Here's what you need to know!
The summer of 2020, the Jewish Education Center of Cleveland had the pleasure of assembling a very talented team of educators to create a one-year curriculum for children in kindergarten through grade six.
The learning approach to La-bri'ut: To Our Health and Wellness was developed based on the following challenges that emerged in the spring of 2020 as COVID-19 pandemic stay-at-home orders were put in place across the country:
As envisioned, parents are not part of the weekly k'vutzah meetings nor heavily involved in the children's projects, though the younger children may need some support. The model is built on the concept of cohorts (k'vutzot, groups) with up to 10 children - a number that can be seen relatively easily on the Zoom screen. To address computer-sharing challenges and engender family conversation, these groups are conceived of as family-based - multi-ages with several families of similar-age children or in geographic proximity. That said, directors may choose to create cohorts that are anchored in grade levels, school districts, neighborhoods, or any other model that fits your culture.
You will find incredibly helpful information in this curriculum's overview/introduction and this one page overview:
The learning approach to La-bri'ut: To Our Health and Wellness was developed based on the following challenges that emerged in the spring of 2020 as COVID-19 pandemic stay-at-home orders were put in place across the country:
- importance of creating, maintaining, and enhancing connections between children-and-children, and children-and-adults
- inherent difficulty for families when needing to juggling multiple computers and different learning schedules for their children
- challenge of retrofitting current curricular materials and textual materials to virtual learning
- appreciation for activities that siblings (and even parents) can support each other in accomplishing
- change in how children began to find their own way out of boredom – play and exploration returned
- fickleness of the Zoom platform at times (especially Sunday mornings after Saturday night security updates), as well as reported “Zoom exhaustion” by children, teachers and parents
- challenge of using Zoom for constructivist, collaborative, creative learning
- parental stress when staying-in-place and needing to juggle work responsibilities, children’s long days at home (including school work, meals, squabbles and boredom). Add to this teachers who are also parents, juggling their own children at home while trying to teach online.
- learning curve for teachers who for many, suddenly had to shift their teaching style to one that they were not used to; some, who were strong classroom teachers, may never feel comfortable in the online environment
- challenges for directors, clergy and others to offer leadership, curriculum guidance and resources for the learning of children in multiple grades
As envisioned, parents are not part of the weekly k'vutzah meetings nor heavily involved in the children's projects, though the younger children may need some support. The model is built on the concept of cohorts (k'vutzot, groups) with up to 10 children - a number that can be seen relatively easily on the Zoom screen. To address computer-sharing challenges and engender family conversation, these groups are conceived of as family-based - multi-ages with several families of similar-age children or in geographic proximity. That said, directors may choose to create cohorts that are anchored in grade levels, school districts, neighborhoods, or any other model that fits your culture.
You will find incredibly helpful information in this curriculum's overview/introduction and this one page overview:
labri-ut_one_page_overview_aug_2020.pdf |