J-Ed Talks

Akiva Carr is a passionate Jewish educator with 10 years of experience across varied age groups. He is in search of a meaningful way to transfer the skills and experience he has built over the years to others in the field. Akiva has recently moved into the field of crowdfunding for the non-profit sector with Charidy. Contact Akiva via email: akivac@charidy.com Akiva Carr on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/akiva-carr/

Akiva Carr is a passionate Jewish educator with 10 years of experience across varied age groups. He is in search of a meaningful way to transfer the skills and experience he has built over the years to others in the field. Akiva has recently moved into the field of crowdfunding for the non-profit sector with Charidy. Contact Akiva via email: akivac@charidy.com Akiva Carr on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/akiva-carr/  

Joshua Sevitz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshua-sevitz-mba-4a13a9109/ Do you want to learn about management in Jewish education? Listen to this episode to hear about the day-to-day ins and outs of a real-life on-the-ground leader of Jewish education teams. Josh brings wisdom and insight as he talks eloquently about the issues that Jewish education faces and how challenges may be met.   

Newly published book: What Would You Do? You Write the Book on Being a Mensch https://www.amazon.com/What-Would-You-DO-Mensch/dp/B0B28HWFLQ https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/what-would-you-do-rabbi-dr-david-s-bauman/1141491349 Rabbi Dr. David Bauman Bio Rabbi Dr.  Bauman has taught  Tanakh and Talmud at Solomon Schechter Day School of Metropolitan Chicago and at Robbins Hebrew Academy in Toronto, and he is the rabbi of Lake Shore Drive Synagogue. He also teaches for the Florence Melton School of Adult Jewish Learning. He was a commissioned officer in the U.S. Navy Chaplain Corps from 2011-2018, stationed in Great Lakes, IL and Okinawa, Japan, among other places. He received his rabbinic ordination from the world renowned Talmudic Scholar Rabbi Dr. David Weiss-Halivni and from Rabbi Zalman Nehemiah Goldberg z”l. He holds a Master's degree in Jewish Studies from The Jewish Theological Seminary, a Master's degree in Education Administration from New York University, and a Master's degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from The University of the Cumberlands in Williamsburg, Kentucky. His undergraduate work was completed at The American University in Washington, DC with a B.A. in Sociology, Education, and Jewish Studies. Rabbi Dr. Bauman earned a Doctor of Hebrew Letters degree in Jewish Ethics at Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership in Chicago. He is the author of the recently published book on Mussar for teenangers: “What Would You Do?: You Write the Book on Being a Mensch. Prior to his work in the U.S. Navy, Rabbi Dr. Bauman served congregations in the United States and Canada. Rabbi Dr. Bauman and his wife, Elly, are blessed with two adult children who live in Israel, Matan and Ori. Rabbi Dr. Bauman is an avid motorcycle rider and can be seen traveling to and from Akiba-Schechter on his Harley-Davidson. In addition, Rabbi Dr. Bauman has training in martial arts, having studied in the U.S., Okinawa, Japan, and South Korea. He was born in Reading, PA, two blocks west of the Monopoly Board railroad station and raised between Reading, PA and New Rochelle, NY.

We welcome Rav Ramon Widmonte, Dean of The Academy of Jewish Thought and Learning to the podcast. In this brilliant episode, he describes the work that The Academy does, both in the Adult Education space and in Teacher Upskilling. One small statistic: Almost 40 participants have done or are doing an MA in Jewish Education over the last couple years. This impact and much more can be discovered by clicking on that play button :-). Enjoy. 

What if you could speak to a student who graduated from Jewish day high school two years ago to ask them about their experiences? Well, in this episode, I tracked down a Jewish day school graduate who was willing to speak to me. "Bob" generously agreed to spend some time chatting informally. As an aside, you will note that I did not have an interview protocol to follow and that I also tried to sometimes provide 'leading questions'. If you are interested in the research side of things, you may want to listen with an ear to how the interview proceeds and how, in a research context, things that the interviewer does or says would have to change. If you are interested in the student perspective, you may want to compare this anecdotal chat to your own knowledge of students or to the more robust research literature that is out there. 

This is a fascinating overview of the Midrasha Institute for Adult Jewish Learning in Cape Town, from Viv Anstey, the director. Not only is Viv a "Serial Social Entrepreneur" in the Jewish community - her influence is felt in a diverse array of communal programmes - she is also a fountain of information about Adult Jewish Learning. Today, we focus on one of Viv's many projects, the Melton programmes which are run for a diverse audience. Listeners are in for a treat as Viv explains what it is that Melton does, what makes it unique, and the impact Melton has had through a range of partnerships. 

What is the purpose of Jewish education?  What is the trick of Jewish education? What is the core challenge that, if navigated successfully, can lead to success in the form of student learning? What is one way to sum up this core issue? Is traditional or progressive pedagogy more appropriate? Does it even matter? Is this a false dichotomy? Maybe it is. But maybe it isn't.  Opportunity cost is what educational decision-making is all about - if you believe Dylan Wiliam (and I mean, why wouldn't you?). But what if you tried to hold both this option and that option. Is this pure indecision and insanity or is there something to it? Are there ways to turn zero-sum games (EITHER OR) into BOTH AND situations? Who knows? I certainly don't. 

Basically, what the title implies. 

Hello again! It has been over a year since I posted. I had grand intentions for this podcast in 2021, but alas, the podcast fell by the wayside. Nevertheless, I had many interesting things happen and the future looks bright at the moment. Most of 2021 was challenging but in a good way.  I share a bit about the year that passed and look into the future. What can you expect content-wise from this podcast? Listen to find out. 

Welcome to a new episode with another outstanding educator! This is a wonderfully varied conversation with Dr Helena Miller (bio below) in which we discuss all sorts of things - from her research on a massive longitudinal study to teaching an MA in Jewish education online to students all over the world (and especially in South Africa).    I hope you find it interesting and informative.    Dr Helena Miller (Source) Co-Head of Teacher Training, Director of Degrees and Senior Research Fellow at London School of Jewish Studies   Dr Helena Miller has a PhD in Jewish Education and has taught, researched and written widely. She heads the “Jewish Lives” longitudinal study, following the cohort of young people who started in UK Jewish secondary schools in 2011. Helena is the senior editor of the two volume International Handbook of Jewish Education (2011 Springer). She is the senior editor of the Journal of Jewish Education, and has both initiated, and been involved in, many innovative education, research and evaluation projects in the UK and overseas. Helena was co-chair of Limmud International 2009-12, and received the Max Fisher Prize for outstanding contribution to Jewish Education in the Diaspora in 2012.

In this episode, Ronnie Gotkin, a veteran Jewish educator, shares some of the key challenges that confront Jewish education and Jewish educators today in Cape Town.  A sample of the topics we cover in the episode:  Ronnie's roles and career If you have the motivation, Hebrew fluency is attainable Hebrew education The role of Jewish history in Jewish education and more! but I don't want to give it all away, so go listen to our chat.  I hope you find it stimulating. 

What educational work goes on in Jewish Cape Town beyond schools? Rachel Bootcov joins us to discuss her role in the community, her views on various educational questions and challenges, the main considerations when creating programming for youth, and other issues.  Rachel is deeply involved in Jewish youth education. Currently, her roles are:  Youth Director at Temple Israel Head of the Zionist youth council Netzer Camp - Head of education and head of Cape Town    

If you have not read Chaya Herman's book, Prophets and profits, then what have you been doing?! In this magnificent book, Herman presents a critical account of the upheaval surrounding a Jewish day school in South Africa. She records various stakeholders' experiences as the school community navigates the treacherous waters of restructuring, new managerial systems, and a concerted effort by a new powerful individual (and his backers) to shift the school's ethos.  Even if you do not agree with her interpretation of the matter at hand, you will come away enriched due to the extensive breadth of the book and the erudition with which the author develops her argument. You will learn to look at Jewish education in South Africa in a new light and you will certainly experience the "shock of recognition" if you are at all familiar with the South African landscape. While this episode turns out to be a bit of a ramble, and I thought of re-doing it in a more precise/coherent way, I decided to leave it be. The book is more important than my comments, and the point of this episode is to introduce you to the book. So why delay?  I hope you go read it.   

This episode introduces the listener to M.E. Katz, a prominent Jewish education personality in Cape Town. His prominence is twofold. First, his professional career was spent as a Jewish educator and principal of Herzlia. Second, he produced (in 1980) a work on the history of Jewish education in Southern Africa that is unparalleled in its breadth and therefore essential reading for anyone who wants to do serious research in the field. I explore a theme he develops in his work and provide my own understanding of the implications of this theme for the contemporary scene.  You can access M.E. Katz's work here:  Title: The history of Jewish education in South Africa, 1841-1980. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/23668  

Having introduced Isaac Goss and his significance to the South African Jewish education landscape, I read an excerpt from his book entitled "Reflections on Jewish Education in South Africa" (1951).  The first essay is a letter written to Goss by a frustrated, yet well-intentioned and thoughtful parent. In it, he poses some challenging questions on the topic of Jewish education. He genuinely seeks answers to these questions, solutions to these problems.  Goss, for his part, addresses the issues in a methodical and practical manner. He weaves together abstract philosophies with concrete suggestions. He sets out to describe his vision for the system but remains anchored firmly to the reality on the ground. It is an interesting piece due to the delicate manner in which he explores these four elements (educational philosophy, pedagogic recommendations, systemic vision, practical suggestions). I do not analyze this further in this episode, but I hope you enjoy it in the raw, unprocessed form.   

This is the first of two episodes dedicated to Isaac Goss, perhaps the most influential Jewish Education Personality in 20th century South Africa. Director of the Board of Jewish Education for four decades and a dedicated educationalist his entire life, Goss's influence is still felt today in the structure and ideology of the Jewish educational system in South Africa. By South African standards, he is a prolific educational writer, and his literary output remains an indispensable resource for both the history of education research and insights into perennial questions.  In this episode, I try to date an apparently updated book of his. It is strange because his other works are all dated but this one is elusive. When was it published?  I track my thinking in this regard and tell you the date that I settled. But then something catches my eye. And this changes everything...     

We are privileged to host Professor Adam Mendelsohn in this episode. He discusses important findings from a recent set of surveys conducted by the Kaplan Centre for Jewish Studies. Although at first glance, the South African community survey is not immediately relevant to Jewish education, it is obvious to me that these results are very significant indeed. Schools are embedded in a community and serve the needs of that society, while also shaping that society. Many of the survey findings discussed shape and are shaped by the Jewish education system.  This is an important conversation to set the scene for deep questions such as: What is the purpose of Jewish education in SA? In Cape Town? What are the best approaches? And how shall we proceed? I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I enjoyed speaking with Adam.  You can read about our guest's bio below.  Kaplan Centre: http://www.kaplancentre.uct.ac.za/ Surveys: http://www.kaplancentre.uct.ac.za/kaplancentre/reports Adam D. Mendelsohn is Director of the Kaplan Centre for Jewish Studies & Research and Associate Professor of History at the University of Cape Town. He is the author of The Rag Race: How Jews Sewed Their Way to Success in America and the British Empire (New York University Press, 2014) and co-editor of Jews and the Civil War: A Reader (with Jonathan D. Sarna, New York University Press, 2010) and Transnational Traditions: New Perspectives on American Jewish History (with Ava Kahn, Wayne State University Press, 2014). He was Chief Historian of the exhibition The First Jewish Americans at the New-York Historical Society, and co-curator of By Dawn’s Early Light at the Princeton University Museum of Art. He is co-editor of the journal American Jewish History. Much of his work focuses on the relationship between Jews in America and the British Empire prior to mass eastern European migration, a time when these fledgling communities were beginning to grapple with the challenges of living in liberal societies. While the time-period that he focuses on has remained consistent – the mid-nineteenth century – the themes he has explored have been more varied: economic mobility, cultural production, and religious innovation. His latest project draws on “big data” – a large database of Jewish soldiers who served in the Civil War – to reconsider the experience of Jews during this period.

This was fun! In a very flexible, generative discussion, Efraim and I bounce ideas off each other. Some of it is pretty theoretical and abstract, but other parts clearly have practical applications for the teacher in the classroom and for the school within its societal context.  Efraim shared his personal background that shaped his desire to help students bring out their best from within. He talks of the value of educational approaches that value the individual as a person. And we wonder together about the challenges of conceptualizing and implementing such approaches.  I consider this a generative discussion rather than a formal interview and I hope you, as the listener, appreciate this different style of conversation. You can hear that some ideas are very raw, some connections are delightful and new. I hope this will lead to further thinking and development of ideas and practices for both of us. You the listener, get to tune in and hear a discussion wind its way around core problems that face education today.  As I say in the conclusion, this is just laying the groundwork, establishing the playing field, and I hope to connect with Efraim again on this podcast. I enjoyed it, and I hope you do too.         

Join us for a brilliant episode with Dr. Sharon Silverman, the incoming Chair of the Board of Trustees of Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership. She is an educator, academic, and published author. Scroll down for a full bio.   Student Voices: We Believe in You  Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership This discussion is filled with insights and wisdom about education and teaching and learning practices. It is peppered with personal anecdotes that illustrate Sharon's points and highlight her belief that stories are a great way to learn. A few details to look out for in the discussion:  Overall approach: While students have many similarities, each one is different from the next and we need to concentrate on how they differ from each other. What is emotional awareness? What is self-efficacy? What is persistence?  Practical suggestions for teachers based on these three components of the Believe In You model.  What is "applied Jewish learning"? "When you're green, you are growing. When you're ripe, you rot!" I hope you enjoy this episode and learn a lot. The quality of the conversation more than makes up for the limited quality of the audio recording itself.  Who is Dr. Sharon Silverman? Learn about her work below. Dr. Silverman is a founding partner in the consulting firm of TRPP Associates. She is an educator and independent scholar with degrees in learning disabilities and educational psychology. She is the founder and former director of the Learning Assistance Center at Loyola University Chicago where she developed LEAP, an award winning student access and retention program and a learning center at the Stritch School of Medicine. Dr. Silverman served on the Board of St. Augustine College in Chicago, the first bilingual institution of higher education in Illinois.    At Columbia College Chicago, Silverman helped develop The Learning Studio, an academic support center for students. At Harry S Truman College in Chicago, she worked with faculty and staff to develop a robust tutoring and tutor training program.  Dr. Silverman also helped The Adler School of Psychology develop a Center for Learning and Teaching. She continues to be a mentor/reviewer for the Higher Learning Commission.  She is a member of the Board of Trustees for Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership in Chicago.   Internationally, Dr. Silverman was a Fulbright Scholar in South Africa and subsequently received a Fulbright Alumni Initiatives Award for a project, "Sharing Cultures" connecting students and teachers in a virtual learning community at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University and Columbia College Chicago.   Other awards include a Rotary University Scholar Grant to continue her work in South Africa and a Fulbright Senior Specialist Award at Suleyman Demeril University in Kazakhstan.  She was an invited keynote speaker at the International Symposium on the Contributions of Psychology to Peace Research in Cyprus and an invited scholar at Kazakhstan-British Technical University in Almaty, Kazakhstan.   Dr. Silverman along with Dr. Martha Casazza co-authored the following publications: Learning Assistance and Developmental Education (Jossey-Bass, 1996) and Learning and Development: Making Connections to Enhance Teaching (Jossey-Bass, 1999), and Partners for Innovation in Teaching and Learning (iUniverse, 2005) and Student Voices: We Believe in You (iUniverse, 2017).

Saul Kaplan shares some of his experiences and wisdom about Jewish education in this short interview. Some of the powerful ideas he mentioned are: The importance of ownership an example of what this looks like The importance of the teacher Considering the input/output process to ensure the system has coherence Education as "the opening of minds" (my words, not his) I really enjoyed speaking to Saul and hearing his ideas. I personally benefit from his prior work on a daily basis and this interview shows a bit of why he was successful in putting together a framework that has lasted so long and is still beneficial to our school. 

What are the implications of Jewish education's obsession with programmes? Why do we have a proclivity to deploy programmes? In this episode, which is based on personal experience rather than objective findings, I explore this issue and the potential for a different approach. The key theoretical claim I make is to view programmes as a positioning act rather than a well-grounded educational decision. The position taken depends on the context but has some general characteristics, for example, that the position dichotomizes and paints the Other with one brush. It is therefore difficult to question the educational power of an established programme because to do so involves opposition to the taken position. You want to ask questions about the educational value, but the programme represents, by its very nature, a position taken (often implicitly ideological) that resists any attempt at questioning.  For those interested, I borrowed the concept of "position-taking"  from Rob Moore and Johan Muller in 'Voice Discourse' and the Problem of Knowledge and Identity. Although I don't state it in the episode, alternatives solutions to deploying programmes would involve addressing systemic goals and developing talent within that framework. Rather than creating further fragmentation through additional sub-systems, you would look to address goals through a holistic lens and problem solve in a whole system manner where implications of proposed solutions apply to all aspects of the system.  I think this idea really plays out in the online situation forced by the worldwide shutdown of schools. The resources that are thrown around as solutions represent programmes that are deployed in a school system. I understand the value in these resources as a short term solution. But as a permanent or long-term approach, I really wonder whether schools relatively indiscriminate adoption of resources is wise?

Along with teachers and schools around the world, we have, in a matter of days, transferred to 'remote/digital/online' teaching. I have found it difficult to transfer the cultural aspects of the school - those Jewish aspects that rely heavily on a physical presence at the school. For me, this includes things like Tefilla, ceremonies for significant Jewish dates, informal activities, corridor interactions, Jewish initiatives, charitable initiatives etc - things that create an 'Avirah' (atmosphere) in the school.  In this podcast, I reflect on the nature of these challenges in the hopes that a better understanding will lead to a better set of possible approaches. By the end of the episode, I identify what my "next-step question" is.  I offer a theoretical lens to frame this problem based on Legitimation Code Theory (LCT). This thinking was inspired by Dorian Love's blog post. I also refer briefly back to Ep 010 - the difficult part of education. How do we foster disposition development in students? Or, if you believe in 'identity goals', what is the connection between student learning and student identity formation? Put into the context of an online environment, these questions become all the more stark.   

Join Rabbi Gavi Ziegler and me for a meandering conversation - I ramble, he is direct and clear! - about Jewish education. We explore what he enjoys about his work, what goals his school has for Jewish education, the challenges they face, their focus on values and integrating values across the school.  Gavi's recommended resource is Rabbi J. Sacks's book "To Heal a Fractured World".  At the end, Gavi shares a powerful message (he heard from Rabbi Sacks) to give us strength during this time of lockdown due to the Coronavirus pandemic. 

I share Basil Bernstein's three fields of knowledge:  production recontextualization re-production Using this as a lens, I present a second idea about the quandary that Jewish day schools face in trying to meet the diverse needs of a diverse community. Since no real philosophy of Judaism within the community can be 'imported' into the school to meet diverse needs - because it doesn't exist, partly due to the fact that Jewish day schools are often the only institution in which diverse communities may combine (cf. the siloing of denominational synagogues) - a new philosophy has to be produced. Thus, Jewish day schools may serve as rich seeding grounds for new ways of thinking about Judaism.  It turns out that Jewish day schools, in addition to knowledge re-production (teaching and learning), may need to become sites of knowledge production and knowledge recontextualization. This may point to the complexity inherent in such endeavours as foundationally complex rather than merely technically complex. 

I know, I know, it's all tricky!! But hear me out and what I have to say in this overly simplistic analysis. In essence, I want to point out that the difficulty in education, the real sticky bit that we have not quite figured out, is how the integration of knowledge in the individual cultivates a particular lens/identity (perhaps this is a spectrum?) in that individual.  How do we minimize the loss of learning/content?  How do we facilitate the integration of knowledge? (I.e., How do people learn and therefore how should we teach?) How do individuals develop identity?  All questions (above) with lots of answers. I'm not saying these fields are simple, I'm saying they are well developed and well understood, at least by some experts in the field.  What is missing is this: how does the individual move from being a novice to being an expert, not just in terms of technical knowledge and ability, but in terms of their dispositions and intuitions. Not sure if this makes sense to anyone besides me... hmmm... lol. sorry 'bout that.   

Yael Fish is Head of Department - Jewish Life and Learning at a Jewish day school. She shares a few golden tips for early or starting teachers. Briefly, they are:  You can learn from your mistakes Balance what works for you versus what the team (or school) requires Don't take it too seriously Make your students feel good Have a mentor (who 'works for you')

I hope that everyone is indoors and safe. Here are a few thoughts about the challenges that this pandemic has created. Obviously, there are many more challenges than this and much more to say about it. Please stay safe and take the time, fifteen minutes every day, to zone in and think meta - think about the things you can do to make your days better. Blessings to you all. 

Topics in this epsiode My background as a teacher with EdTech My background as a student (online/distance)   Interaction between teachers and vendors EdTech community hype Over-emphasis on EdTech What type of research is done Things that are missing in an online environment Support through the 'grief' process in learning new stuff Teachers are expecting more from kids (especially re instructions) Learning conversations are stilted and unnatural Skills (as a conceptual whole) to thrive online - analogy to a novice apprenticed to a master to gain 'in-group' status The danger of this mass move to online/remote teaching is that ideas are disempowered (Papert). What does this mean for the pathway (i.e., the discourse going forward) - the types of questions/assumptions that are debated and enacted? 

A relaxed, substantive conversation about Jewish education with Stan Zive, friend and educator. Listen as we engage in a far-ranging discussion about Stan's experiences as a teacher, his approach, and general thoughts. This episode only scratches the surface and there is much more to dive into next time! 

Ari Poyurs has spent time as a Jewish studies teacher as well as in a role as informal Jewish educator. Join us as we hold a relaxed and enjoyable conversation about Jewish education and his point of view on some topics.

What is the purpose of Jewish Education? Join me for a relaxed monologue about three possible outlooks that you may or may not have heard of before. The first two, continuity and inherent meaning of Jewish learning, have been well explored in the literature, but the third one may be new to you. If we start thinking carefully about the purpose of Jewish education, we can create a system that is more purposeful and more guided. Ultimately, such developments foster further improvements in diverse areas of the system, including innovative approaches that challenge the current system. All in all, a good conversation to start and worth thinking about! 

Three short interviews from the National Jewish Education Symposium held in May 2018. The Academy of Jewish Thought and Learning hosted this symposium and I used the opportunity to get some audio content that traced people's personal stories and a short idea based on their own experiences.    Enjoy the listen and hope that you find it informative.

Am interview of two different people involved in Jewish Education in South Africa. At the Jewish education symposium, I went looking for personal journeys in Jewish education to share with the listeners of this podcast. Here are the first two.   

In this short episode, I explain why I am changing the format of the podcast.  I know that it has only been two episodes but I have been thinking quite a bit how to bring value to listeners and his to work towards my started goal of contributing to the conversion.  Thanks for listening.   P.s. I made this podcast entirely on my cellphone, including this upload!  Three next step is to edit in my intro music.

In this episode, we discuss the following ideas:  Dvar Torah - admit your mistakes Tech mezonos - Google Slides stop motion Shabbos Lunch - learning from all sources for the sake of our students Seudah Shlishis - Link coding and JS Contact details - Twitter @MrMrMoch     

In this inaugural episode, I introduce you to the structure of the podcast and also share some edtech tips for the Jewish Studies classroom. Stick around for the ending to find out how to get in contact and also please let me know if you like the final piece of music that ends the podcast.