Ethics Curriculum for
The Jacobson Sinai Academy and The Bergmann Upper School
Garfinkle Center
for Jewish Studies
All
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Kindergarten/
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Second
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Fifth
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Sixth
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Seventh
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Eighth
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/ References
Isreal
web Sites
Kindergarten
through Eighth Grade Ethics Curriculum
Kindergarten- Gratitude to God and Loving God Ahavat Hashem/Chesed
A. We Walk in God's Ways Deut. 10:12, 28:9
Use TRIBES format when applicable.
1. Create an Activity Chart on "How we are kind, generous, and helpful".
2. Maintain a bulletin board mural showing.."How we are kind, generous and helpful". .Include pictures from newspapers, photos from home and drawings.
B. Read an account of the "7 Days of Creation". Gen. 3:1-24
1. Group children (7), have children make their day ..(i.e. God created …) out of modeling clay to make a diorama of 7 days. (This might be done in Art Class)
2. Discuss and share what was included and why? What was left out that child would have included.
C. Teach children song "Eli, Eli" discuss the meaning. (Music teacher could help)
D. Teach "Shehecheyanu", have children recite it at all appropriate times (Perhaps Hebrew teachers can help)
E. Integrate their morning journal with ethical related teacher prompts.
F. Integrate "values education" into content areas.
G. Trips
1. Walk around and picnic on school grounds or Greynold's Park. Point out variety of "Creation" features. Have children bring back one piece of nature that they like to make a class "nature Diorama."
2. Visit a farm.
3. Watch appropriate movies or documentaries depicting nature or society.
H. Make tzedakah boxes (perhaps in Art Class)
1. Present choices of Mitzvah projects. Children will choose a year-long project. They will see clearly where the money is going and how it will help.
2. Bring in money at any time and keep in class. Children will watch the money grow.
Loving Your Neighbor v'ahavta l'rayacha kamocha Community Kahal
"You shall love your neighbor as yourself." Leviticus 19:18
"What is hateful to yourself, do not do to your neighbor. That is the entire Torah: all the rest is commentary. Go and learn from it." Hillel
A. We are all part of many communities.
1. Make a chart with 4 headings: Family, School, Religion, Friends.
Children will list at least 5 ways that they are part of each community.
2. Read stories of Cain and Abel, Joseph and his Brothers. Discuss (chart) how Cain and Joseph are similar and different in their relation to their families and to God and religion. What are the similarities in their own families? How can they make it better?
3. Create a "Love your Neighbor" bulletin board mural. Glue on pictures, photos, drawings, or anything that relates to the community.
4. Contact another Jewish Day school in our community. Set up a pen-pal program, visit each other and have activities together. Share a tzedekah project together.
5. Discuss and illustrate, "Do not separate yourself from your community." Pirket Avot
6. Teach and discuss the songs "Hineh Mah Tov" (translarte this) and Pirke Avot "All Israel are brothers" Tanhuma Naso 3 "You shall love your brother as yourself" Hillel (Music class can help)
B. Possible field trips or on campus activities
1. Wannado City
2. Other Synagogues and Jewish Community Centers
3. Have speakers and visitors from the different communities.
4. Rabbi takes classes on a "Get to know what a rabbi does" trip.
C. Make tzedakah boxes (perhaps in Art Class)
1. Bring in money daily or weekly and use it to teach "Creating a Chart".
2. Choose a community charity to support: visit that charity, get literature on it, have a speaker come, write letters.
D. Integrate across content areas.
Peace in the Home Shalom Bayit and Honoring Your Parents kibud horim
A. "Where there is domestic harmony, the Lord Himself dwells in the home" Sukkah 17a
1. Discuss the quotation.
2. Bring in photos of family to add to mural showing "shalom bayit".
3. Continue journal entries for one week describing shalom bayit (or lack of) in their home.
B. Read and discuss the story "The Rabbi's Eye" in the book "Who Knows Ten" by Molly Cone.
C. Honoring Your Parents- what is special about them? How do we honor our parents? Why is this considered to be the most difficult of the commandments to follow?
1. Make a "Responsibility Chart" headed "parents' responsibilities towards children" and "childrens' responsibilities towards parents."
2. Families are unique. Create a scrapbook of family memorabilia.
3. Read the "Giving Tree" by Shel Silverstein. Discuss how this story can be a story of a family.
4. Draw a "Giving Tree" having the leaves representing all the things that family/parents do for each other.
5. Learn a Hebrew song about abba/ema.
6. Students will keep a simple journal with headings of "Mother", "Father" (possibly grandparents) for one week, listing all the things that their parents do for them.
D. Trips
1. Parents and teachers (perhaps school) will arrange to have Shabbat dinners various homes. (Each host home will invite 3 or 4 classmates, ensuring that each child is invited to be somewhere. Or have entire grade at one place where all parents bring kosher "pot luck".)
2. Each child will make a tzedakah box (perhaps in Art Class) and bring in money daily . Class will decide where money will go: an orphanage or shelter, school for special children. The recipient of the tzedakah will be contacted by letters or by email and perhaps culminated by a trip to the site.
3. Invite a speaker or take a trip to an HRS facility.
Guarding the Earth
Shomrei Adamah Do Not
Waste Bal Tashchit
A. "In the hour when the Holy One created the first human being, God took the person before all the trees of Eden and said…'See my works, how fine and excellent they are! Now all that I have created, for you I have created. Think upon this, and do not corrupt or desolate my world: for if you corrupt or desolate my world: for if you corrupt it, there is no one to set it right after you.' " Kohelet Rabbah 7:28
"But ask the beast and they will teach you, the birds of the sky and they will tell you: the fish or the seal, they will inform you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Eternal has done this." Job: 7-9
1. Discuss various textual quotes concerning ecology and destruction of the earth. Make an experience chart.
2. Write daily or weekly journal entries.
B. Read and act out the the story of "Choni and the Carob Tree" or "Noah" in Hebrew or English or both.
C. Collect articles about conservation issues.
1. Make charts of Jewish values that can be identified in articles
2. Make a two part mural with one side "How we destroy the earth" the other "How we preserve the earth". Include pictures, photos, or writings.
D. Set aside time after lunch to go to the classrooms collecting plastic refuse from lunches.
E. Do a home survey of cleaning products to assess what is dangerous to environment.
F. Adopt a tzedekah project based on Guarding the Earth. Raise money, write letters, contact the people, and culminate with a visit.
G. Trips
1. Recycling Centers
2. Collect eye glasses, hearing aids, school supplies, etc. and go to donate to a specific shelter.
3. Visit a working farm or ranch.
Respect for all Human Life, the Developmentally Disabled, and the Physically Challenged Mishaneh Habriyot
Teach Blessing for when you see someone that is different. "Blessed are you Lord of the Universe, Who formed many types of People" (Hebrew teachers can help)
A. Why should we bless God for making people different?
B. Why should we bless God for making some people physically or developmentally challenged?
C. Invite developmentally/physically challenged individuals to class to speak about their family life, how is the same/different (OR invite a relative of the challenged person to discuss the best way children can help and behave).
D. Journal entries will be dealing with feelings concerning developmental/ physical differences.
E. Learn a bracha or song using sign language. (Maybe Tracey Bellew can help).
F. Conduct a survey in our local area indicating which stores or services have wheelchair access. Explore our school and temple facilities for special provisions. Make a chart relating to different accommodations: i.e. entering buildings, hanging up coats, drinking water, bathroom facilities, parking cars, washing hands, getting a siddur, sitting in the sanctuary or chapel, hearing the service. Does the temple have a wheelchair on the premises for someone to borrow? Is there a phone for the hearing impaired? Are there large print or Braille Siddurim? (Maybe the class could raise money to purchase these things as part of their mitzvah project). Invite president or rabbi to discuss any actions necessary for the synagogue to take to make the facility more friendly to challenged individuals.
G. Contact Best/Buddies, a school for the deaf, or a school for the blind. Invite speakers, write letters, contact the institution.
H. Make tzedekah boxes, collect on a daily or weekly basis, choose a foundation or cause (braille books, wheelchair, donate tzedekah for their fundraising events)
I. Have the class role-play different disabilities
J. Trips
1. Visit the recipient of tzedakah drive. (Make sure students are welcome)
2. Visit a School for Deaf and or Blind. Research to see if there are facilities specifically for Jewish children.
3. Attend and participate in Special Olympics activities.
Doing Righteous Acts/ Tzedakah /Fixing the World Tikun Olam
A. "A woman of valor…is one that stretches her hand out to the needy" Proverbs 31:20
"Tzedakah is as important as all the other mitzvoth combined." Baba Batra 9a
1. Students will identify the needs of others. Students will make individual charts with headings:
What are people's needs? What am I good at? What do I like to do? How can I help others to achieve their needs? Where can I do it?
2. Tzedakah boxes (perhaps made in Art Class) bring in daily tzedakah, research and choose a charity…write letters, send email, invite speakers, visit the facility.
3. Write to various corporations describing charity and class goals, ask for donations of a specific type.
B. Invite speakers: Best Buddies, Special Schools, HRS, Federation to speak to children (and perhaps parents) about opportunities for Tzedakah in the community. Write thank you notes, contact by e-mail and arrange ongoing integrated activities.
C. Use the class mural to collage articles, photos, and writings demonstrating "tikun olam".
D. The focus of their class play could be based on some aspect of giving to the needy.
E. Write to the president of the temple requesting that before each meeting of the board, SPA, study group…a teach box be passed around to help with this specific cause.
F. Have children write their requests for tzedekah to be read at meetings, services, etc. to raise awareness for their project.
G. Trips
Visit schools, shelters, neighborhoods. Ask parents to drive their children through depressed neighborhoods so they can see how others live.
Visit designated charity twice, once at beginning of each project, and then at the end of the (project) year. After their money has been donated, visit or get photos and letters to see tangible proof of their work.
Life Cycle: Covenant Brit or Sacred Purpose
A. Read accounts of covenants from Torah. Genesis 2:1; Exodus 31:16 (Shabbat); The Flood and the Rainbow: Genesis 9:8; Circumcision: Genesis 17:4
1. Create a chart with the headings: Texts, God's Part, Our Part, Symbol
2. Discussion: What is a covenant? Why should we consider "tzedekah" and "tikun olam" as part of that covenant? What type of relationships would be based on covenants? Why do we do tzedakah? Does knowing about the Covenant change attitudes toward tzedakah and life cycle events?
B. Write essays based on textual material.
C. Make a grade mural depicting various life cycle events that are based on covenant.
D. Discuss, write an essay: "A Mitzvah is an action required by Covenant" (Sacred Act or brit)
E. Tour the synagogue and school. List what mitzvahs can be performed in different places (examples: Sanctuary: prayer, Lobby: collecting baby items, food, School: teaching to children, Bathrooms: avoid lashon harah, Office: hospitality,.
F. Tour home with parents and make a similar chart.
G. Have a personal mitzvah day. See how many of the personal mitzvot you and your classmates can do.
H. Commit to a foundation or charity. Raise money (individually or as a class) work, donate time, money. Log all activities into a digital portfolio.
I. Invite Rabbi, Principal of School, Cantor or Temple President to have a discussion of life cycle events.
J. Make Havdalah candles, Sell candles to congregants and donate proceeds to designated Jewish cause.
K. Find someone needy who is expecting a child(ren) in the community. Have a tzedakah drive to pay for baby's needs (possibly pay for brit milah).
L. Trips
1. Locate and visit an old Jewish cemetery in the community or nearby. Beautify a neglected area. Ritually bury siddurim or Jewish objects.
2. Visit a Jewish museum. Discuss the continuity of Jewish people.
Loving your Neighbor v'ahavta l'rayacha kamocha Repairing the World Tikun Olam
Individual mitzvah projects
A. Tikun Olam and Loving one's neighbor
1. Discuss what is Tikun Olam, and what it means to Love your neighbor.
2. Make an ongoing mural. Include photos, poems, writing and drawings demonstrating "loving your neighbor".
B. Research various Jewish charities and organizations based on tzedaka: Federation, Magen David Adom, or Akiva, schools and homes for elderly, physically and or mentally challenged, the poor.
1. Children will choose charity for their mitzvah project (community service) A covenant will be signed by parents and children as to the intent and purpose of mitzvah project (community service will be based on both the project and individual hours)
2. Students will keep a computerized journal of progress, experiences, trips to charity, phone calls, donations of time or money (projects to raise money)
C. An essay of intent and purpose will be saved in their portfolio.
D. Social studies credit be given for community involvement.
Loving Israel Ahavas Tziyon
A. Create a classroom mural on Israel which could include: current events, politics and political parties, geographic locations, the peace process, aliyah, kibbutz life.
B. Group Mitzvah Projects to Raise Money for Or Akivah. Find out the needs, communicate, write letters, e-mail.
C. Students read important essays re: these quotes:
"If you will it, it is no dream." Herzl : Teach the song "Im tirtzu, ain so agadah."
"The Jewish People…forced to leave their ancient country, has never abandoned, never forsaken, the Holy Land: the Jewish People has never ceased to be passionate about Zion. It has always lived in a dialogue with the Holy Land. " Heschel
D. Listen to Israeli popular music. (perhaps the music teacher can help)
E. Buy Israeli products. Arrange a Shabbat dinner using only Israeli products and dishes. Speak only in Hebrew, except to parents.
F. Open a bank account in an Israeli bank.
G. Trip to Israel…visit Or Akiva
"Teaching Mitzvot" by Barbara Kadden and Bruce Kadden
"The Zif Giraffe Program" by Danny Siegel
"The Book of Jewish Life" by Jo David and Daniel Syme
"A Topical Bible" Naomi Pascheff
Making a Difference" by Bradley Artson and Gila Gevirtz
Created and Compiled by Laurie Steinberg and Roz Averbook