Jewish Education Research Articles

Progressive education and the case of a bilingual Palestinian-Arab and Jewish co-existence school in Israel

ABSTRACTThe purpose of this paper is to exemplify a ‘grass-roots’ change based on Dewey's experimental progressive education model employed in the ‘Bridge over the Valley’ bilingual school, a Palestinian-Arab and Jewish school in Israel. In order to identify the progressive ‘approach' underlying this change, the ‘method' that guided the implementation of a bilingual school, it's evaluation and then its dissemination to other schools, we used a qualitative case study method to understand whether John Dewey’s theory of education for peace was able to effect change in Palestinian-Arab and Jewish school education in Israel. The case findings describes the use of the progressive approach of education for peace in the ‘Bridge over the Valley’ bilingual school, as it is expressed in the school’s pedagogy, the implementation of the progressive method and in the accompanying discourse. Reciprocal teacher–child relations are considered an important factor to create fertile conditions for learning. The case findings contribute to our introduction of democratic education in a spatial reality. Underlying this approach stood a pedagogical method and conceptualization for conflict resolution and the opening of a space for empowering dialog for co-existence.

Millennial Children of Intermarriage: Religious Upbringing, Identification, and Behavior Among Children of Jewish and Non-Jewish Parents

The study examines changes in religious upbringing, identification, and behavior among children of intermarriage across three generations. Drawing on data from the 2013 Pew Research Center’s survey of Jewish Americans, we show that children of marriages between Jews and non-Jews in the Millennial generation are more likely than older counterparts to have been raised Jewish and to have received a formal Jewish education. Further, as a result of more widespread Jewish upbringing and education, they are more likely to identify as Jewish in adulthood and practice some aspects of Judaism. We attribute these developments primarily to the more welcoming and inclusive attitudes and practices toward intermarried families by Jewish organizations during the 1980s and 1990s. We discuss the study’s implications for Jewish demographic continuity and for the study of the dynamic interplay between intermarriage and religious affiliation.

Impact of Culture Context on Perceptions of Arab and Jewish Early Childhood Education Students Regarding Early Childhood Education and Care

ABSTRACTThe study examined intuitive perceptions of early childhood education students regarding education and care of children from birth to age 3 in Jewish and Arab societies. Research included 182 education students majoring in early childhood at three Israeli colleges. Data were collected via a questionnaire covering five topics: What is the most influential year in child development? What aspects make the greatest contribution in influencing child development? What care and education setting makes the greatest contribution? What roles of the individual in charge of child care contribute to the child’s care and education? and What are the desirable ways of coping with children’s distress? The results showed differences in perspectives in all five questions, which were primarily caused by cultural differences. The authors saw that though both cultures reside in the Israeli society and share common approaches, cultural environment still has an effect on their perceptions regarding the first year, the areas of emotion, and the child’s welfare. This study contributes to the understanding of the preparation of the early childhood caregiver, while emphasizing the important impact of the cultural context on the perceptions of Arab and Jewish caregivers in Israel.

Jewish Souls, Bureaucratic Minds: Jewish Bureaucracy and Policymaking in Late Imperial Russia, 1850–1917 by Vassili Schedrin

Reviewed by: Jewish Souls, Bureaucratic Minds: Jewish Bureaucracy and Policymaking in Late Imperial Russia, 1850–1917 by Vassili Schedrin Victoria Khiterer Jewish Souls, Bureaucratic Minds: Jewish Bureaucracy and Policymaking in Late Imperial Russia, 1850–1917 By Vassili Schedrin. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2016. xii + 292 pp. After the fall of communism and the opening of the Russian archives, many books and articles devoted to the Jews of imperial Russia were published. However, the book of Vassili Schedrin brings to light the semiforgotten and little researched topic of the work of the Russian Jewish bureaucrats "known as uchenye evrei (learned Jews or expert Jews)." The monograph is based on rich documentary materials from the Russian archives and incorporates all available scholarship and memoirs. Schedrin shows that the attitude toward expert Jews in traditional Jewish society was quite negative, because they were perceived as the agents of the government. But, according to the author, expert Jews were motivated by the [End Page 142] ideals of Jewish Enlightenment and, like the Russian authorities, believed in the necessity of the modernization of traditional Jewish life. Schedrin writes that the imperial Russian policy toward Jews was "motivated by raison d'état rather than by the personal Judeophobia of the tsar and the bureaucracy." The Russian government was motivated by raison d'état (with some exceptions) at the time of the Great Reforms in Russia (the 1860s–1881). But with assassination of Tsar Alexander II and the establishment of state anti-Semitism under Tsars Alexander III and Nicholas II, the policy toward Jews drastically changed from rapprochement of Jews with the gentile population to their isolation and intensified discrimination. The position of expert Jew was established in 1850 and functioned until the February 1917 Revolution. Each governor-general was supposed to appoint two or three expert Jews. Expert Jews were appointed to the seventeen Russian provinces of the Pale of Jewish Settlement, the two city administrations of Odessa and Nikolaev, and to the Ministry of Internal Affairs. "Within seven decades, a total forty-eight expert Jews were appointed to these twenty bureaucratic offices." The expert Jews had "a broad social mission of cultivating loyalty among the Jews and eradicating Jewish fanaticism by applying their moral influence." The Russian authorities considered that the majority of Russian Jewry—Orthodox Jews were religious fanatics and believed that their way of life should be modernized through military service and education. The major function of expert Jews was implementation of the government policy on Jewish questions. They advised the governors-general on religious affairs and translated Jewish texts, documents, and correspondence from Hebrew and Yiddish to Russian. Expert Jews often were used "to perform a variety of police functions aimed at the prevention of subversive political activity." They worked as translators for interrogation and courts. Sometimes, expert Jews worked also as censors of Jewish books and press. By the order of the Russian authorities, expert Jews also traveled on inspection tours of the various cities and towns of the Pale of Jewish Settlement, and reported about Jewish economic, social, and religious life. To efficiently perform all these varied functions, Jewish bureaucrats needed special preparation and education. The first generation of Jewish bureaucrats had a traditional Jewish education. But later, expert Jews typically got their education either at the Vilna or Zhitomir rabbinical seminaries or at Russian or foreign universities. The work of Jewish bureaucrats was very well [End Page 143] paid. Schedrin writes that "the compensation of expert Jews became comparable to salaries of Russian bureaucrats in the rank of the IX class." They were also often awarded medals, orders, and other signs of honor. Many expert Jews worked at their positions for 20–30 years. They believed that they "toiled both for the sake of the government and for the sake of the Jews." However, while implementing the policy of the Russian government, expert Jews often undermined and harmed traditional Orthodox Jewish society. For example, when the expert Jew German Barats traveled to the southwestern region of Russia (Kiev, Podolia, and Volhynia provinces) to popularize "the enrollment of Jewish children into government-sponsored Jewish schools" the Hasidic Jews of Kamenets-Podol'sk threw stones at him. The purpose of...

Jewish Socialists in the Land of Sunshine: Freedom, Springtime and the Pesakh Spirit of the Future

Nature is free-springtime is here!The folk is free-Passover is here!- Chaim ShapiroBorn in Russia in wake of assassination of Tsar Alexander II, Chaim (Khayim) Shapiro moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1908. Although he was just twenty-two years old at time, he was already a veteran activist and became a founding member of city's first Yiddish-based Jewish organizations, including local branch of Arbeter Ring (Workmen's Circle). He served as principle for city's first Yiddish school, as director of Jewish Consumptive Relief Association's Sanatorium for victims of tuberculosis in Duarte (now known as City of Hope), as president of Los Angeles chapters of Histadrut (Israeli General Federation of Labor) and ORT (Society for Trades and Agricultural Labor), and as chairman Los Angeles offices of YIVO Institute for Jewish Research. A graduate of University of Southern California Law School, Shapiro was one of city's leading defenders of civil liberties, representing several of city's unions and dozens of political activists threatened with imprisonment and deportation. An active leader in Socialist Party, he ran for lieutenant governor in 1930, on a socialist ticket with his friend Upton Sinclair, and was party's candidate for mayor of Los Angeles in 1933. He was also a prominent voice in fight against Nazism in Los Angeles, serving as chairman of United Anti-Nazi Conference and Jewish People's Relief Committee. Despite his left-leaning politics, he became a founding member of Los Angeles Bureau of Jewish Education and Los Angeles Jewish Community Council, serving for a time as Vice President. During his six decades in Los Angeles, he played a leading role in nearly every aspect of progressive politics and Jewish community life.In 1913, four-and-a-half years after his arrival, Chaim Shapiro penned an essay entitled Gedanken vegn frayhayt (Thoughts About Freedom), published in inaugural Pesakh (Passover) edition of Los Angeles' first Yiddish newspaper, Kalifornieryidish shtime (California Jewish Voice).1 Written in Yiddish, his essay honored occasion by joyfully recounting story of Jews' liberation in Egypt and linking that liberation to nature's renewal in springtime. Rather than offer praises to God, he heralded Jews' freedom from slavery as a product of collective action and called on his fellow Jews to be more involved in fight against slavery and oppression of their times. Weaving together religious and secular philosophy with allusions to natural world, Shapiro used Pesakh story as a medium for expressing his beliefs about Jewish peoplehood, politics, and prospects for future human liberation. Known for his forceful oratory, Shapiro was a people's propagandist, not a prolific writer or theorist, and Thoughts About Freedom is one of only a few pieces of his published work that remains today. The essay thereby provides a rare glimpse of how he understood his Jewish identity and a vital means of uncovering ideals that animated his long career as an activist.This article will examine Shapiro's life and variety of religious, political, and literary influences he contended with during his years in Europe and America, each providing important intellectual resources through which he forged his ethnic-socialist worldview, as described in his Thoughts About Freedom. Rather than debate truth or legitimacy of his interpretations of Jewish tradition, I will argue that Shapiro's system of beliefs was heterodox and syncretic, an ideological bricolage that blended sacred and secular, socialism and nationalism, and religious and philosophical traditions from Europe and America into his own particular understanding of Pesakh holiday and what it meant to be Jewish. First, I will consider Shapiro's life in Europe to examine his claim that socialism was the Pesakh spirit of future, showing how he combined his religious education and his engagement with socialism to forge his own understanding of Jewish peoplehood. …

Experiential learning and values education at a school youth camp: Maintaining Jewish culture and heritage

In our post-modern, globalised world, there is a risk of unique cultural heritages being lost. This loss contributes to the detriment of civilization, because individuals need to be rooted in their own specific identity in order to actively participate in community life. This article discusses a longitudinal case study of the efforts being made by Australian Jewish schools to maintain Jewish heritage through annual experiential religious education camps, coordinated in a programme called Counterpoint. The researchers’ aim was to analyse how a school youth camp can serve as a site for socialisation and education into a cultural and religious heritage through experiential learning and informal education. During research trips which took place over several years, interviews enabling insights into the process of experiential education were conducted with a total of three different Directors of Informal Jewish Education, two Jewish Studies heads, five participating teachers, seven youth leaders, as well as seven student focus groups. In their analysis of the semi-structured interviews, the authors of this article employed a grounded theory approach using a constant comparative method, which enabled a more nuanced understanding of the main phenomenon investigated. Over the years, they were able to observe two philosophical approaches, one of which focused more on socialisation, with immersion into experience, while the other focused on education, with immersion into Jewish knowledge. Their findings reveal that some educators aim to “transmit” knowledge through “evocation”, with the students involved in active learning; while others focus more on students’ “acquisition” of knowledge through transmission. Experiential learning activities were found to be more meaningful and powerful if they combined both approaches, leading to growth.

Positive Psychology in Jewish Education: Gratitude in the School and Synagogue Classroom

Positive psychology is a rapidly growing area of study for research psychologists, and more recently for school psychologists and educators as well. Yet religious education researchers and practitioners have yet to embrace this exciting new field. The current article introduces positive psychology to clergy and educators in religious institutions. By way of example, we explore gratitude, an area of particular focus among positive psychologists, demonstrating the benefits observed in those who possess and express this trait, and delineate how gratitude can be induced in the Jewish religious classroom.

El método micro-textual como herramienta de análisis de foros en línea en contextos multiculturales

In this paper, we present the micro-textual method as an efficient analysis tool for the research that is being conducted about online teaching and multiculturalism in higher education, in Melton Centre for Jewish Education in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The aim of this paper is to show how the method allows to identify and characterize different types of dialogues in online forums, and to examine their evolution. The method consists of a toolbox of terms that was developed for the analysis of texts. The aim of the method is to contribute to the understanding of textual and intertextual discourse and its evolution in virtual courses, particularly in higher education. This method uses textual and contextual components for the understanding of texts. The ethno-cultural indicator is a main component and it is related to the participant’s membership in a religious or cultural group, and to issues related to its identity. Through the example that was chosen for this work, we propose to analyze questions related to the interrelationship among personal, professional and ethno-cultural indicators, as well as the role of the teacher in online higher education.

Accentuate the Positive: The Influence of Kurt Lewin’s ‘Bringing Up the Jewish Child’ on Postwar American Jewish Life

This article contributes new insights into German-Jewish psychologist Kurt Lewin’s work and its considerable influence on American Jewish educational theory and practice since the 1940s. Though he died in 1947, Lewin’s theories about the emotional needs of the Jewish child and the principles of effective Jewish education continued to influence American Jewish pedagogy long after his passing. Lewin, a social psychologist who fled Hitler’s Germany in 1933 and eventually landed at MIT, argued for the importance of inculcating a notion of “group belongingness,” or attachment to the Jewish social group, in the Jewish child as a critical factor in his or her healthy emotional development. According to Lewin, positive and joyous childhood experiences with Jewish culture would shield Jewish children from debilitating feelings of inferiority and self-loathing. Rabbis and educators across the ideological spectrum relied on Lewin’s work to explain to parents how a Jewish education could help nurture happy, well-integrated American Jewish children. For American Jews in search of both acceptance and ethnic preservation, Lewin offered appealing scientific evidence of the psychic benefits of Jewish education and the potential of positive Jewish experiences to produce both proud, committed Jews and loyal American citizens. The impact of Lewin’s work on American Jewish life and thought is evident in the 2013 Pew Study, in which 94% of American Jews reported that they are proud to be Jewish.

Jewish Education, Past and Present: Israel Friedlaender Re-Visited

ABSTRACTA century ago, Israel Friedlaender—scholar, communal activist, and educator—played a key role in such educational institutions as the Teachers Institute of JTS, the Bureau of Jewish Education, the Menorah Society, Young Israel, and Young Judea. A JTS professor and prolific writer, Friedlaender has been described as “the teacher of the Jewish youth of that generation.” Yet, scant attention has been devoted to exploring his educational thought and action agenda. This retrospective focuses on Friedlaender’s activities and impact in advancing Jewish education and considers the relationship of his legacy to current directions in the field.

Code-Switching Functions in Modern Hebrew Teaching and Learning

ABSTRACTThe teaching and learning of Modern Hebrew outside of Israel is essential to Jewish education and identity. One of the most contested issues in Modern Hebrew pedagogy is the use of code-switching between Modern Hebrew and learners’ first language. Moreover, this is one of the longest running disputes in the broader field of second language research and education. Based on recent conceptualizations of bi/multilingualism together with findings from an empirical investigation of beginner students at an Australian university, this article argues that strategic use of code-switching serves the needs of both learners and teachers working within a bi/multilingual educational environment.

Political and Pedagogical Dimensions in Holocaust Education: Teacher Seminars and Staff Development in Greece

ABSTRACTThe present study examines Holocaust education and professional teacher development in Greece. It briefly reviews the history of Greek Jewry and the stance and significance of Holocaust education within the Greek education system from historical, political, and pedagogical dimensions. The study also compares various approaches, themes, and contexts implemented at the Jewish Museum of Greece (JMG) teacher seminars, with Jewish Education System of North America (JESNA) criteria designed for Holocaust teacher development programs. While serving as a guide, the study demonstrates how seminar organizers can provide teachers with the means of incorporating their local, regional, national, and global history and memory when teaching about the Holocaust.

Additional Contributions of ‘Abd al-Ḥaqq al-Islāmī to the Muslim-Jewish Polemic

‘Abd al-Haqq al-Islāmī, a fourteenth-century Muslim polemicist of Jewish origin, has been somewhat obscured in research due to doubts about the uniqueness and originality of his thinking and the extent of his Jewish education. This article, part of a broader research effort presently under way, attempts to surmount these doubts by demonstrating that ‘Abd al-Haqq made a unique contribution to the oeuvre of Muslim anti-Jewish polemics, displayed originality in his extensive use of gematria and adaptation of source material to his agenda, and possessed no small amount of Jewish knowledge. The last-mentioned is reflected in his familiarity with the structure and messages of the Bible, at least a superficial acquaintance with parts of the Oral Law, and possibly some proficiency in Hebrew.

Explication of the jewish child-rearing traditions in the principles of pedagogy of freedom

The article considers the author's view on the process of explication of the most characteristic for the Jewish national culture traditions of child-rearing in the principles of pedagogy of freedom. It is based on reconsidering, summarizing and comparing of the basic ideas of the Jewish child-rearing traditions based on the values of Judaism and identifying their basic ideas in the system of invarious principles which constitute the basis of the author's developed concept of pedagogy of freedom as a special direction of humanistic pedagogy. It views theoretical and practical bases of a personal inner freedom, its subjectivity, capability of conscious and responsible self-identification, independent choice and realization of the own life experience. Such comparison demonstrates fundamental Jewish education traditions in the principles of freedom pedagogy, their deep connection and it supports the idea that the pedagogy of freedom, not being a fully autonomous phenomenon, is genetically linked to the Jewish child-rearing traditions, which to some extent are focused on values of freedom

The ‘right’ education in Israel: segregation, religious ethnonationalism, and depoliticized professionalism

ABSTRACTThis paper underlines three foundations upon which the current condition of the Israeli education system is predicated. These are: (a) the separation between Palestinians and Jews in the Israeli education system and isolating both from any significant contact; (b) endorsing a strong ethno-religious ethos and narratives that widen the chasm between the Jewish ‘us’ and the Palestinian ‘them’; and (c) shaping education for the Palestinians in Israel as a highly standardized and de-contextualized endeavor that excludes ideology and politics, which are seen as irrelevant to good professionalism, while substantiating and thickening the ideological education in the Jewish education system in line with the right political agenda . In doing so, this paper contextualizes these foundations in the recent developments of Israeli politics. Particularly, the paper associates these foundations with the rise of the extreme right politics in Israel, arguing that these, taken together, serve the state’s efforts to continue preserving its excluding ethnocentric political regime and controlling the Arab Palestinian education in Israel under conditions of subordination and inequality.

Jewish Education in the Age of the Rediscovery of the Soul

ABSTRACTThe literature on Reform Jewish education in America rightly recognizes Emanuel Gamoran’s work in establishing the direction of Hebrew schools in the Reform movement toward a cultural pluralism influenced by Samson Benderley et al. Yet the terrain onto which Gamoran stepped was not unmarked. Prior to his tenure, three Reform rabbis thought hard about how new currents in psychology could strengthen Jewish education toward the ends of religious individualism. This article examines how Henry Berkowitz, David Philipson, and Louis Grossman integrated select currents in educational psychology into their writings on Jewish education, and into their theology of the educated Jew.

On the Origins and Persistence of the Jewish Identity Industry in Jewish Education

ABSTRACT“Jewish identity,” which emerged as an analytical term in the 1950s, appealed to a set of needs that American Jews felt in the postwar period, which accounted for its popularity. Identity was the quintessential conundrum for a community on the threshold of acceptance. The work of Kurt Lewin, Erik Erikson, Will Herberg, Marshall Sklare, and others helped to shape the communal conversation. The reframing of that discourse from one that was essentially psychosocial and therapeutic to one that was sociological and survivalist reflected the community’s growing sense of physical and socioeconomic security in the 1950s and early 1960s. The American Jewish Committee and its Division of Scientific Research offers an enlightening case study of this phenomenon. Jewish educators seized on identity formation, making it the raison d’être of their endeavor. But the ascent of identity discourse also introduced a number of challenges for the Jewish educator—conceptual, methodological, political, and even existential.

American Jewry at Risk: “A Time to Act” and the Prioritization of Jewish Education

Twenty-five years after the publication of A Time to Act, by the Commission on Jewish Education of North America (CJENA), we are in a position to evaluate this initiative with historical hindsight. At the time, the commission was heralded as an unprecedented communal undertaking and a signal that after years of perfunctory treatment and neglect by the organized Jewish community, Jewish education was gaining recognition as a vital concern. While accurate, this assessment benefits from contextualization both in the American and the American-Jewish situation of the 1980s and early-1990s. The CJENA and its report mirrored American anxiety during that same period about the state of K-12 education, while initiatives to address systemic weaknesses in Jewish education were concurrent with the spate of reform efforts spawned to address the perceived decline in public education. At the same time, A Time to Act exemplified a more general malaise within the Jewish community about the effects of rapid integration on Jewish ethnic and religious survival. Communal leaders became convinced that Jewish education could stem the assimilationist tide. The CJENA, which was funded by the Mandel Associated Foundations, also presaged a sea change in the funding of Jewish education, particularly the growing impact of mega-donors on the Jewish educational landscape. Among the commissioners were a number of the funders and foundation executives who emerged in the 1990s as formidable players in such areas as summer camping, adult education, leadership training, day schools and heritage tourism. Indeed, the greatest legacy of the Commission may be that it paved the way for the initiatives that followed. If A Time to Act was not a veritable voice crying out in the wilderness, its cri de coeur shaped the leading edge of a broad-based effort of reform and revitalization facilitated by an influx of family foundation funding. And while it is an exaggeration to claim that the commission generated the celebrated and fruitful mega-donor collaborations of the late-1990s and early 2000s, including the funding of Taglit-Birthright Israel and the Partnership for Excellence in Jewish Education, it undeniably contributed to an environment that placed a premium on such partnerships.

Financial Constraints on Intensive Jewish Education: The Interactive Effects of Financial Capacity and Jewish Connections

This paper examines the independent and interactive effects of financial capacity and Jewish connections on reported constraints in purchasing two intensive forms of Jewish education, day school and overnight summer camp. The analysis is structured around three hypotheses: (1) financial capacity is inversely related to constraints on Jewish education; (2) Jewish connections increase or decrease the level at which financial capacity determines financial constraints on Jewish education; (3) the strength of the inverse relationship between financial capacity and financial constraints on Jewish education varies by the strength of Jewish connections. We merge data from 13 local Jewish community studies to test the hypotheses with bivariate crosstabulations and multivariate logistic regression models. We assess the empirical evidence as showing moderately strong, though admittedly variable, support for our three hypotheses. The most robust support for the hypotheses comes in the case of financial constraints on Jewish day school education, with less consistent support when modeling constraints on Jewish summer camp. A final section highlights and integrates the main findings and concludes with several strategic and normative considerations.

Introduction to the Special Issue on Jewish Education

Introduction to the Special Issue on Jewish Education