Homeschooling Jewish Subjects

In response to a discussion of rabbinic objections to homeschooling in the area of limudei kodesh (Jewish subjects):

"My own fear is that probably many rabbanim would say I'm not qualified in this area.
As a baalas teshuvah, my own awareness of limudei kodesh subjects was VERY limited until my kids started in day school. I have picked up so much over the years: practical things like how to lead kids through the davening, ideas for craft projects, songs for brachos and various yamim tovim, how to read Rashi script... everything I know about Yiddishkeit, I learned from Uncle Moishy. :-)))

At this point, the older kids are far beyond my skills. Sometimes, Elisheva gets frustrated - "why won't you just sit down with me and study Navi!" Okay, maybe if I had some background, I could. She has no concept that an adult would not know elementary-school Navi. These days, I only study with her if she makes up flashcards ahead of time, which actually helps her get her thoughts organized and helps me help her despite my ignorance.

Here's a thing I wrote ten years ago or so about how I began the process of my own Jewish learning as YM started kindergarten (at Yesodei HaTorah - ha ha ha):
http://www.ou.org/publications/ja/5760winter/dear%20jennifer.pdf

My fear now, as I embark once again on this elementary school journey (Elisheva graduated from Grade Eight this week, so they're both finished, just as Naomi Rivka is starting), is that I am still so woefully deficient, still so "making it up as I go along" that there is no way I could offer the kind of living Jewish curriculum that a day school run by FFBs could ever do.

Thoughts on how BT/geir parents can make up for a lack of Jewish elementary education...? (perhaps with an eye to countering rabbinic/community opposition)

Good Shabbos, all!"

Comments

לימודי קודש/Limudei Kodesh Copywork & Activity Printables

Welcome to my Limudei Kodesh / Jewish Studies copywork and activity printables page. As of June 2013, I am slowly but surely moving all my printables over to 4shared because Google Docs / Drive is just too flaky for me. What you’ll find here: Weekly Parsha Copywork More Parsha Activities More Chumash / Tanach Activities Yom Tov Copywork & Activities Tefillah Copywork Pirkei Avos / Pirkei Avot Jewish Preschool Resources Other printables! For General Studies printables and activities, including Hebrew-English science resources and more, click here . For Miscellaneous homeschool helps and printables, click here . If you use any of my worksheets, activities or printables, please leave a comment or email me at Jay3fer “at” gmail “dot” com, to link to your blog, to tell me what you’re doing with it, or just to say hi! If you want to use them in a school, camp or co-op setting, please email me (remove the X’s) for rates. If you just want to say Thank You, here’s a

Hebrew/ עברית & English General Studies Printables

For Jewish Studies, including weekly parsha resources and copywork, click here . If you use any of my worksheets, activities or printables, please leave a comment or email me at Jay3fer “at” gmail “dot” com, to link to your blog, to tell me what you’re doing with it, or just to say hi! If you want to use them in a school, camp or co-op setting, please email me (remove the X’s) for rates. If you enjoy these resources, please consider buying my weekly parsha book, The Family Torah : the story of the Torah, written to be read aloud – or any of my other wonderful Jewish books for kids and families . English Worksheets & Printables: (For Hebrew, click here ) Science : Plants, Animals, Human Body Math Ambleside : Composers, Artists History Geography Language & Literature Science General Poems for Elemental Science . Original Poems written by ME, because the ones that came with Elemental Science were so awful. Three pages are included: one page with two po

Are Jews an "underrepresented community" in children’s publishing?

I applied for a writing award yesterday. I'm not going to get it, but that's not what I wanted to share with you. Here's what I wanted to share. This box: I stared at this box for a long, long time. And then I decided not to check it. Even though I believe people like me truly are underrepresented, we probably wouldn’t fit the definition in other people's minds. Why? Well, because we're European. Because we are white. Because as everybody knows, Jews control the media. (do we???) If anything, some people say, Jews are over -represented in publishing. And yet. Some definitions are careful not to include people like me. Like this random definition from the State of California which defines underrepresented for some very specific business purposes as: "an individual who self-identifies as Black, African American, Hispanic, Latino, Asian, Pacific Islander, Native American, Native Hawaiian, or Alaska Native, or who self-identi

Adventures in Mama-Land

Search This Blog