The Religious Schools
Education is B'nai Emunah's first priority, and young people are at the very center of our program. Our school staff, headed by Director of Education Eliyahu Krigel, offers formal instruction combined with effervescent informal programming, including a Middle School youth group (No'ar Emunah), regular overnights in Fall and Spring, and our B'nai Mitzvah Camping program. Eliyahu has a gift for related and affirming relationships with youngsters at all age levels. Our School Committee is eager to make sure that youngsters from pre-kindergarten to 12th graders take pleasure in their studies and develop a solid familiarity with Jewish civilization.
The Elementary School curriculum is shaped by our association with the Institute for Southern Jewish Life, a visionary agency which serves congregations in the South and Central Midwest. The ISJL curriculum connects our young people with their Jewish peers in other cities, and ensures a rich and stimulating experience in the classrooms of our school. Our pioneer ISJL intern during the 2008-2009 academic year was Shelby Deeney. Our current intern is Allison Goldman, and we look forward to a long and productive association.
In cooperation with Temple Israel, our sister congregation, B'nai Emunah is actively involved in two important combined programs. These are Midrasha (grades 7 through 12) and Ivriya (an accelerated program of Hebrew language instruction for older youngsters). If you'd like to register for Midrasha for the coming semester, click here.
Substantial support is available to students who wish to participate in an Israel Pilgrimage program or summertime study camping. We are committed to the Ramah camping movement, but will also help underwrite summer experiences in any program that affirms basic standards of observance and involves young people in a program of formal Jewish study. Printed material describing our program in detail is available by calling Eliyahu Krigel at 918.585.KIDS
The Core Commitments of the
Congregation B'nai Emunah Schools
Rabbi Marc Boone Fitzerman
We believe that education is the highest purpose of the congregation, and that every good thing flows from that core. We are committed to engaging the best and brightest practitioners and giving them the full support of all congregational stakeholders. Our aim is to employ people of enormous talent, whose gifts are encouraged to flourish and grow.
It is essential to us that children experience our school as a place of joy; that they feel loved and embraced by the teachers, administrators, and staff members they encounter. We believe that our children deserve this affection, and that they will associate the warmth and care of the school community with their experience as members of the People Israel.
We expect that our school will encourage friendship between children, connecting them to one another in a continually expanding network. We ask that the same attention be paid to connecting families, so that the community of the school becomes a rich social experience for its members.
We believe that education unfolds along a continuum; that the education of adults is no less important than the education of children. In fact, intellectually curious adults who are committed to their own education as Jews help to ensure that their children will connect with our tradition.
We think that our future lies in a hybrid school experience that emphasizes learning, mastery, and the classic value of Talmud Torah inside a context of experiential, affective education. Neither is sufficient alone, and both are required to make the school experience sweet and worthwhile.
We are committed to Hebrew as the language of the Jewish People. At the most basic level, we expect that the children of our primary division will be accomplished reader/decoders by the time of bar and bat mitzvah. We expect, also, that our school will lay the groundwork for later fluency and the study of classic Jewish texts in their original languages. We commit ourselves to exploring various curricula in the name of moving more quickly toward this goal. In an ideal world, real language acquisition would begin in the primary department, with still more substantial gains in middle and high school. (See below.)
Our school aspires to partnership in varying and appropriate degrees with all other Jewish institutions in Tulsa. We are determined to deepen all of these relationships, coordinate our programming, and work toward the goal of mutual advantage and growth.
Our school is also in partnership with each child’s home. Unlike tasks in business or industry, Jewish education cannot effectively be outsourced. One of our essential tasks is to strengthen every parent and grandparent as a primary Jewish educator in the life of a child. What is transmitted with love from parent to child is likely to be cherished and valued for a lifetime. No other mechanism for transmission is likely to exceed this crucial link as a conveyor of ultimate values and commitments.
We believe in innovation, experimentation, and noble failure. Nothing significant can be accomplished without risk, and we are ready to support interesting projects that have not been tried before, even if they end in occasional disappointment. Our future gains will be richer as a result.
We believe in the importance of a best-practices curriculum, constantly reviewed and compared with alternatives. Thoughtfully designed and carefully implemented, such a curriculum would expose children to the wholeness and complexity of Jewish civilization, and create well-rounded, knowledgeable members of our community.
We are determined to address all children in our congregation, with attention to their unique strengths and life situations. Every child has a place in our program, and our approach to education requires that we adapt our efforts to individual need.
We expect that the tone of our school will be marked by shared enthusiasm and mutual respect between teachers and students, as well as students with one another. We seek a school environment that is conducive to learning, civil, and courteous, and avoids a preoccupation with policy, procedure, and elaborate strategies of discipline. In its place, we invite students, parents, faculty, and others into an environment of problem solving, the establishment of goals, and flexible response.
Synagogue education offers unique opportunities for integration. We expect that the life of the Synagogue—Shabbat, festivals, the essential institutions of Jewish civilization—will be the life of the school. We commit ourselves to exploring every opportunity to bring the two together.
We strive for integration, as well, on another level, between school and the context of other experiences, programs, opportunities, and realities in which it operates. We are especially eager to shape informal experiences in which children and adults feel the passion, power, and ultimate meaning of Jewish life. This sometimes happens in the classroom, but frequently occurs in informal settings. When it is functioning at it most accomplished level, our school would ensure that children and adults are regularly exposed to these transforming moments.
Mo'adon
We’d love to have more time with kids at the Synagogue, and to get kids to experience the Synagogue in new ways. With that in mind, we’re investing in a new opportunity for our elementary students on Monday afternoons called “Mo’adon: Club Judaism at The Synagogue.”
Mo’adon will be different from Hebrew and Sunday School. Look for a program that’s informal, experiential, and always changing, based on the likes and enthusiasms of our youngsters. During the first semester of the new year, we’ll be working on Jewish cooking, Jewish film, and a Jewish newspaper for students. Next semester, it could be something else, depending on our kids. Many of these activities will be centered in the new Samuels Youth Center, with foosball, bumper pool, and Wii at hand.
All third through sixth graders are invited to join “Mo’adon: Club Judaism” this fall beginning on Monday afternoon, September 14. The group will meet from 3:30 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. Every afternoon will start with a healthy snack, prepared by kids in the Synagogue kitchen. This program is entirely voluntary and open to every elementary school student in the Synagogue community.
Please call Eliyahu Krigel at 585-KIDS or write him at Eliyahu@bnaiemunah.com if you would like to enroll your child in our new program. We’re excited about creating a new space for Jewish elementary school students where they can connect with the Synagogue, express themselves Jewishly, and work creatively with one another.
Hebrew in the Synagogue School
One of the greatest challenges in American Hebrew schools is the question of Hebrew, itself. Like all other language programs, learning Hebrew requires multiple contact hours and constant reinforcement. It cannot be learned as a living language in the hours available in our educational program.
Our program is designed to deal honestly with this fact. In grades K-2 we concentrate on Hebrew letter recognition. In Grades 3-6 we concentrate on decoding skills. That means the fluent association of consonants, vowels, and sounds that allow a child to pronounce the words of the liturgy in preparation for bar and bat mitzvah. To raise this exercise to a more meaningful level, we also pay attention to key terms in the liturgy that define a distinctively Jewish world view. These include such terms as chesed (lovingkindness) and tzedek (justice).
Beginning with Middle School, we encourage participation in Ivriyah, the living language program in our joint school with Temple Israel. Students move through the Hineni and ISJL series in small groups with native speakers. We believe that there are great gains to be made in this program, although we are still hampered by the number of available contact hours.
For families who are eager to get an earlier start, we are pleased to announce a new program at the Synagogue of supervised, individual study. Under the direction of Eliyahu Krigel, the program will meet formally once a week on Monday afternoons, but the emphasis will be on self-paced study using a combination of print and electronic materials. We are eager to begin this Hebrew instruction experiment, and hope that families will make contact soon.
