Teaching Tu B'Shevat

Each year, the madrichim at PSJC have to plan lessons to teach to our classes on our own. This year, I plan to teach Kitah Gan about Tu B'Shevat, the birthday of the trees. In previous years, we have made seder plates or played Hebrew Boggle, so this year seems slightly boring in comparison. We will be making dirt and worms from pudding, Oreos and gummy worms, doing a sticker activity and reading The Lorax. What I'm most excited for is reading The Lorax, one of my ultimate favorite Dr. Suess books. While reading it for the lesson, I found myself with goosebumps. But, how could you not react to the words of the Once-ler, reflecting on his wrong doings and the lifting of the Lorax. He says, "UNLESS someone like you cares a who awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not." And I think that pretty much sums up our role as teens, as madrichim, as Jews, as students and as people. I guess, in a very basic sense, it is my job to be passionate about something, be it learning or tzedakah. That passion, more than anything else, is what I hope to find and to teach to my students.

I'll let you all know how the lesson goes, and, of course, when I find things that I truly do care an awful lot about.

-Julie

A Sunshiney Day

I just got back from the Hebrew School's annual Tzedakah Fair. After a very very last minute organization, I pulled off a booth for the PSJC Teen Social Action Group's project for this year: The Solar Cooker Project. Thanks to Elisabeth, Julian (who surprised me by showing up) and I were able to talk to parents and kids about the project, which raises money to buy solar cookers for refugee women in Africa so that they can cook near their homes instead of traveling long distances for firewood, making them vulnerable to rape and attack. In addition, many kids were able to decorate their own symbolic spoons, representing the project. I had a lot of kids get involved, staying with me at the station and helping explain the mission. Other kids offered to take some spoons around the fair and attract people to the booth. It took a lot of standing, but I was happy to explain the project and was so thankful that we got such a great opportunity to further our teen group's progress on this year's project. I feel like it was a great success and we also did a great job soliciting our Parents' Night Out program; a lot of parents seemed very interested. The only thing that could have been better is if we had more blank wooden spoons for the kids to decorate, because a lot of them got really into it.

-Lucy