On Teaching: Finding the Good in Students Reply

Finding the Good in Students

by Joel Lurie Grishaver

In Pirke Avot, 1:15 we find this famous text. Shammai says: “Make of thy Torah study a fixed practice; say little and do much; and greet all people with a cheerful countenance.”

Jewish RIC-CU-LUM OF THE FUTURE Reply

Joel Lurie Grishaver

If we are going to look at the future of Jewish Education, at some point we are going to have to stop talking about technique and look at the content.

Free Range Synagogues 1

Joel Lurie Grishaver

The New York Times published an article by Michael Paulson last week, The ‘Pay What You Want’ Experiment at Synagogues. It puts together two things we know (a) that synagogues are losing members, and (b) that synagogues are expensive (if costly to operate). Its news is that more than 30 synagogues are trying to build membership by allowing members to set their own dues level. It suggested (as lots of people–including me–often do) that money is the problem.

Within a week, Nina Badzin responded on Kveller, Expensive Dues Aren’t the Only Reason People Don’t Go to Synagogues , “Changing the financial requirement for membership without addressing the deeper disinterest in attending synagogue is going to yield more of the same long term: low participation and apathy.”

I Wanna Start a Fad Reply

Joel Lurie Grishaver

There are a lot of places to look for what is hot in Jewish Education. You can look at JEDLAB and JED21. You can listen to the gate keepers. You can examine the sessions done at education conferences. You can read Educational Leadership and other secular models. You can be part of a conversation of friends. There are lots of ways to look at the new stuff, to think about it, to figure out your own adaption, and to take it out for a spin.

So here is what I know. Experiential Education. Fad! Project Based Learning. Fad! Mastery Learning! Not so much. Design Thinking. Not Yet. The Flipped Classroom. Silence. Hebrew Through Movement. Trending!

How Do You Get Them to Show Up? 3

Joel Lurie Grishaver

For the past few years, every time I do a workshop that contains some element of family education, I get a series of questions: “How do you get them to show up?” What if you can’t get parents to read any of your e-mails?” “When they shut everything down, how do you get through to them?” There is a lot of frustration that comes from working with families today. It seems like there is a new physics—like the universe has change. I teach the basics: relationships and teamwork. Anticipating teaching another family session, I’ve done a lot of research about the issue, and this posting is the result.