EDUCATION IS OVERRATED

Education is overrated. The Merriam-Webster defines education; “to give (someone) information about something, or the knowledge, that you get from attending a school, college, or university.” Learning, on the other hand, has revolutionized the face of education forever. The more science continues to understand the human mind and the way in which we learn new things, the better off our students will become. Provided we make deliberate changes to the way we practice teaching. Content served, does not equal learning achieved. My first encounter with 21st-century learning, -a term popularized by innovative education- was Salman Kahn’s first ever homemade video posted on YouTube, where he tells the story of his nieces living in a different state wanting him to tutor them in math over the web. His homemade math videos soon went viral, becoming the impetus for him to quit his job and develop what is now widely known as Kahn Academy, promoting its ambitious slogan “You can learn anything.” It taught me as I watched my own children spend time with it, that customized, trackable, mastery-based learning was possible with the help of technology.
As educators we all recognize that our classrooms are filled with a diverse range of learners, the struggle we all share is how to reach each one of them single-handedly. The answer I believe is simple; blended learning. Over the last several years I have developed an entire blended learning Rabbinic Literature Program, allowing me to transition from being the sage on the stage, to the guide on the side. It has given my student the complete autonomy to learn, discover, at their own pace, and afforded me the flexibility to pull up a chair alongside a student and check-in with them and their learning progress. Naturally, all new things come with their own set of challenges, mine, in particular, is the unique challenge of attempting to teach not just a topic, but a way of life through the face of a computer. I still struggle to find that balance, I wonder; man vs. technology or vice-versa?

It has been an experiment that has proven results, with a measurable increase in student learning. The built-in formative assessments continuously check for understanding of the Text, along with the opportunity for students to demonstrate their understanding at the end choosing from an option of assessments. Education must be more than just, “gaining knowledge by attending school,” put best by our Sages “Educate each child according to his own way, and even when he is old, he will not depart from it.” 

My Rabbinic Lit. Web site can be found here: talltorah.blogspot.com

NO RESULTS - WHY CANT I GET MY MONEY BACK?

Op-Ed: I wonder why there is no money back guarantee in education if our schools don't live up to the mission statements that guarantee what their graduates will look like. I wonder why we promote students to think outside the box while sitting them inside a box. I wonder why we treat symptoms in education rather than diagnose the causes. I wonder how we want our students to be practicing Jews if we spend twelve years teaching them only the theory of Judaism. Educational requires a vision that causes us to ask, answer, guide and implement change.

I was raised in an ultra Orthodox community, with an upbringing and education to match. Old school Cheder style methods of discipline were used by our teachers. Never did we question their schooling style or lack thereof, not until I grew up did I realize that it is possible to educate a generation of children with kindness, understanding and acceptance and that our sacred Torah can and will continue to be the moral compass of our precious students for generations to come. So much has changed in the last generation alone, new and improved scientific theory about the human mind and the way in which it learns new things, along with constantly evolving theories about human behavior. If we want answers to the above mentioned questions we must educate differently than we did in the past.

Thirty one million people watched Sir Ken Robinson's Ted talk on “How schools kill creativity”, yet we still seem to be so far from making a dent in the problems that plague education. I spend every waking minute pondering about meaningful ways to affect significant change, I have no doubt that it is my life’s calling. My fifteen plus years in education have led me to believe that no single solution can be applied to solve all of Jewish educational challenges, rather each school needs a unique individual to create the balance necessary to take that particular school from good to great.

THE CASE FOR THE WORLDS FIRST JEWISH HYBRID SCHOOL

One of the fastest growing concerns of the Jewish Day School parent is the forever rising costs of tuition. It is a dilemma that is not going away anytime soon, rather it is a rapidly growing concern. For the first time in our history, higher earning parents are raising concern over the rising costs of tuition and the constant need to keep subsidizing costs on behalf of the lower income parents. As the local federations continue to pull back funding from the scholarship accounts of our local day schools, and the larger donation continue to dwindle, schools are being forced to raise tuition costs and use monies to cover their scholarship students that would otherwise be funding the growth of the institution. We must end the never ending rising cost of tuition.

The second growing concern is the ability of the traditional day schools to keep up with the rapidly changing needs of our 21^st century student, the student who will learn information in fifth grade that will likely be outdated by the time he reaches the workforce. We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented, in order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet. Our students are the future of an emerging world, battling challenges that we as adults, never had to face; our sacred Torah will serve as their moral compass only if we teach them how to navigate the seas. We must end the one size fits all model of education.

Welcome to the Hybrid model, solving the tuition crisis as well as the one size fits all educational structure. If we want to encourage our children to think outside the box, to explore, and develop into the future of tomorrow, we must take them out of the box. Allow them to collaborate rather than cheat, to love and embrace Yidishkiet rather than just read about it in a book, to learn at their own pace, rather than be held back by their peers. To advance beyond their grade level with the help of technology. Schools all across the nation are slowly doing away with the traditional 1960’s classroom model, frontal teaching, homogeneously divided classrooms and a one size fits all education.

Florida is home to the nation’s leading online school program, offered completely free to our children in return for taxpaying dollars that we would otherwise have no benefit from. We must take advantage of what is out there. Imagine the savings schools would incur as a result of eliminating half its staff and textbooks. When pitching a new sales concept, the first rule is always to create the need. The need is clear, and those looking for change don’t need to be sold. However, for this concept to become a reality it will take all involved to commit. As the old adage goes ‘it takes a village to raise a child’. I would love to hear feedback from all those wanting to invest in our future.

FOOTNOTE: Blended learning is an educational approach where the traditional classroom is integrated with an online component. A web-based Learning Management System contains curriculum and course materials, and ties the two learning environments (classroom + online) together. In a blended learning model, the teacher conducts lessons during scheduled class sessions, and students are assigned independent study online. The students receive face-to-face instruction during class meetings, and then logs into a LMS for independent study (or virtual group collaboration) to continue their learning and to complete assignments.

DEFINING THE CHABAD DAY SCHOOL CRISIS

I have spent the last twelve years in education, primarily in the Modern Orthodox/Community Day Schools, learning and growing from the way they run and develop their schools. They are trying to prepare their children for a rapidly changing world, for jobs that do not yet exist, to solve problems that we do not yet know are problems, to equipping them with the tools and skills necessary to remain loyal and devoted Jews who are capable of becoming moral young adults and eventually parents, who can financially and emotionally support a family. At least they are trying…

For years our (Chabad) day schools have relied on the teacher-directed, one size fits all, learning for school “sage on the stage” approach to learning, it does not work any longer, schools today are learner-centered, personalized, learning for life “guide on the side” places of learning. The old Chinese proverb says it best "Tell me, I'll forget. Show me, I'll remember. Involve me, I'll understand". For years we have churned out Yeshivah Bochrim and Seminary girls capable of doing one thing only, and when the square pegs didn’t fit into the round hole, we built ‘special Yeshivos’ for them, not realizing that we were setting them up to fail from the very beginning, by using the above-mentioned teaching methods. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are invested into these Yeshivos every year to ‘deal’ with the students that come out of the other end not necessarily only wanting to do the one thing they were taught to do. Why not invest those funds in the primary to middle school years of our children’s lives, so that every child, whether right brain or left brain, is given the skills and tools to face the future of his/her choice while maintaining the strong values and principles that only Chabad has to offer?

So many of our educators are putting their talent to good use in other schools, in schools where they would never send their own children, it’s time to use that talent to educate our own children. You may have read some of the recent Op-Ed pieces on some of the Chabad blogs, even though I am sure you have better things to do, that have very passionately and vocally expresses many of the growing and existing challenges we face within Chabad. It’s easy to identify the problems and to shift the blame; however, I know deep in my heart that the Rebbe wanted us to find solutions where we saw a ‘problem’.

Some of the problems are as follows: (in no particular order)

- A lack of professionally educated or trained staff.
- The absences of accountability.
- Weak teacher/administration work relationships.
- Weak teacher/ parent communication.
- Lack of classroom structure and or a unilateral discipline system.
- The reluctance to adopt or accept new teaching method and curriculum.
- The lack of a competent general studies education.
- Students that cannot critically think on their own.
- Students that are not being given the skills to become independent learners.
- Failing miserably in the area of basic respect for others.
- Failing to make learning relevant.
- Teaching for knowledge/facts/data only.
- The inability to apply skills.
- Not combating bullying
- "Teaching to the test”.
- Frontal teaching.
- Complacency.

To be honest most of our day schools are run like a Chasidisher Farbrengen, parents are begging for change, we now have an entirely new generation who desperately want to see something done to guarantee a better future for their own children, a Day School System that will recognize each child’s strength, a school that is student-centered, a school that will give each child what they need to provide for their families someday. I have and could cry for days without looking further than my own family and close friends, how much they struggle to support their families wishing they had some kind of ability to hold down a sustainable job. I firmly believe that along with a solid well balanced Judaic and general studies program that will give each child the ability and skills to be able to face the future, to leave the educational ‘System’ feeling confident to become the best at what that are good at, to use his/her G-d given talents to conquer the world, at the same time remain loyal and faithful to the love, warmth, and passion for Yiddishkeit, they are not a contradiction. I firmly believe that no matter how this generation has turned out, all of us want our children to be better role models for their children then we might be for our own.

A recent study of more than eight thousand individuals between the ages of eleven and thirty-one had eight common attitudes, behaviors, and expectations that clearly distinguished them from their parents and more than their predecessors of the 1960s, expect the following: (to name a few)

- Freedom to choose what is right for them and to express their personal views and individual identity.
- Customize and personalize, the ability to change things to better suit their own needs.
- To find out the behind-the-scenes analysis so they can find what the real story is.
- Collaboration and relationships to be a vital part of all they do.
- Entertainment and play to be integrated into their work, learn, and social life.


Not to recognize that today’s children cannot be educated by yesterday’s methods, that today’s children learn and think differently than the students of the past is a crime. We must and can do something about it. Yesterday’s Mechanchim are clearly doing a disservice to our children unless you think that we are producing well balanced successful adults. I would like to do so by setting up a meeting of the minds, a group of individuals that share a similar understanding, people who are capable of seeing the bigger picture.