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Friday LetterFriday Letter Archive | Friday Letter Alerts
September 17, 2009
On behalf of the entire elementary school administration, faculty and staff, we wish you a Shanah Tova U’Metukah, a sweet and happy Rosh Hashanah. Happy 8th Birthday, Yael and Rina! Fri. Sept. 18 Erev Rosh Hashanah – NO SCHOOL Online Student Technology Survey - NYS Education Department has just released the Student Technology Survey 2.0 for student input on the development of a statewide educational technology plan. This survey is an updated version of a student technology survey released by the State Education Department in June 2009. The Student Technology Survey 2.0 is for students at all levels and stages of learning. It addresses questions such as: What kinds of technology do you use both in and out of school? What kinds of technology do you want to use, and how? We encourage you to share this survey with your child so that the NYS Technology Plan will reflect the input of a comprehensive sample of NYS’ students, including Jewish Day School students. The Student Technology Survey 2.0 can be found at: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=_2fnjMG1PK8b92nKxZP17A9Q_3d_3dThe deadline for completing the survey is September 30, 2009. Last Call for Lulav and Etrog Orders – We encourage children to bring lulav and etrog to school throughout Hol HaMoed Sukkot, so make sure you place your order by Wednesday, September 23rd. Delivered in school on Thursday, Oct. 1st. Last Call for ASK Program – There are still spaces open for our Monday and Thursday after-school programs. If you are interested, register by Monday, September 21st. Click HERE for ASK brochure and registration form. Weekly Math Mania – Mrs. Swerdloff’s New Website for weekly math challenges at each grade level is off to a great start! Lots of children and their parents participated in week #1, but plenty more have not yet tried it out: • Go to the website http://www.mathmania4kids.com • Click on the challenge of the week for your child’s grade level • Print out the challenge and read the problem carefully. Talk to your child about the different ways to approach the problem. There will usually be more than just one way to figure out the solution. • When you and your child figure out the answer, please be sure to have your child’s first and last name as well as his/her class written clearly at the top of the page. • Have your child bring the finished paper into school and place it in the MATH MANIA box for his/her grade that is located in the front office Click HERE for more information about Math Mania. Paper Recycling Program – Brown Paper Bags Needed – Last week, we asked for lots of brown paper bags to be sent in to help the fifth graders collect paper for recycling. We need way more! Please send it brown supermarket bags, this week, and frequently. We will need a constant supply all year long. Label All Your Children’s Outerwear and Lunchboxes – the lost and found collection is already growing, populated by unlabelled items. Pretend this is camp! Please label all your children’s jackets, sweaters, sweatshirts, Kippot, lunch boxes, and backpacks. FYI: Mrs. Jan Brunswick volunteered to pack and deliver 8 crates of children’s clothing left at the school at the end of the 2008-2009 school year. ____________________ Dear Parents and Friends of the Solomon Schechter Elementary School, Tapukhim U’D’Vash B’Rosh Hashanah… These days, voices of children singing about apples dipped in honey on Rosh Hashanah waft through the air and the Schechter elementary school. The month of Tishrei is knocking and the Schechter kids are ready!! Each grade, at its own developmental level, explores the themes and symbols of the Jewish New Year, and for the next four weeks, we will sing, paint, explore, pray, write, read, and eat (and NOT eat!) our way through the holidays of Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Hashana Rabbah, Shmini Atzeret, and Simchat Torah. There is so much to learn, so much to do, that I feel grateful to have the luxury of time which only teachers and students in a Jewish day school have to delve into the holidays. This week, Rabbi Herrnson and Rabbi Schwartz, our Director of Jewish Life, paid visits to many of the classrooms, giving demonstrations of Shofar blowing, telling stories, and wearing a Kittel, the traditional white robe worn by rabbis and cantors on the Yamim Nora’im, the Days of Awe. The bad news is that your children have not learned everything there is to know about the holidays. The good news is they – God willing – will live long lives and continue learning more and more each time they pass through the annual cycle. I personally am a member of the Huntington Jewish Center, and this year, my rabbi, Rabbi Neil Kurshan, put out an email request asking congregants to send to him their recollections of Days of Awe. He has subsequently shared one response per day in an email to the congregation called the “Elul Project.” People have shared amazing and interesting, insightful, funny and reflective memories, and each day, I have so enjoyed reading them. It gave me an idea to propose to you: this year before Rosh Hashana, share with your children a poignant memory of the Days of Awe, perhaps a story you never told them before. I bet they will enjoy it. This is also the season of forgiveness, the time when we make amends with people we have wronged throughout the past year. The Talmud teaches that making T’Shuva is a pre-requisite before we can stand before God and petition for forgiveness on Yom Kippur. When my children were very young, probably in 1st or 2nd grade, I decided to make the bold step of telling each of them individually, in detail, one episode when I had done the wrong thing. Then I asked each one for forgiveness. Here is an example: “Remember that time you guys were laughing and running around having fun and making noise, and I screamed at you for making so much noise? I lost it. I had a headache, and that was not your fault. Come to think of it, yelling at you only made my headache worse! I’m sorry for losing it and yelling at you. I hope you will forgive me and I will try to not to lose it in the coming year.” Then a kiss and a hug. I must say, that first time, they were stunned. They did not reciprocate because they weren’t prepared to do so, which was just fine. In the years ever since, this has become an annual tradition in our family, the tradition of reflecting on our own behaviors and “fessing up.” As they got older, my children gained an appreciation and respect for my honesty and regrets, and they too, began to prepare and think about what they want to say sorry for to me. And then they spontaneously started doing T’shuva with each other. Over the years, an amazing thing started to happen…we got nicer and nicer to each other as we became more and more reflective about our own behaviors, not just in the weeks leading up to the Tishrei holidays, but all year long. I have to give credit to the fact that we decided to take seriously the simple Jewish ritual of doing T’shuva when the kids were little. I wish you and your families a Shanah Tova U’Metukah, a sweet and peaceful and healthy new year. To read a beautiful Rosh Hashanah poem that our librarian, Mrs. Katz, read to the children, click HERE. Shanah Tova,Dr. Cindy Dolgin Elementary School Principal D'var Torah
Dr. Shuly Rubin-Schwartz is Dean of the LIST College, Associate Professor of Jewish History and Acting Director of Enrollment Management at the Jewish Theological Seminary. She is a past co-chair of the SSHSLI Board of Education, parent of SSHS alumni Avital (Tali) ’98 and Eliezer z”l ’00 and mother of Rabbi Moshe Schwartz, Director of Jewish Life. Psalm 27 Psalm 27, which we recite twice daily from Rosh Hodesh Elul through the High Holiday season, beautifully encapsulates our hopes and fears at this season of awe. If we are not already confronting both the small ways in which we’ve fallen short and the bigger questions of our own mortality and purpose in the world, the Psalm reminds us of this reckoning every morning and night. And yet, even as the Psalmist jarringly recounts the horrors of evildoers, wars, death and abandonment, he simultaneously dares to dream of salvation, peace, and a long life: One thing I ask of the Lord, for this I yearn: to dwell in the House of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold God’s beauty, to pray in God’s sanctuary. And the Psalmist even has a healthy dose of confidence! He asks for only “one” thing from the Lord and then proceeds to enumerate three things that he desires! In this era of diminished resources and thwarted expectations, many of us are afraid or unable to look beyond these circumstances and dream big. The Psalm reminds us that despite the inevitable disappointments and devastations of life, we ought never to curb our passion for life. Going one step further, the Psalmist suggests a direction for our zeal, one most likely to yield contentment: God’s sanctuary, where he hopes to "dwell", "behold," and "pray." His three requests include important guide posts for our own yearnings: comfort in place, the ability to behold beauty no matter what challenges we are experiencing, the power of prayer in community. If we can achieve these three things, we will have found the tranquility that we yearn for this High Holiday season. May we all merit this achievement. Shanah Tovah, Dr. Shuly Rubin-Schwartz
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