What are the shared values of Jewish education?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Robyn Faintich on -
I have been thinking about this too. I wonder if there are four sets of values (or even more). The values we as educators want to live/teach by, the values we want to transmit explicitly to our learners as Jews, the values we want to transmit explicitly or our learners as learners, and the implicit values we want to transmit by socialization methods within education. I believe that there would be some overlap, but also some that would not.
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Permalink Reply by Rabbi Shmuly Yanklowitz on -
Shalom,
I continue to believe that Dr. Woocher is one of the most thoughtful scholars thinking about Jewish education today! I always enjoy reading his thoughts.
On this subject, my hope is that when our community discusses the future of Jewish education in America that we not only wrestle with enrollment numbers, new technologies, and costs (important technical issues) but that our primary conversations are guided by how we’re appropriating traditional Jewish values and frameworks (ethics, G-d, halakhah, Shabbat, tzedek chevrati, community, etc.) and making them impactful in new times and contexts.
Part of the goal of Jewish education, in my humble opinion, should be focused on the learner herself (autonomy, development, reasoning, affect, etc.) but another part should be focused on the values themselves ensuring their effective manifestation in the world. The later often gets left out. The question is not just whether we taught a value of chesed well to a student but whether that student was transformed enough that his family/friends/teachers can see a noticeable change in his behavior. Do we have measures of success for whether the values we're teaching are being implemented out of the classroom?
I’m often concerned that I don’t see traditional families modeling the ethics learned in schools and that I often don’t see less traditional families modeling the rituals learned in schools. For the Jewish values discourse to have impact and integrity it must transcend the classroom and be modeled within the community and home.
I look forward to hearing others’ thoughts on how we can ensure that values education isn't a cognitive activity but a life enterprise.
Kol tuv, Shmuly Yanklowitz
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Permalink Reply by Adrian A. Durlester on -
I think Robin has made an excellent point here. I do think there's at least one other aspect to this, though I suspect it will rattle a few people. Almost all the models of Jewish Education for the 21st century that are being discussed have as a central tenet that the learners are part and parcel of determining what is to be learned and how it is to be learned. This may seem an entirely radical concept, but I do believe we need to extend this tenet to how we discuss the concept of the shared values of Jewish Education. It may seem a bit bass ackwards-values, as we all (think we) know derive from traditions, experiences, wisdom, etc. As Robin suggests, there are values in Judaism that we each wish to live/teach, wish to transmit to learners as Jews (and as learners) and by osmosis (i.e. socialization.) What are the values that our learners want to learn? What are the tools our learners want to help them determine how to use the values extant within Judaism, and how to create their own? Yes, it sounds radical, but I believe we do need to invite the learners to the table in this conversation. They, more than anyone, may enable us to discover that there really are a core set of shared values to transmit. I don;t know about the rest of you, but often I learn more about values from interaction with young students than I do interactions with older folks. We learn as we teach.
Robyn Faintich said:I have been thinking about this too. I wonder if there are four sets of values (or even more). The values we as educators want to live/teach by, the values we want to transmit explicitly to our learners as Jews, the values we want to transmit explicitly or our learners as learners, and the implicit values we want to transmit by socialization methods within education. I believe that there would be some overlap, but also some that would not.
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Permalink Reply by Robyn Faintich on
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Adrian,
Interesting about bringing the learners to the table to pick the values ... I just wrote a paper about this for my EdD ... it was loosely based on an article I wrote for Jewish Education Leadership journal of Lookstein in their August 2010 issue.
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Permalink Reply by Jonathan Woocher on -
Adrian, I think you're absolutely correct. It's critical that learners have the opportunity to articulate their values and that they be taken seriously when they do so. We can use the tradition (itself far from uniform or simple, of course) to interrogate our values, and vice versa. The learning comes from the multiple levels of dialogue we can create.
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Permalink Reply by Reuven Werber on
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I can't imagine a list of critical values for Jewish education that doesn't include the responsibility to work for the perpetual existence of the Jewish People (Am Yisrael or Knesset Yisrael). The commitment to the physical existence of Am Yisrael - Brit Goral in R. Y.B. Soloveichik's terminology - is the basis for all the rest - the continuation of a vessel to realize tikkun olam b'malchut SH. To help bring about a better world for all to live in.
Personally, I also see the bond between Am Yisrael and Eretz Yisrael as a central value for Jewish education.
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Permalink Reply by Andrea RC Kasper on -
I think you are absolutely right, in a complex tradition full of as many interpretations as people, the unifying values for Jewish educators must include the perpetuation of the religion, I think it is at the onset why we have chosen this profession. At the risk of sounding too vague, I think that is how we come to the table and what makes us intersting/effective as a group of educators are the hundren different ways we embody being Jewish. I have found for myself, and my students, that the most effective way to find a connection to Judaism is through another Jewish person who modeled a life and outlook I respected and wanted to emulate.
Reuven Werber said:I can't imagine a list of critical values for Jewish education that doesn't include the responsibility to work for the perpetual existence of the Jewish People (Am Yisrael or Knesset Yisrael). The commitment to the physical existence of Am Yisrael - Brit Goral in R. Y.B. Soloveichik's terminology - is the basis for all the rest - the continuation of a vessel to realize tikkun olam b'malchut SH. To help bring about a better world for all to live in.
Personally, I also see the bond between Am Yisrael and Eretz Yisrael as a central value for Jewish education.
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Permalink Reply by Adrian A. Durlester on
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Ever the gadfly, allow me to throw out this challenge. Though, like Andrea, I do have a passion to work for the continuation and survival of Judaism, and have received this largely, as she suggests, from observation and connection with other role models, I don't think this goes far or deep enough. Survival and perpetuation simply for their own sake are no longer, I believe, adequate. For many years, one of the tenets underlying my own passion for Judaism was the simple understanding or "mir zenen doh" - that we survive-that despite all that has transpired throughout history, Judaism is still here.
Whether it is wisdom that comes with age, or the realities of our 21st century world, I no longer find that sort of philosophy adequate. It's no longer good enough to give Judaism (or any other religion or philosophy for that matter) a pass on contemporary relevancy and purpose simply by virtue of longevity and ability to survive despite great forces brought to bear against it. The modern challenges of today are too strong and too tough to be overcome simply by a plea to the past and/or a plea to the weight of longevity.
There was a time when the simple passion of "mir zenen doh" was effective. I no longer believe we can afford the luxury of such a dependency. I say this most reluctantly, but we really are at a place when we must "justify" our continued existence based not on how long we've been around, the trials and tribulations we have suffered, and the good that we have wrought in the world, but on what good we are doing now and can continue to do for the world in the years to come. I fear that if we do not do this, then even the next remnant that survives will be unable to respark and rekindle Judaism.
All this being said, I do believe our continued existence is a good thing for the world, and I will not have any personal difficulties maintaining my passion for Judaism. My ability to share and transmit that passion, however, will be greatly affected by our ability to find and embrace a stronger idea than merely working to insure our own continued existence. The younger folks I speak with, teach, and learn from have told me quite bluntly that this isn't enough for them. They need better reasons to embrace a particularlistic idea in a universalistic world, and we need to find those. They are there, I am sure. But we may have to think way outside the box (or look deeper inside the box in places we haven't looked at in a while, or are even afraid to look) to find them.
-Adrian
Andrea RC Kasper said:I think you are absolutely right, in a complex tradition full of as many interpretations as people, the unifying values for Jewish educators must include the perpetuation of the religion, I think it is at the onset why we have chosen this profession. At the risk of sounding too vague, I think that is how we come to the table and what makes us intersting/effective as a group of educators are the hundren different ways we embody being Jewish. I have found for myself, and my students, that the most effective way to find a connection to Judaism is through another Jewish person who modeled a life and outlook I respected and wanted to emulate.
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Permalink Reply by Andrea RC Kasper on
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I absolutely agree and I too have found that for myself and my students the ideal of existence for existence's sake is NOT enough...I did not mean to convey that. When I went to grad school, I was quite literally shocked that Judaism had so much to say to ME and then I was angry that the Jewish education I had received in day school and as part of the conservative movement cheated me - as far as I as concerned. There is a tremendous depth to this tradition and dialogue that we need to engage in. Had anyone, really anyone, turned to my 13,14,15 year old self and presented a dialogue I would have engaged. Had that same person continued this dialogue respecting the perspective of a defiant teenager I would have engaged, but neither was the case. When I first read Lonely Man of Faith, I was blown away by the fact that every teenager in existence can relate. If there is an overwhelming teenage emotion, it just might be loneliness, the existential kind, the one you only become aware of as a teenager. I have had the privileged of teaching Lonely Man of Faith at Prozdor in Boston to 3 different groups of teenagers, some in high school and others in middle school and it never fails to speak directly to them. I think modern Jewish philosophy has, at least, part of what is missing in Jewish education today. These thinkers (Soloveitchik, Buber, Rosenzweig) can provide us with a further understanding into our existence in this world, to the dilemmas we face and the manner we wish to live.
I have spoken to many contemporaries who either attended Jewish day schools or camps and they all feel the same way, especially coming out of the Conservative movement...we were given superficial crumbs and expected to engage.
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Permalink Reply by Malka Stern on
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Malka Stern said:I think the teaching of Hebrew letters is a shared value. Not always in the same measure, and not only as the cultural language of modern Israel. Without knowledge of Hebrew as the language of Torah, Jewish education will necessarily be a shadow of what it could be.
Appreciation of the meaning of the language which transmitted to the world the values of Judaism, is also a deep experience of one's inner landscape. The letters are far from arbitrary symbols; each reflects a deep wisdom which even young children can grasp, and they deserve to know this wisdom.
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Permalink Reply by Andrea RC Kasper on
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have you read this blog post...interesting
How Rabbinical Schools Close the Door
Malka Stern said:
Malka Stern said:I think the teaching of Hebrew letters is a shared value. Not always in the same measure, and not only as the cultural language of modern Israel. Without knowledge of Hebrew as the language of Torah, Jewish education will necessarily be a shadow of what it could be.
Appreciation of the meaning of the language which transmitted to the world the values of Judaism, is also a deep experience of one's inner landscape. The letters are far from arbitrary symbols; each reflects a deep wisdom which even young children can grasp, and they deserve to know this wisdom.
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Permalink Reply by Malka Stern on
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Robyn Faintich said:Adrian,
Interesting about bringing the learners to the table to pick the values ... I just wrote a paper about this for my EdD ... it was loosely based on an article I wrote for Jewish Education Leadership journal of Lookstein in their August 2010 issue.
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