From Morah Alex and the 4-6th:
Today, we dove deeper into the "We Will Do, We Will Hear" text about Moshe. First, we studied four Hebrew words from the text:
Kol = voice
Moshe = Moses
Na'Aseh = to do
Neeshmah = to hear
We also reviewed the Hebrew word cavod.
The students practiced saying and writing these words in Hebrew.
After that, each student was given a page with the 10 Commandments. The students were handed a marker, and was asked to "mark up" their pages with their thoughts, questions, and reactions as we read them together (in English).
After they "marked up" their texts, each students worked in Hevruta pairs to share their thinking.
Here is some of the wonderful thinking that took place:
Aviva shared the words "idols," "honor," and "covet."
Soli circled the words "shalt" 8 times, and asked "what does it mean?"
Julia shared the words "gods," "idols," and "steal" as the words that stood out for her.
Lemi shared the words "vain" and "Sabbath day" as words that sparked his interest.
Next week, the students will be invited to create their own 10 Commandments for 2021. It will be interesting to see what they choose to include in their top 10!
From Phoebe and the 3rd graders:
How many ways can you read a text? Anyone who has ever texted someone understands how nuanced they can be- and how misinterpreted. Studying text, again and again, and looking for those nuances, is one of the many ways we DO Jewish.
To play around with this idea, we all took turns saying "I'm sorry" in as many ways as we could think of. There was the frail sorry, the sincere, sorry, the not really sorry at all sorry, the little old lady sorry, the big angry person sorry.
Then, we took turns reading the text of Shammai/Hillel and acted out their reactions to the man on one leg. What was the difference between how Hillel reacted to how Shammai reacted? What was happening there? In hevruta pairs we wrote down our notes, and then compared them with a friend.
We noticed that Hillel spoke, Shammai didn't. Hillel stayed calm, Shammai got mad. Hillel offered a way to understand, Shammai was impatient. Or that was our reading of what happened.
Next up: CAN WE NOT DO WHAT WE DON'T LIKE? Our pledge to each other, and maybe the whole world.