Navi Class Goes Montessori: Ch. 1

Pacing: approximately one perek per week. That’s fast; but I haven’t found that this group derives an appreciable amount of satisfaction from moving slowly and thoroughly.

Class:

a. Introductory storytelling (because there are some girls with very organized minds who will melt into the floor like the Wicked Witch of the West if they are asked to piece together a story they haven’t heard the end of yet).

b. Occasional class-wide or small-group discussion or special project.

c. Otherwise, students are turned loose in a classroom with 30+ activities tacked to the wall, and choose what they want to do. Some activities are social, some creative, some skills-intensive. As we go on I will probably start meeting with them to discuss their goals and choices, but for now the only guideline is that each day is graded like an assignment: the assignment is diligence.

Also, they have to complete:

d. One guided-reading worksheet per perek. They can use an English Navi for this. They have a choice between my worksheets, which are very how-would-you-have-felt-if-it-were-you, or Rabbi Alterman’s much more straightforward who-what-when-wheres, which I pulled off Chinuch.org.

e. Two translation worksheets per week. (We have a four-day week.) Break up the pasuk into shorashim and by trop; write in full English sentences.

We have a couple of other programs humming along in the background of class, one an individualized plan for behavior, the other a universal growth program I swiped from Novhardok; but those are a different story.

Navi Class Goes Montessori: Prologue

Part I: How Do People Teach Navi?

I’ve spoken over the years with a couple of Navi teachers, I’ve observed a couple of classes, and I am blessed to be a student of some truly great Navi teachers, like the one I’ve quoted here before under the name of Rabbi St. Helens.

Most Navi teachers of my acquaintance begin a perek or lesson with an overview or an anticipatory question or anecdote, perhaps an “Imagine that you are…” moment. Then they call on each student in turn to read and translate a verse. They write new vocabulary and grammar rules on the board for students to study. They “bring out” the lessons of each passage by telling the lessons explicitly, sometimes with additional stories, or by initiating a class discussion. Eventually the class gets to the end of a perek and then there is a review game or art project (e.g. make a scrapbook page, or build the scene out of candy), and a test.

Some Navi classes, among them many night lectures for adults, are more what is called in the vernacular “outside”; that is, outside the text: the focus of the class is not so much on the text itself but on its application; the course objective is only to teach ideas, not to also develop student text-skills.

My middle-school Navi teacher just had us dramatize each perek and then take turns reading it aloud in English, but that’s not standard.

Part II: How I Tweaked the Model

I knew when I started teaching this year that I did not want to follow the model of most of the best and most inspiring and popular Navi teachers I know, who lay each verse before the class by having a student read and translate it. In some skills-intensive classrooms this constitutes the majority of the lesson. I suspect that it takes a lot of motivation/inspiration/classroom management presence/charisma/student philadelphia to keep a roomful of students focused on a Hebrew text before them, silently following along to improve their own skills while one classmate at a time haltingly hones hers aloud. I am neither male nor South African and I just could not see myself pulling that off effectively and keeping students excited about it in a class with a four-year grade span.

Instead, I gave each student a list of translated – not words, exactly, but shorashim and prefixes and suffixes and an occasional injunction to “look in your friendly local Metzudas Tzion” – and set them in chevrusos (draw a toy from the basket; learn with the girl who drew the same species or color; and eventually I assigned seatmates, which saves shuffling-around time) to prepare the text; and then we went over their work together.

Some loved this and said it worked much better for them than the read-aloud model; some – they are after all preteen girls – missed the higher percentage of large-group social experience.

Discussion, creative projects, games, tests. I try to stick with art projects that demand either a detailed or a sophisticated understanding of the material, so we didn’t do a whole lot of scrapbooking.

Class was good…

…but the proportion of School to Fireworks was still too high. I like to see a blinding Aha! moment go off at least once every 40 minutes and despite varying the lesson in all sorts of interesting ways I just was not getting that kind of display from them.

“Make it top-down,” advised Rabbi Silktie.

“Make it bottom-up,” advised Rabbi Estuary.

“Make it so top-down it stands on its head,” advised Rebbetzin Appletree.

I experimented…

…class got better…

…still didn’t get enough fireworks.

I went back to the principal, and asked, “Can we revisit that idea I proposed at the beginning of the year…?”

So we did, and here it is.

Some favorite moments from Samuel I, ch. 3

Ch. 1
Ch. 2

3:6 The first time Shmuel went to Eli, in 3:5, Eli said, “I did not call you; go back and lie down.” This time, Eli adds a word: “I did not call you, my son; go back and lie down.”

So nice. He doesn't want to hurt Shmuel's feelings. It's embarrassing to think that you're bothering someone unnecessarily, and Eli doesn't want Shmuel to feel embarrassed. – says someone.

The Malbim says that Eli already suspects what is going on, and so is extra careful to preserve Shmuel's feelings because – as we all know, you can't receive prophecy when you're depressed. If Shmuel gets into that place in your mind where you go when you're embarrassed that you've bothered someone unnecessarily, he's not going to be in the frame of mind that is conducive to clear prophecy.

3:9 Eli tells Shmuel that if he gets called again, he should answer, 'Speak, Hashem, for Your servant is listening.'

3:10 But when it comes to that, Shmuel drops the direct address: 'Speak, for Your servant is listening.'

My husband said he thinks he read somewhere that this was a better answer but just reading it I wonder whether Shmuel does not sound a little abashed to be addressing Hashem directly.

3:15 “And Shmuel was afraid to tell the vision to Eli.”

3:16 “And Eli called to Shmuel and said, 'Shmuel, my son.' And Shmuel said, 'Here I am.'”

I think I read somewhere that Shmuel's morning routine was to open the doors and then go to Eli. This morning, he was afraid to go to Eli.

Eli, meanwhile, wants to know what happened.

“Shmuel, my son,” he says – not articulating the question.

“I'm here,” says Shmuel – which sounded to me the first time I read this like he is sidestepping the question he knows Eli wants to ask; but now I think not. Anyway.

So then 3:17, Eli asks outright, and adds some strong urging which suggests (to me) that he knows just how badly Shmuel wants to avoid telling him.

3:18 Eli's response is staggering.

One of the commentaries points out that he uses the name of Hashem which connotes the middas harachamim, that Hashem is acting mercifully.

3:21 More people start to receive nevua.

I'm not sure this is related; but this reminds me of the story about the Beit Yosef (right?) and how he labored and labored to answer a particular question in Torah learning; and the next day he heard a little boy chirp out nonchalantly that idea that had just taken the Beit Yosef all night to unearth.

Q. What is happening here, that a little kid can answer that question so easily?

A. The Beit Yosef pulled the idea into the world; now it is public property.

Sefira calendar...? or just little houses to cut out

The big elementary-school activity this season is making Sefira calendars for counting up to Shavuos. I wanted to come up with an ingenious idea of my own for Loops – people get very clever with Sefira calendars – but lacking that offhand, I rummaged online and turned up this:

Little Boxes on the Hillside

I printed one copy with numbers and then, because there aren’t enough, covered the numbers and ran another copy (it occurs to me that you could just erase the numbers in Paint on a computer).

I’m not really satisfied with this craft as a calendar: sefiras ha’omer is a wander through a wilderness, not a stroll down a civilized street. We’ll have to come up with something better for next year. But I thought those little houses are such excellent practice in coloring and cutting and gluing and engineering that I had better share the link; so here you are.

They are technically operable boxes -- you could put exercises in them or something. Sefira is not exactly candy month.

Pharaoh in Pajamas

A perfect send-up of the silent film genre.

Happy Pesach!

Pharaoh in Pajamas, by the 5th-6th grade at Torah Academy

Some Favorite Moments from Samuel I, part 2

Part 1

2:13 “...the servant of the kohen would come while the meat was cooking, and the three-pronged fork would be in his hand.”

Q. I asked my husband, who knows his way around the Mishkan, Have we heard of this fork before? No, he said. All right, I said, why is it called the three-pronged fork, using the definite article, as if we all know what this fork is?

A. In that generation it was an infamous fork. Here comes that three-pronged fork.

2:19 “His mother would make for him a little robe...” – lots of them.

Back in 1:6, Penina would vex Chana by asking her about sewing garments for the children she did not have.

Now she has one and so, say Chazal, it was an especial pleasure for her to sew for him.

2:21 Students tend to forget this: Chana went on to have more children. So nice.

2:23-25 I think the tone of Eli's rebuke is fascinating. Differences of opinion about whether it was the best thing to say or not.

2:26 The Meam Loez cites a story from the Sefer Chasidim about a man who made a point of always carrying small change with him, in order to be able to do a favor for any passersby who needed to change a larger denomination; and, asked about this practice, he would quote this pasuk and say that he, too, wished to find favor “with G-d and also with men”.

I told my students about a time I was walking past Tachana haMerkazit and found urgent need of a safety pin; hailed the first passerby to ask for one; she gave me a funny look like how did you know? and pulled from her knapsack an entire chain of safety pins, kept for the purpose of just such emergencies.

My students suggested that keeping a stash of hair elastics would be another good example. Or being a smiley person.

2:27 The man who has to come give Eli this message, say Chazal, is – Elkana. Oof. He has to go to the shofet of the generation, the role model who is now raising Elkana's son, who has been there for his family all along and participated in that early nes of Chana's having that son, and deliver this message.

2:29, Midrash: not that they literally kicked, but they would point with their feet instead of their fingers, which is not respectful.

What Did Jewish Women Wear in 12th Century Germany?

The answer -- more or less -- to that question.

This post is about clothes.

35 by 35 no. 22, a Victorian wrapper

Sewing again

Eruvin Comes Alive with the All-New Eruvin Lego Set!

The Portland Kollel using Legos for a visual aid in its studies

January HSF and 35 by 35 nos. 20 & 21

Sewing, again...

More Victorian Jewish Miscellany: hats, secession, and Schone Aussicht

1. In high school, I searched earnestly online for the paintings of Moritz Oppenheim, and found only tiny, blurry reproductions.

Today I searched again and lo! Quite a number of them are on Wikipedia, in extremely high resolution – yay!

You know in vol. VIII, where a man in the train pokes fun at a young woman for having her hair covered? – I always wondered, How could he tell? – because in the pictures of Rav Hirsch's family all the women look (to my untrained eye) perfectly à la mode in their headdresses, such that a stranger would have a hard time telling whether a woman was covering her hair or not – well! here is the answer. You can see in the Oppenheim paintings that those beautiful frothy bonnets are worn over a sort of under-cap, which was not the case in the non-Jewish population.

this young lady is also standing under a tallis, at her chassuna.

  

2. Q. What did the rabbanim of the time have to say about the US Civil War?

A. IIRC somewhere in Rav Hirsch, after slavery ended in the South, he mentions its end with some relief.

Today I re-found a website that I misplaced years ago, which has --among a great many other curios -- lectures on the subject from American rabbis. Here, for one thing, is R' Illowy's lecture on States' Rights, which apparently pleased the secessionists of New Orleans so much when it was published that they invited him down to become rabbi of that city.

 

3. Schopenhauer lived in the same building as Rav Hirsch and at the same time, but apparently there is no evidence that the two ever met. I always thought that fascinating, wow, like a particle accelerator gone awry.

Anyway, because Schopenhauer also lived in that (now vanished) house on Schone Aussicht, it is a famous house and there are loads of pictures and a virtual tour of it online – here.

Some Favorite Moments from Samuel I, ch. 1

Occasionally I hit a moment when I just have to sit back and watch the movie. Here are a couple of them, and also some insights that turned up that are satisfying although not as cinematic.

(I'm using Mikraos Gedolos, Meam Loez, Daas Sofrim, the brown sefer entitled Torah SheBaal Peh, and Abarbanel on occasion. Who said what – ask me if you need to know; if I stop to look it up again now I'll never get this published.) Do not take my word for anything.

1:1 “...and his name was Elkana... an Ephratite.”

Q. Why is he called an Ephratite, from the tribe of Ephraim, since he was really a Levi?

A. The answer I always heard is that Ephrati is a generic term for a distinguished person, “a leader among his peers.”

Also, of course, he lived in the territory of Ephraim.

But this year I saw that one of the commentaries – I don't think I made this up – puts the two together: he lived in Ephraim, and he was a leader there. (You may have gathered this from that other Midrash that he used to take different routes up to the Mishkan every year, encouraging as many people as possible to come with him.)

In other words, he was such a great influence on Ephraim – which is what the Leviim were scattered around the country to be – that he is called an Ephrati, as if he were a member of the tribe himself.

1:3 This is the pasuk (verse) from which we learn that he would take those special routes up to the Mishkan to encourage people to come with him; and it concludes, “and there the two sons of Eli... were kohanim...” – dun dun dun – now we see why that extra encouragement was necessary.

1:6 “And her co-wife would anger her...”

Q. The Medrash tells us what Penina said to get Chana to daven (pray). It bothered me incessantly: in what tone of voice did Penina say this? I tried it over and over and the right tone of voice was just not in my repertoire. So, I called a rav, and asked him; and he read the Midrash, and all of a sudden it made sense. Moral of the story, if you need to know the tone of voice of something in Tanach, call a rabbi.

One theme of this perek seems to be how to get someone to do what you think they should do. Penina tries to get Chana to daven. Elkana tries to get Chana to cheer up. Eli tries to get Chana to sober up. And Chana tries to get Hashem to give her a child. Some are more effective than others. Discuss.

1:8, when Elkana is trying to cheer up Chana, someone says she understood from his words that he had reconciled himself to her childlessness; so she finally saw clearly that if anything was going to happen she was going to have to be the one to daven for it.

All these needlings finally add up to Chana going to daven after all.

1:14, Eli – explains someone – is suggesting that Chana go take a nap and come back later.

1:17, Eli's response to Chana is a play on words. Yiten has two meanings.

Sheila, spelt oddly as it is in this pasuk, also has two meanings: a request, or a child.

You can read Eli's words as a blessing: Hashem should give you the request that you have asked.

Or you can read them as a promise – Eli is having a flash of prophetic insight: Hashem will give you the child which you requested.

1:18, the very next verse, Chana hears Eli's bracha but she also hears the other meaning, the prophecy, and she lights up and the whole way home she can't stop smiling.

At least, that is how I read it; I don't have a source for that.

There is a Midrash – the kind that you read and say What? - that says that until now, Chana looked like a monkey; but after this encounter with Eli she didn't anymore. I think it is the Malbim who explains that what that means is that her intense sorrow was disfiguring; but now that she was happy she looked beautiful again.

The Midrash says Shmuel was a preemie.

Being an Orthodox Jewish Girl in a Non-Jewish School

I was talking to a friend of mine who is in this position at the moment and it reminded me of my own experiences as the same. I thought I'd stick some of our chatter online in case there are teenagers surfing the web and quaero mihi similes.

“It is but a single step from the profound to the ridiculous.”

I found this line in Rav Hirsch a few months ago and was immensely pleased with it, finding it a clear expression of one of my biggest concerns in extra-curricular education; and I went round quoting it to anything that would stand still long enough.

And I would have kept citing it in the name of Rav Hirsch to every teacher, student, and doorpost, had it not shown up a couple of weeks ago in “an old School-boy's” memoirs of Dr. Arnold's influence at Rugby.

?!

I could not get over the coincidence, and made a mental note to look up what common source Rav Hirsch and the “old School-boy” could possibly have been reading, and promptly forgot all about it...

...Until it showed up again last night in Edith Hamilton.

??!

A guest kindly looked the quotation up for me and reported that the phrase first appeared in a late 18^th century French philosophical work, and was subsequently publicized further by Thomas Paine and Napoleon, among others.

I'm going to guess that it was making the rounds of high society drawing-rooms by the mid-19^th century. But it is tempting to sit here and speculate about what could have been on Rav Hirsch's reading list.

(...or not, unless the phrase itself is to serve as the single step it speaks of.)

I still like it.

Historical Sew Fortnightly no 12, Re-do.

I disappeared from the HSF for several months, but now the Hundred Projects have settled down and it is winter break and I sewed something:

I made this doll before and I have just finished its dress and given it a face, by request of Loops, who chose the colors.

I am very pleased with the thought to use a scrap of wool roving as hair; it is nice and fluffy and took seconds to sew on; now, we'll see how long it lasts...!

The ripply neckline results from my turning-and-stitching rather than using bias tape as instructed: a lesson learned.

Now, can one of you experts out there tell me whether this is actually what gauging is supposed to look like – like an obstructed flow of water, and with four rows of visible stitching?

The challenge: no. 12, Re-do. Let's call this a re-do of the earlier challenge "Out of My Comfort Zone". It is my first attempt at gauging. It is my first attempt at a 19th-c. dress, with the dropped sleeves and double darts and hook-and-eye closures.

Fabric: I thought this would be a quick test of a pattern for use by students, so... polycotton scraps *ducks and runs for cover*

Pattern: Great Auntie Maude's Favorite Doll, sold here.

Year: somewhere in 1840-1865 -- I'm going to guess I hit around 1860

Notions: three hooks-and-eyes

How historically accurate is it? The pattern is ultra-accurate. Ms. Clark says to paint on the hair and features. I didn't make the underpinnings or perfect the fit as instructed, the fabric is a blend, and I have my doubts about the visible machine-stitched hem.

Total cost: all from stash.

Is it suitable for beginners? I actually think making full-size baby clothing is easier. But working in miniature is quickly rewarding.

Kate Henderson and "A Meeting of the School Trustees"

I have always been fond of this painting of an 1880's schoolmarm, making her case to the Board of Trustees.

A Meeting of the Board of Trustees, by Robert Harris

It looks like she wants something that they are disinclined to grant her.

The subject of the image (though not the actual artist's model) is a teacher from PEI named Kate Henderson.
That's about all the information readily available about this painting.


So it was a very pleasant surprise to me to find that someone has taken this painting I like so much and dramatized it:
One-minute film


But what is the real story behind the painting? -- I couldn't find it.
...until...
this week, Loops asked me to bring her some children's library books on "how to teach," and in one of them I espied suddenly the name "Kate Henderson".
Aha!
You!

Here's the story.
One of Kate Henderson's responsibilities in Pine Creek School, PEI was to teach Bible. She found that the children were merely reading aloud, not grasping the content; so she set them to acting out the stories.
This went over very well with the children, and when they came home they told their parents all about how they got to play Pretend in school with Bible stories.
The parents opined that this was sacrilegious; and issued a call: Fire the teacher!
The members of the Board -- the shopkeeper, the miller, the doctor, and the minister -- met and summoned Miss Henderson to defend herself. In the end, they suspended her for a week.
The minister had his doubts about the issue of sacrilege involved, noted that the children had seemed unusually interested in his sermon that week, and that Sunday he got up, asked some children to act out a Bible story, and preached on the subject of new ways of understanding the text.
Miss Henderson was reinstated and everyone lived happily ever after, the end.

A Pre-Raphaelite Painting of Unknown Jews

This image is cropped from a painting by the pre-Raphaelite artist William Holman Hunt. According to the (unreliable) book I found it in, Hunt began painting it in 1854 on a visit to the Land of Israel, but made slow progress because he wanted Jewish models for his Pharisees and “the local rabbi” ruled that sitting for such a painting was not permitted, so no one was willing to model. (Can we think about that for a moment – a pre-Raphaelite painter wants models and no one is willing to participate.)

“The local rabbi” eventually reversed his ruling; the book is fuzzy on the details but implies that the reversal was due to Hunt's claiming the final picture would not be religious. (If this is accurate, then Hunt lied egregiously.)

I am curious who “the local rabbi” was, and what the psak really was, and whether any of these anonymous 19^th century Jews of Eretz Yisrael are identifiable.

Hunt, I am sure, took a fair degree of artistic license; and when he exhibited the completed painting in 1860 it was with a bitterly anti-Semitic commentary. But I am intrigued that – to whatever degree – his painting has preserved these Jews' faces for us.