What do you think are reasonable expectations for an average sibling relationship? At first glance, the relationships Yosef has with his brothers don’t seem like very good examples for us. But looking more closely, we can learn some interesting things. At this point in our story (Genesis 37: 18-28), Yosef has found his brothers grazing their flocks of sheep. As…

This week we’ve been learning about commentary. Commentary, as one of our students put it, is the story of what you think about a (typically missing) detail in a text. We learned some commentary written by a well-known, medieval, French rabbi named Rashi. Looking at his work allowed us gain a different perspective and a deeper understanding of our text….

This week, we began studying the story of Yosef and his amazing, technicolor dream coat. It’s often easy to feel highly critical of our families, especially as we’re all juggling so much and want to be phenomenal parents. I want to suggest that Yosef’s family offers an interesting lens for thinking about how families function together (or don’t) that maybe…

The enthusiasm for Ivrit (Hebrew) learning over this past week has been so high that we decided to keep our Shulchanot Avodah (learning centers) available through Friday. Our students could not get enough of letter identifying, vocabulary learning, trope singing, and text translation. It helped to have a little extra motivation in the form of a Bingo board. Every time…

As usual, your brilliant kiddos blew us away this week. Over the past few days, I’ve watched the Boker (pre-K—1) students pick up the basic mechanics of Hebrew reading and all the Hebrew vowels. Beverly challenged the Erev (2—5) students to all read and sing at least two words of text with trope, and every single one of them did….

What do we know about God? The answer is a LOT of things, from a LOT of different stories, which are at times repetitive, comforting, contradictory, and upsetting. Over the past week, we examined half a dozen stories from Jewish text and pulled out what God is doing, how God is treating Bnei Yisrael (the Jewish people), and what we…

When I share with other Jewish educators what we teach our students on weeks like this one, they are either jealous or amazed that we take on theology in such a complicated way with such young students. But at the end of the day, this is child-led learning! And your children have asked a lot of questions about God. So…

Bnei Yisrael (the Jewish People) have finally made it to Israel and life is good! After centuries of slavery and decades of wandering in the desert, they have a home where there’s plenty of water and food and space. They settle in and get comfy. And in their comfort, Bnei Yisrael forgets the brit (two-way promise) that they made with…

Is God present in our lives? How can we tell? This week we continued studying the summary of Jewish History that the Levi’im (Levites) recounted during the first Yom Kippur celebration. We read the part of the story where Bnei Yisral (the Jewish people) were wandering in the desert and counting on God for food and water. This is a…

This week, one of the texts we focused on together was the Levi’im (Levites) re-telling the whole history (as they see it) of the Jewish People. What they highlight and don’t is fascinating all by itself. One piece they highlight is the Jewish People’s inability to be grateful for how bountifully God provided for them while they are wandering in…

Winter break is just around the corner! We have an exciting lineup of camp days planned for the week, and we’d love for your kiddos to join us. Camp days run from 8:30am to 5:30pm. They include a variety of trips, games, and projects. Below you can find detailed schedules for your perusal. Click here to register! Each day, we…

One of the greatest joys in my job is helping to bring Jewish text and ideas to life for our students. We’ve spent two weeks now learning the story of Ezra and the first public Torah reading. Yesterday we had the amazing opportunity to put the text into action and do our own Torah reading with targum (translation) as part of our tefilah (prayer) service.  After starting off with a few…

We had a wonderful time gathering for Shabbat dinner last week! Thank you all for everything you brought and did to make that happen. Between dinner and dessert, we had a few minutes for parents to learn and talk with each other. Our learning focused on Birkat Yeladim—the traditional Friday night ritual for blessing our children, where we bless our…

How do we remember and recreate the experiences of those who came before us? Why is that an important thing to do? Our text this week tells the story of the first public Torah reading and comes from chapter 8 of the book of Nehemiah. We looked at it in conversation with the story of the Jewish people receiving the…

Jewish History has given Bnai Yisrael (the Jewish People) our share of challenges to overcome. Even with that, Jewish wisdom is timeless and always has what to offer us in every iteration, generation, and stage of our lives. When we meet challenges though, we often adapt and invent new approaches to our inherited Jewish wisdom. The Book of Nehemiah, Chapter…

What are your top ten “commandments” for participating in community? What are the promises that should hold between any individual and the rest of the community members? Here’s what we came up with for our Makom Community Brit this year(not necessarily in order of importance): We love everyone in the best way we can. We show gratitude. We get to…

How do you respond in the face of someone else’s anger? The story of het ha’egel has a beautiful example in it of a leader (Moshe) defending the people in the face of God’s fury. God finds out that Bnei Yisrael make and pray to an idol and gets really, really angry. Moshe notices God’s anger and stops God from…

  This week we started learning the story of het ha’egel, the big mistake Bnei Yisrael made by making and worshipping a golden calf (Exodus 32, 33:1-4).  Mistakes are tricky things! It’s easy to feel upset with ourselves and others for doing the wrong thing. But do strong negative reactions provide us with the best mindset for learning and growing from our mistakes?  We examined the feelings that we have right before…

Last week, I watched a pair of siblings playing together after their homework was done. The older sibling was intentionally annoying the younger sibling, and the younger sibling responded by pushing the older one. Then we stopped to talk about it. Their reflections were interesting. Their followup was impressive.  The younger sibling was able to admit that he should have spoken up instead…

Nobody is treated better than anybody else. We make people feel loved. We treat everyone like they are family. According to your incredible, loving kiddos, that’s how we treat the people in our community.  Like family.  We definitely felt that love this past week. Beverly had the amazing opportunity to be part of the Upstart Lab, which meant spending three…

In one of the most poignant moments in Torah, the newly formed Jewish people responds as one voice when presented with a tremendous opportunity and challenge. “Moshe wrote down all the things God said. Then he took sefer habrit (the book of the covenant) and read it aloud to all the people. They said, “All that God says—na’ase venishma! (We…

What would you do if you found a lost item that belonged to your enemy?  We’re talking enemy, here, as in a “person you fight” and a “person you hate” (definitions from your kiddos!).  According to the mitzvah (law) we read this week, you have to bring the lost item back to them.  Woah.  Hard! Here’s a list of the…

Do you ever read a text, feel full of questions, and wish you had a friend there to help you answer them?  That’s what hevruta study is all about. It’s a method of digging into a text with a partner. Here are the steps of the process: Read the text. Ask questions. Offer answers. Agree or disagree and discuss.  Use…

The experience Bnai Yisrael (the Jewish people) had at Mt. Sinai was strange and confusing, and we had LOTS of fun imagining what that experience might have been like.   This is the text we studied this week:  Exodus 20:15-18  All the people saw the thunder and the lightening, the shofar, and the mountain smoking. When the people saw it, they stepped back. They said to Moshe,…

Have you ever caught yourself really pining after something that belonged to someone else? What does all of that wanting do inside us? What might it lead us to do to other people? And how can we deal with it? This week we learned the 10th and final commandment, “Don’t covet your neighbor’s belongings. Don’t want their things so badly…

What would the world look like if we successfully followed all of the aseret hadibrot? And if we followed none of them? Today we focused on #8, “Do not steal.” We delved into whether it is an easy commandment to follow, what kinds of situations make following each commandment challenging, and how our mistakes affect the people around us. We…

Are you a perfect promise keeper? Jewish tradition has some great wisdom to share with us about making and keeping big, important promises. This week we learned from your amazing kids how that wisdom plays out in their lives. On Tuesday we dove into the third commandment, don’t make a promise using God’s name unless you’re going to keep it….

We love how engaged Makom Community parents are, and we know you want to talk with your students about everything they are learning and experiencing at Makom Community! In the coming weeks, we will be studying the 10 Commandments. During the week of September 18, we are delving into the first four commandments: I am God. No idols. No empty…

In our text this week, Bnei Yisrael (the Jewish People) is gathered in the desert at the bottom of Mt. Sinai, unsure of what’s coming next on their journey after slavery. God speaks to Moshe and tells him that if Bnei Yisrael will keep the brit (two-way promise) with God, then they will be for God a “treasured possession,” a…

New students and returning students are here, and we are so excited to welcome them in and get the year going! Next week, our kindergarten students will join us, too. This year, we have a large enough enrollment in afterschool enrichment that we created two learning groups functioning in parallel. We have Boker for our Pre-K, K, and 1 students,…