Search results for: Early childhood

How do we talk to young children living far away from Israel about the current situation (Operation Protective Edge) when they are not yet old enough to understand terms like “Zionism” or “anti-Semitism” or “terrorism” or “occupation”? As parents of young children and also as Jewish educators, we would like to offer some tips for talking (and listening) to young children about the current conflagration.

Becoming a parent comes with many challenges, one of the first ones being choosing the perfect name that will honor tradition, sound unique but not too unique, and help form this child’s identity for the rest of her life. No biggie, right? We’re here to make this grueling but important process a bit easier with the launch of our very first app, Kveller Jewish Baby Names. Now you can search through our extensive Jewish baby name bank on the go, from the comfort of your iPhone or iPad.

Sixteen Jewish Early Childhood Educators from around the country had just completed the fifteen-month Jewish Early Childhood Education Leadership Institute (JECELI). We had engaged in intensive Jewish learning, inquiry and reflective practice, leadership development, and community building. The new task before us was to continue this meaningful experience by not only sharing our learning with our host institutions but also by deepening and strengthening the connections we had already formed. We were determined to continue our relationships, our community and our learning. We decided we would create for ourselves a COP (community of practice) among this tightly established group of educators that had formed in JECELI.

A foundation that distributes free Jewish books to Jewish children in North America and Israel is launching an initiative to deliver Arabic books to Israeli-Arab preschoolers. The Harold Grinspoon Foundation’s PJ Library and Sifriyat Pajama, PJ’s sister program in Israel, have collectively given away more than 10 million books in nine years. The new initiative for Israeli Arabs is called Maktabat al-Fanoos, Arabic for “Lantern Library,” and will distribute Arabic children’s books to 45,000 preschoolers living in Israeli-Arab communities.