Malka Scheinok, the BJE’s director of school services, calls it “the newest, most modern early-education program, based on a program from Italy.”
The idea borrows from the Reggio-Emilio program of “emergent curriculum,” utilizing the child’s curiosity and experience to drive the learning.
“It’s a fairly complex process that requires quite a lot of training,” she said. “To simplify it into a situation: If the child comes into the class and says, ‘Did you see the moon last night?’ you then spend the day or week teaching about the stars and the galaxies, whatever sparks their imagination.
“It’s not basically a Jewish idea, so we are adapting it, and JEMS is modeled on the Reggio program concept.”
JEMS has been test-running at the Osher Marin Jewish Community Center in San Rafael with great success, she said. “We’re going to expand it to San Francisco and the Peninsula this fall.”
Among its other new programs, the BJE is also piloting Jewish Journeys, a new curriculum at Havurah High, the teen education program in San Francisco. It emphasizes group learning and marks a distinct shift in program structure.
“In other years we’ve used the traditional format — a core class and then an elective afterward that gets changed halfway through the year,” said Mark Lazar, principal at San Francisco’s Havurah High. “This is a total departure.”
An adaptation of the adult education program Synagogue 2000, the teen program incorporates both informal educational methods as well as text study.
Journeys is designed to mesh with the introduction of a trimester-based school year, during which students will be engaging in three different Jewish Journeys. Those include such topics as Jewish Global Citizenship, Jewish Mysticism and Israel in the Media.
“Each term-long journey will be an elective unto itself, with one class and teacher the entire term,” he said.
The idea is to build a sense of community and increase the comfort level of the students.
Bob Sherman, executive director of the BJE, is excited about the new fall offerings.
“We are offering a whole lot of new programs in so many avenues of education,” he said. “There’s really quite a variety and diversity about what we’re trying.”
In addition to the Journeys, the BJE will be organizing all- school interactive workshops and programming related to the Jewish calendar and to Israeli affairs.
Beyond that, the BJE will put the Innovative Models of the Religious School Project into effect this year. The project is designed to give congregational religious schools the opportunity to work together, sharing resources and support.
The project is in collaboration with the national Experiment in Congregational Education project. Participating congregations will use it to help create a vision for their religious schools.
Lisa Langer, BJE community coordinator and educator, is tying together a legion of consultants and community coordinators trained by the BJE, congregation leaders and teamwork task forces.
The project includes five Bay Area congregations: Beth Sholom and Sha’ar Zahav in San Francisco, Peninsula Sinai Congregation in Foster City, Kol Emeth in Palo Alto and Peninsula Temple Sholom in Burlingame. The congregations will use an innovative technology-facilitated process to re-imagine their religious schools’ structure and agenda.
With five models presented on an online learning site, congregations will be able to choose elements that work best for them.
“It’s going to be an ongoing investigation of what’s outside, what’s wanted and what’s possible.”