and creation), highlighted by a protocol for guided group discussion of Sefer Yehoshua and project-based learning related to the laws of kashrut.
Fostering Metacognition as Differentiation: Keeping Student Portfolios
For the past five years, I have taught at a cloud-based school in which I have built a digital portfolio-driven course for 9th and 10th grade English. This course is premised on periodic self-assessments and benchmarks of portfolio "publishing" at the quarter and semester points. The attached document details the moments of self-assessment, the uses of self-assessment in the school calendar, the uses of self-assessment as a means for formative and summative assessment, and the development of metacognition in each student through the personalized differentiation of goals, challenges, and successes as readers, writers, and students. While used in high school English, this model for cloud-based portfolio keeping works on any level of student production and teacher assessment--from Elementary through High School, and for
any discipline, too.
Halacha by Action
Students use hands-on obstacle courses, field trips and models to replicate actual Halachic scenarios they are likely to find in their own lives. Students take the knowledge they have studied. research the best ways to implement it and create a life-like interaction with these Halachos.
Halachic User Manual
Students created a student centered, research and project based "Halachic User Manual" to master the topic of Kashrut. Students were tasked to use the various components of a user manual to incorporate the different halachot and halachic applications based on a commonly used item found in a kosher kitchen.
My Hero Next Door – Documenting and Preserving The Heroic Life Journeys of Senior Citizens in Virtual Reality
Grade 9 English students at TanenbaumCHAT will create immersive reality / 3D documentaries on the heroic lives of Jewish senior citizens in their community.
Students will also design an app that will serve as an archive, an online film festival and a digital portfolio, featuring Jewish elderly people through the lens of the hero's journey story framework.
The unit, lesson plans and the immersive reality documentary app will be offered to Jewish high schools around the world to create their own films on Jewish seniors, and upload them on the app.
Our ultimate outcome is for the heroic journey of 200,000 Jewish seniors to be archived and shown online in our communities.
Immigration Fair
I teach the same students 4th grade Texas History and then 5th grade US History the following year. We put on an Immigration Fair for 2-5th grades using what we learned about Immigration into both Galveston and Ellis Island.
Innovations Across the Nations
In conjunction with science and social studies, students learn about real-world problems that affect humankind on a global scale. Students are challenged to think critically and creatively as they plan and engineer products that address the real world problems.
Integrated Learning Lab for Junior High History, Language Arts, and Tech Tools Instruction
A first-in-its-class Integrated Learning Lab and Enrichment Option for 6th-8th grade boys and girls was configured for the 2016-17 school year, based upon the successes and lessons learned in earlier pilot studies in 2013-2016 (see, for example other submissions from this school). The goal of this ambitious program is to more fully involve students in the process of discovering, analyzing and engaging with new information, while giving them real-world experience in using the critical-thinking and technological tools imperative for rational, safe and productive interaction with today’s networked world.
Intergenerational Oral History Project
Gann 11th graders studied 20th century U.S. history through the stories of Jewish elders. They learned skills in oral history, contextualized the elders' stories in the grander scheme of U.S. history, and developed a final project that applied their learning to their own lives.
Jewish Heroes Congress
This unit was developed to help students increase their knowledge of mitzvot and virtues and help them be more discerning when choosing people to hold in high esteem.
Jewish History curriculum from the United Monarchy to the Talmud
This curriculum introduces students to an academic approach to Jewish history with the intention of enriching their study of traditional Jewish texts like the Tanakh and Talmud by offering context and background to these sources. Additionally, this curriculum will expose students to academic concepts and methods regarding Jewish studies that often come up in university courses. If done in a thoughtful way, this can blunt any potential surprises or discomfort students may have when these ideas come up on a secular campus.
JSTEAM – Melacha Makerspace
JSTEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math) Makerspace. STEAM through a Jewish lens in sync with Maimonides School's mission creating a beautiful blend of Torah and Worldly experience with hands-on creativity.
Keva Vs Kavanah: The Trial of the Millennium
Middle school students learn Rabbinic texts about prayer’s structure, purpose, and origins, while simultaneously evaluating their own relationship with Tefillah in a reflection journal. The entire unit builds to a trial created by the students and presided over by a panel of local community rabbis, pitting Keva Tefillah against Kavanah Tefillah.
Kindergarten Community Library Project
Using the Design Thinking Model, the Kindergarten classes redesigned and created a more efficient and organized library based on the needs of our school community. The children researched, interviewed, and engineered in order to enhance our JPDS-NC South Campus Community Library which houses picture books, non-fiction, fiction, easy readers, Hebrew, and Jewish values books in an inviting environment which is conducive to learning and reading for fun.
Life Under Shlomo: The Golden Years
Using information gleaned from I Kings 3-8, students designed tourism promotional websites about King Solomon's kingdom. Content areas covered needed to include: his administration and government, cultural sites, testimonials & reviews and a gift shop.
The Living Haggadah: From Slavery to Freedom
The grade 5 students study the Exodus narrative through the lens of the Big Idea topic: “Who goes out from slavery to freedom? One who understands the meaning of a miracle and responds to its call.” This unit involves study in many disciplines, including Chumash (Torah) study, Hebrew language, Visual Arts, Music, Dance, Language Arts, and Social Sciences. Learning in all disciplines contributes to the final project, the Dramatized Haggadah performance, which is written and performed by the students.
Mah Nishtana Goes Tech
Over the course of last school year first graders learned the basics of coding using Scratch Jr. Each lesson in Scratch Jr. also included concepts that were taught elsewhere in the curriculum. The first graders extended their coding skills late last spring by programming our resident robots to travel to a designated spot and ask and answer the Mah Nishtana in the correct order as we had studied in class in preparation for Pesach.
MakerLab: Innovation and Creation
Hillel Academy's goal is for students to “learn how to learn”. We don’t give instructions in Makerlab, we give tools and guidance, and challenge the students to find answers and solutions on their own. It is amazing to watch the next generation of innovators get their first taste of inventing.
The Makers Movement @ Kellman Brown Academy
Kellman Brown Academy is committed to the principle that ALL of our students are critical thinkers and problem-solvers. Through introducing the Makers Movement into the culture of the school, students are challenged to "make" what they need to solve real-world problems using their imagination and any materials they can get their hands on. The Makers culture promotes independence, ingenuity, and collaborative work.
Making Space Holy
Fourth Grade students were challenged to transform the school's maker space into a full-scale Mishkan. Students self-organized to design and build the various components of the Mishkan using limited materials, tools, and resources. These constraints intentionally mimicked the design challenges faced by the Israelites.
Making Stories Come To Life
When teaching plot, setting, and characterization I find that children learn best when they can bring the stories to life in a meaningful way. The children learn about these elements best by creating their own characters and writing their own stories to perform for each other.
Making a Talmudic Sugya Occupy Space
Students composed their own talmudic sugyas using argument forms mastered during their year of study, based on key themes in biblical and talmudic texts they had learned. They then transferred the concepts of their sugyas into three-dimensional sculptures that reflect the thesis and arguments of the sugyas they had written.
Mishkeh Mechanic/Success Strategist
Eighth grade students completed a project in STEM class, documenting throughout using the SeeSaw app's video and picture abilities, and crafted a non-fiction “narrative" in Language Arts class, where they followed the Teshuva process to "realize," and thus capitalize upon, their mistakes.
Modular Educational Games
A kit to produce educational games in any language, in any subject, and at any level of difficulty. The process of creating these games develops the student’s learning abilities (focus on detail, categorization, collaboration,self-direction) and social skills.
These games can be used as a part of teaching, reinforcement, review, and assessment.
Moot Beit Din
As a summative capstone to my student’s learning of the Jewish applied science of Torah, I decided to create a Moot Beit Din project in the eighth grade, in which student would learn about current controversial issues and make a judgement based on sources. They would research halachah, science and other relevant information, then debate their topic and the other students would form the court, passing judgement and justifying their decision based on the information presented.
A Musician for Life: Improvisation, buckets, and multimedia reviving instrumental music for the centennial generation.
I’m reinventing the idea of middle school band – by orienting my lessons around creative improvisation and multimedia. improvisation in music curriculum is the key to countering the distractions facing increasingly wired youth. By using lessons like bucket band and film scoring, I’ve been stimulating their creative potential.
My Family Story
“My Family Story” was a collaborative unit between my 8th grade history students at Beth Tfiloh, their art classes, the Jewish Museum of Maryland and the Diaspora Museum (Beit Hatfusot) in Tel Aviv. As the opening unit of my ancient history course, students delved deeply into their personal histories and identities, conducted genealogy research, interviewed family members, researched immigration stories, and created family trees; they then chose one aspect of their family history to depict artistically and worked with the guidance of their art teachers to create visual representations of their unique family stories. The “My Family Story” unit culminated in an evening event that began with a multi-generational prayer service at one of Baltimore’s oldest synagogues and featured an art exhibition at the adjacent Jewish Museum of Maryland, where the students showcased their work to siblings, parents, grandparents and community members.
My Wonder Woman
Using a combination of collaborative work, research, interview skills, & analysis, students determine what makes a woman a worthy role model. Critical & creative thinking skills are evident throughout the process and culminates in a persuasive essay through which each student nominates her Wonder Woman. All discussions & writings were done in Ivrit
Now You Siyyum…An Exploration into Thematic Jewish Learning
Hillel Day School eighth grade students experience an integrated Judaic Studies learning opportunity as part of their final year at Hillel. Instead of separate Rabbinics and TaNaKh classes, students are guided through classic and modern texts of many genres to explore, thematically, our Hillel Day School core Jewish values. The students are encouraged to explore deeply, and to begin asking the many great questions that arise as they synthesize their developing Jewish identities with our modern world.
Nutrition Nibbles
To conclude our nutrition unit, I challenged my 5th graders to each design a tasty, healthy snack for kids which would be a good source of their assigned vitamin/mineral. Each student would present at our student-designed snack conference, to which we invited other classes. The whole creative process could be applied to various other subjects.
Olivia’s Creative Compilations – Jewish Texts Come to Life!
Whether it is marrying off two characters from "Once Upon a Time" in an Orthodox Jewish ceremony, designing ad campaigns around Nezirut or creating Ten Plagues theme parks using Minecraft, my students have done it all. My mandate as a teacher is to enable students to access content in a rich, creative way that showcases their unique, creative thinking and knowledge on the topics.
(parsha) Cereal of The Week
"Cereal of the Week" makes the Parsha come alive! Every cereal parsha has divrei Torah in it. It took me 3 years to complete. It is all online at: http://www.chinuch.org/item_detail/Cereal-Of-The-Week-Parsha-Program. (71 parsha cereal sheets) Every child loves cereals! Many parents told me their children did not want to be pressured at the Shabbos table with parsha questions, and the weekly parsha cereal sheet was the answer!
I have attached some samples. There is a cereal for every parsha, yom tovim, Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Chanukah, and Purim. It is a great method to help remember what each parsha is about! Students also now think of their own ideas of which cereals apply to a parsha.
Parsha Cereal of the Week 2.0
Was teaching parshas Vayeitei in 1994, telling class how Lavan did many tricks on Yaakov.
I said the word "tricks" a few times, and all of a sudden thought about "trix" cereal, which was my kids favorite Shabbos cereal. I then told class(if your parent get Trix cereal for you, it will remind you about the Parsha! Cereal of the week was born!
Parshan Study (Exegete Exegesis)
Students choose a biblical commentator to study and analyze throughout the year. Each student creates an online portfolio of their chosen exegete, by selecting commentaries, translations and offering their own analysis. Students intimately learn the methodology of one exegete and in turn become a commentator in their own right.
A Personal Journey through Parshat Hashavua
Parshat Hashavua – The Weekly Torah Portion:
The weekly Parsha becomes relevant and personal in our First Grade class and prepares students for life in the 21st century. With the advent of the internet, information is at our fingertips. The challenge is what do we do with that information? In addition, devices are becoming more accessible and usag
Pirkei Avot to Pop Song
Mishnah was made to be sung. Well, if not sung then certainly repeated (coming from the root shanah). How better to get our students to repeat -- and through repetition, remember -- the mishnayot of Pirkei Avot than by singing them? How better to get our students to sing sections of Pirkei Avot than by having them write and record their own songs?!
Pirkei Avot Scrapbook
Students create two pictures for each Mishna, one that shows a literal meaning and one that shows a deep understanding. This long term project is used to develop higher level thinking in students. Students learn how to ask questions and think deeply about material.
PIRKEI AVOT/TORAH ETHICS FOR LIFE – a Comprehensive Study of the First Chapter for Thinking and Feeling Students
A Pirkei Avot curriculum for middle school students that is rich in content with a purposeful balance of teacher-directed content and project-based creative learning. The learning experience of each mishna is meaningful, personal and one that is meant to be forever cherished.
Poems of the journey’s end
Analyzing Leah Goldberg's poem שירי סוף הדרך, that deals with the reflection on life at an old age and the decisions one makes in order to make their life meaningful.
The poem deals with the phases of life, the ever-changing point of view about life as we grow older, and the motivation and decision to make each and every day meaningful not matter what circumstances are ahead.
This poem is taught in the 11th grade, where students are asked to understand the figurative language, to discuss points of view as they're portrayed by the main character in each stage of life, and reflect upon them.
At an end-of-unit assessment, the students are asked to bring their personal reflection in the form of a video clip, picture, movie trailer, poem, book ,or other, and explain the connection to the Goldberg's poem. The students are asked to follow a rubric in order to understand how to present their reflection. The rubric calls for an oral presentation in Hebrew while using new vocabulary learned in class and the ability to connect to the content discussed in class.
An example of a clip that conveys the message of the poem is attached (a story of a remarkable teacher). I have presented this clip to the students and we discussed its relevance while connecting the main message to our poem.
Project Based Learning in 7-8 Social Studies at Hillel Day School
In the 7-8 Division, the eighth grade students participated in a PBL experience where the students created the ideal civilization based upon their own creativity, and ideas from our study of Mesopotamia, ancient Egypt, ancient Greece, Alexander the Great, and ancient Rome. In addition, the eighth grade students participated in a PBL experience that compared similarities of world religions.
Project GO FORTH: Lech L’Cha: A Cross-Curricular Study of Immigration and Personal Narrative
Project GO FORTH: Lech L’Cha is a multi-faceted, interdisciplinary approach to understanding the immigrant experience in America. Project GO FORTH: Lech L’Cha integrates seventh grade Social Studies, in which students study the history of American immigration, with Language Arts, in which student examine creative writing and sensory language, with Judaic Studies, in which students specifically explore the parsha Lech L’Cha as a lens through which they can understand the spiral of Jewish History with the originating immigrant experience of Avraham.
Recreating the Experience at Ma’Amad Har Sinai
מתן תורה is a part of history, as opposed to being a legend. To see a sign is a direct experience. To hear a report of a sign is an indirect experience. For those who do not see the signs themselves due to distance or time, they can still hear a report of these signs through the testimony of the Israelites.
Scribal Arts
Students explore the over 3000 year old tradition of Hebrew writing using the traditional equipment of quill, parchment and ink. A key aspect of the course is for student to reach a proficiency in scribing so they can analyse different Torah scrolls/Megillot found in our school, and evaluate their respective merits. Students also explore the deeper meaning of the letters (i.e. why is a dalet shaped like it is, and has the name it has?) exploring a chosen letter, and seeing how its deeper messages relate to the world and their lives.
Senior Magazines
Every year my high school senior English classes dive into a series of writing exercises and research to create outstandingly honest narratives integral to their self-understanding. The students then publish these essays in a class magazine that they themselves design and distribute.
Shake Your Lulav!
This is a Google Slide presentation about the mitzva of Ushpizin, welcoming honorary guests into the sukkah, which integrates content and skill building, as well as Hebrew language acquisition. It was originally designed for use as a flipped classroom.
Shnayim Mikra Initiative
This initiative will be a game changer in the Jewish chinuch teaching world.
Many benefits include Hebrew reading proficiency (which is a major problem)
And fluency in chumash, which is the foundation of Judaism.
Simulation of the Election of 1800
Acting out key figures from American history, 3rd/4th graders simulated the election of 1800. As Adams’ Federalists debated Jefferson’s Republicans, students leveraged primary sources, honed communication skills, learned phases of the election process and came to appreciate the challenges of responsible engaged citizenship amidst the 2016 election.
STEAM Initiative
The Ma’ayanot STEAM initiative orchestrates a learning environment which fosters creativity and reasoning, compelling students to evaluate, ideate, prototype, test, and iterate . Our philosophy is one of Constructionism which shares constructivism’s connotation of learning as ‘building knowledge structures’ and adds the idea that this happens most pronounced in a context where the learner is consciously engaged in constructing an entity. Students are forced to engage dynamically with their creations in order to prevail in the fruition of their design.
Student Council- Real-World Learning
The Perelman Jewish Day School Student Council inspires real-world learning of civic engagement in our school. The Student Council provides students with opportunities for leadership and ownership of actual student issues. Students have a forum for discussing our school environment and exemplifying good citizenship.
Tanach Circles
After introducing my English students to literature circles with great success, I decided that I wanted to use that model to create "Tanach circles." In Tanach circles, students choose a sefer of Nach that they would like to learn, and then they learn the sefer independently, and meet four or five times per semester to have a sort of "book club," in which they each must prepare a submission about the material and engage in a discussion around the material that they learned. At the end of the year, student groups have a collective siyum celebrating their learning, and sharing with the other groups an introduction to their chosen sefer as well as some of their favorite points that emerged in their discussions.
Teaching Chumash Analytically
Traditionally, verses in the Torah have been taught in the classroom to younger students in a superficial and mindless format. The assumption is that young minds are incapable of grasping anything but the most simple concepts. By dividing each verse into an outline format, each phrase in the verse can be seen as it relates to other phrases in the same verse and to phrases in adjacent verses and these relationships can be used to promote critical thought in the classroom.
Teaching Talmud in a Postmodern age
the challenges of teaching Talmud in a postmodern age and my attitude for dealing with them using art, particularly literature, as an entry point.
Teaching to Learn: Developing Faith Through Engagement With Modern/Contemporary Jewish Thinkers
My students complete a year-long exploration of Jewish faith & Modern Jewish Thought by teaching an essay written by a modern thinker. Each student-teacher summarizes the thesis & provides supporting ideas & illustrations. Likewise, s/he articulates a personal response, appropriating ideas in which s/he believes and explaining his/her reasoning.
TED Talks- overcoming adversity
After reading novels including Out of the Dust, The Miracle Worker, The Outsiders and A Long Walk to Water, students, as a final project, had to write and present their own TED Talk related to overcoming adversity. It could be personal or about a person that they knew. They watched several TED Talks, we studied the format, and instead of writing an essay, my students were required to write a speech using a hook, an anecdote to rig the reader in, a strong introduction, a body paragraph and statistics to support the points made, and a final concluding paragraph with a powerful clincher or message. They were also required to prepare visuals as well. (As a side note, those who felt uncomfortable exposing information, could choose a more neutral topic related to NGO's and how they are helping people through out the third world in particular.)We then invited parents to the band room, set up the room to seem like a TED conference, and the students presented their speeches. It brought many parents to tears, and was a powerful lesson on human strength and endurance even during difficult times.
Tefillah Curriculum
Our elective based tefillah program offers various options for students to connect to prayer in a way that is most meaningful to each student individually. One elective offered was a tefillah vaad. The vaad was a group of self selected students who were tasked with designing and implementing the electives that were offered during the next semester. While those students ran their electives for other students, the next group of vaad members were working on the next semesters options of electives.
The Young Acharonim Initiative
Students use centuries old traditional Talmudic methods to build critical thinking skills. This is done by giving the students the ability to become the teachers by planning and researching their own lessons, presenting them to the class, and allowing others to critique, and perfect their logic.
This is The Young Acharonim Initiative.
Torat Chayim: Real World Learning in Tanach and Gemara; Analysis and Integration through Real World Application
How do we engage students in the rigorous, text based learning of Tanach and Gemara while helping them learn how to apply their learning to their lives and the world around them? A portfolio of sample projects are provided that serve as different models in answering this question. These projects challenge student to extract values, apply and synthesize their learning in various "authentic" ways.
True Tefila
In the aftermath of hurricane Irma, our school building sustained significant damage, forcing the relocation of the entire middle school. The students responded to the chaos of the new learning environment with an unrelenting determination of meaningful prayer. This response, was an outgrowth of the foundation for Tefila established in our class.
Understanding Identity Through Megillat Esther
The goal of the unit was to show how Megillat Esther forces the reader to consider what their own personal identity is, in addition to how they incorporate their religion and nationality into their identity.
Unique classroom methodology implemented in HS Coding class
An overview of the unique and productive technical learning approach - essentially an integration of personal and formal educational theories together with the teaching framework defined by codeHS.com - I implemented in the Coding and STEM robotics class I currently teach at Rae Kushner High School.
Using Aristotle’s Rhetorical Triangle to Effect Change in Our Community
11th Grade AP Language students were tasked with identifying & researching a community issue, creating an advertisement campaign to raise awareness of the issue, and writing articles that incorporated their research and Aristotle's rhetorical strategies. Student work was published in our school newspaper & displayed around the community.
What Makes a Good Story?
What makes a good story? In this project-based learning unit, students explore that question in a variety of modes, including reading and analyzing exemplary short fiction, learning narrative theory, and writing and peer-revising their own stories. This unit culminates in a panel presentation as well as a published magazine of student work.
What Would George Washington Do?
This lesson plan introduces George Washington and his philosophy of government. We investigate and discuss how he dealt with issues during his first presidency and how political parties developed.
Yad Hayotzer: An Interdisciplinary, Experiential Approach to Teaching the Prophets
Jeremiah Chapters 18-19 explore the interplay between God and His people as the fashioner of Jewish destiny through the agency of a potter. Jeremiah’s symbolic action comes to life as each student experiences "becoming" the potter, realizing the challenges of imprinting one’s vision on another. This project enhances the tefilla experience for our students as they explore the Yom Kippur piyyut - KaChomer BeYad HaYotzer, Like Clay in the Hands of the Potter - and helps shape their understanding of the roles of fate and free-will, both in the history of the Jewish people and in their own lives.
Yeshivat Noam: Connecting the Past to the Present and Making it Relevant to Middle School Students Using the Arts and Technology
Our unit of study explores the Immigrant Experience of 1880-1924 and the Holocaust to guide students to connect to the past which will broaden the students' understanding of his/her role in the present and his/her place in the future. Through the lens of individuals (Holocaust Survivors and New-Immigrants), students will be able to connect, appreciate, and apply key moments in history.