We return to the same city park a few times each year. ​

The children note the passing of seasons and how nature adapts.   ​

Other times we run freely. ​

by Veronica Maravankin

The following are amended remarks shared with families at the close of the school year.
 
As the end of the school year is upon us, we experience the conclusion (siyum in Hebrew) of a yearlong journey. Simultaneously, in a few weeks, Jewish people all over the world will celebrate the holiday of Shavuot that commemorates the revelation at Mount Sinai and the giving of the Torah to the Jewish people. Back then, the Jewish people were given the “document” that was to guide them in living a Jewish and a righteous life. Despite the hundreds and thousands of years that have gone by since they received the Torah, what was written in the Torah remains actual today, and can be a guide for us throughout our school journeys.
 
In the poem “All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten,” skills from the preschool years are listed that serve children throughout their life journey. Play fair, don't hit people, put things back where you found them, clean up your own mess, don't take things that aren't yours, wash your hands before you eat, flush, draw and paint and sing and dance. While these lessons are very important, they are not at the root of the Jewish message we hope to convey. Because of the proximity to the holiday of Shavuot, and the fact that the mission of our schools is to engage families in Jewish journeys, we want to look back and reflect on some of the big ideas and our children can learn in our schools throughout the yearly cycle of the Jewish holidays.
 
On Rosh Hashanah we talk about new beginnings with new opportunities to recreate and  rebuild relationships. We think about ways to see life in a new light. We wish and have new goals and dreams for ourselves and for others.

On Yom Kippur we reflect and seek repentance and learn to say one of the hardest phrases: I am sorry.

On Sukkot we welcome guests. We embrace them and making them feel special. We share the importance of bringing together different qualities and abilities to make a whole.

On Simchat Torah we remember the importance of a cycle. We acknowledge that year after year, we read or are exposed to the same topics and concepts, but what we learn is always different. Our understandings are deeper. We are in a different place, therefore our takeaways always are different.

On Hanukkah we think about doing, just as the Maccabees did. We highlight bravery, determination, thinking and planning our actions, working together, fixing what is broken, bringing light and happiness to the world, and being thankful to God.

On Purim we accentuate living a joyful life, having the capability to find joy in simple moments and the ability to rejoice. We stand up for what we believe, we are brave, and we explore our identity. What is our essence underneath our costumes or masks? What is it about the character we represent, identify with, and strive to be like?

On Passover we think about noticing. If Moses not noticed the burning Bush, our story would have been much different. We listen to a calling, we trust in one’s abilities despite our insecurities and uncertainties, we persevere, we have faith and hope in the face of fear, and we remember what it means to be a leader.

On Shabbat we take the time to pause, reconnect, and to be together. We celebrate our weekly accomplishments, refuel, and re energize for what is coming.

On Havdalah we ensure that the sweetness and gains of Shabbat remain within us. We separate and recognize between the holy, extraordinary and the ordinary, while having the capability to appreciate both.
 
Living Jewishly is about being in community, celebration, family, and togetherness. These blessings are a symbol of appreciation, gratefulness and the ability to find the extraordinary in the ordinary moments.
 
This is what some of us call Seamless Judaism; imagine a world in which citizens live by what the children in our schools have learned throughout the cycle of Jewish holidays, some of the most fundamental universal values, which have seen through a Jewish lens.
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As we prepare for the siyum or the closing of the school year, we also must remember the vision we hold for children and families. As we model a school of seamless Judaism, we hand children and families a Torah that guides them through all the paths they’ll take from now, continuing l’dor v’dor or from generation to generation.  As the Proverb says, “It is a Tree of Life to those who hold fast to it.”
 
Questions for educators to consider:

• How do you map the Jewish big ideas present in your school?
• How do you make Judaism visible to your community in a way that enriches and leads the way toward a meaningful life? 
• How do you help families map out the next steps in their Jewish journeys after preschool? 

 
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Veronica is the Vice President for Early Childhood Education at the Mandel JCC in Palm Beach Gardens. She is also a founding Partner at the Paradigm Project.

Paradigm Shifters from across the world share their Passover ideas and experiences. 

​“I keep hearing mention of ‘godly play’.  What IS it?” Good question.

A few tips to understand more about Torah Godly Play and how to incorporate it in guiding your students’ learning:

Step 1:   Take a look at one or both of these videos showing Godly Play in action about the story of Exodus from Egypt.
Paradigm Project Webinar with Rabbi Michael Shire (Hebrew College)
Godly Play Foundation

• • What do you notice about the materials in these two videos?  (Available for purchase from Godly Play Foundation’s website – Volume 2 materials.)
  • Where does the teacher look during the story?  Where is the focus?  Why?
  • What do you notice about the words and the hand motions?

Step 2:   Try it out!  Get a container or natural-colored piece of fabric.  Place sand in it, cover it up. This is your story platform.  Wooden people can be found at craft stores (“peg people” like those pictured above) or from the Godly Play Foundation website.

• Use this script (Exodus Vol II Script) to tell the basic story of Exodus/Passover.
• Let go of the pressure to include EVERY detail; stick with what your children will best grasp, depending on their age, interests, etc.
• Do any of your families have wooden people toys they could donate?

Step 3:   Support the children as they explore the story through their own play.  Listen, wait, and facilitate their play by adding props, questions, various materials to express themselves.  The conclusion of the story incorporates “I wonder” statements for the children.

• “I wonder what part of the story you liked best.”
• “I wonder what part of the story is most important.”
• “I wonder what part of the story is about you or who you might be in this story.”
• “I wonder if there is any part of this story we can leave out and still have all we need.”

Step 4:   Report back to us!  What happened?  What have you noticed?  What might you adjust?
Other Resources:

The Complete Guide to Godly Play by Jerome Berryman, Volume 2 is available for purchase on Amazon.  Includes other scripts from the Torah.

This is an exclusive excerpt from a new ebook called Exceeding Excellence: An Anthology of Appreciative Inquiry Stories in Education from Around the World.  This book can be downloaded for free on the publisher’s website.

One of the authors, Lori Geismar Ryan, first introduced us to the book Appreciative Leadership in 2011 and since then the tenets of the book have become core to our approach to #Shifting the #Paradigm. 

By Lori Geismar Ryan and Louise Cadwell

The conversation today begins with Lori’s excitement as she explains that she is using the book that we read together just months ago and agreed to “unpack” in phone calls, notes and musings via email.  The book, Appreciative Leadership, by Whitney, Trosten-Bloom and Raeder, is the basis for a seminar that Lori is teaching in Denver.  Educational leaders will read the book together and offer one another examples of how they have used the principles of Appreciative Leadership in their practice.  For example, they will share the positively powerful questions that they are asking and how these questions illuminate experiences in their schools that express community and cultural values.  Shared reading and unpacking examples of practice in action are among the components that we continue to weave into our work.  Lori tells Louise that this book has had an enormous influence on her recent work as a coach and educational leader.  She is thrilled about sharing and supporting this work with others and is grateful for its effect on her growing understanding of AI.

Reading together is a foundational practice for us and is mirrored in the work that we do with others.  Engaging educators in reading of books, chapters and articles invites us to be scholars together, to open the school to the perspective of thinkers outside of the school environment, sometimes drawing on resources outside the field of education. Over the years, the collection of references has grown and many remain as classics.  The intent of shared reading is to have meaningful conversations among teachers and school leaders, and in some cases with parents, prompted by thoughtful questions that invite broad and deep interpretations of text.  AI questions invite readers to seek connections to their own experiences, make meaning together, and project a future for the school community and their own practice.

In 2011, as a part of a long-term community partnership, Lori coached a shared leadership team of parents, teachers, and school leaders at the Robert E. Loup Jewish Community Center in Denver, Colorado as they engaged the full school community in a study of kindness and compassion in the everyday lives of children.  One hundred copies of Susan Dermond’s book, Calm and Compassionate Children (2007), were purchased for teachers and parents who participated in the shared inquiry.  Informal and formal conversations took place throughout the months leading up to an end-of-year evening gathering where a large social hall was transformed into a candle-lit, calm and compassionate space.  Ten tables, each covered in fabric, held tent-cards with powerful quotes and experiential materials set the stage for an appreciative conversation led by a dyad of a parent and professional leader.
​
Parents and teachers who joined the “Nature Awakens Feelings” chapter group sat at a table beautifully composed with smooth stones, textured bark, daffodils and tulips. Baskets of healthy snacks were shared.   One tent card featured Dermond’s quote, “You never know what experience in nature will touch a child’s heart,” and the other, a quote by contemporary Jewish scholar, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, “Our goal should be to live life in radical amazement…get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted. Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible; never treat life casually.  To be spiritual is to be amazed.”

Appreciative questions set the stage for dialogue. “What do you remember from your experiences as a child in the natural world? How have these experiences influenced you as a person? Thinking about your life today, as a parent or teacher, how might you share those experiences with the children in your life?”  These kinds of questions mirror the AI cycle.  They invite participants to discover meaning based on their past experience and to dream about and design their future relationship with children.  The evening’s conversations concluded as chapter facilitators invited each person at their table to share a take-away, for example, a new insight, a different way to look at children, or a question that they wanted to pursue.

​In reflection, leadership team members recognized that they had created an evening filled with rich conversation that would ripple out in meaningful relationships with the school community.  The year ended with a feeling of shared commitment to an ongoing study of kindness, compassion, and empathy and a dedication to better understanding our roles as teachers and parents in nurturing these characteristics in the everyday life of children.