ECI ONLINE BOOSTS JEWISH CONTENT IN PRESCHOOLS

BY MARK DWORTZAN
Photos by Patrick O'Connor

Do not ax down fruit trees during wartime. That's the biblical basis for the rabbinic proscription known as bal tashchit—literally, do not destroy. From Deuteronomy 20:19–20, talmudic sages, medieval and modern commentators extrapolated a call to not waste or unnecessarily destroy anything of value—even the tiniest mustard seed.

This millennia-old mitzvah made a powerful impression on preschool educator Lori Asulin as she studied Jewish texts in a Hebrew College course called Teaching Jewish Values to Young Children. So when Tu B'Shevat arrived, she created a weeklong unit on Jewish environmental ethics for her class of 3-year-olds at the Springfield, Mass., Jewish Community Center. "Instead of simply talking about ecology and recycling, I introduced the concept of bal tashchit," she says. "Since taking this course, I've tried harder to find the connection between Jewish values and the secular themes that I cover in my class."

Until last fall, Asulin and other Jewish preschool educators in her area would have had to endure a 3-hour round-trip commute to take Teaching Jewish Values to Young Children at Hebrew College's Newton Centre campus. But in the past academic year, the College has brought this course, and more, to them.

Since September 2004, the Early Childhood Institute (ECI) and Hebrew College Online have run ECI Online, a distance-learning program for early childhood Jewish educators in Western Massachusetts. With seed funding from the Harold Grinspoon Foundation, ECI Online has delivered Teaching Jewish Values to Young Children and Parents and Teachers in Early Childhood Jewish Education, the first two of four courses leading to a Certificate in Early Childhood Jewish Education, and plans to offer the other two in the coming academic year.

Sixteen preschool educators from the Springfield JCC and neighboring institutions are participating in this long-distance version of the on-campus certificate program. The educators attend two local, in-person meetings with the instructor and three videoconferencing sessions beamed from Hebrew College. From the comfort of their own homes, they complete online course modules and exchange thoughts on the material via online discussion boards, similar to students of the many other Hebrew and Jewish studies courses offered by Hebrew College Online.

"Almost everyone can find time to take a course using this setup," observes Shelly Brown, a preschool teacher from Lubavitcher Yeshiva Academy in Longmeadow, Mass. For classmate Lori Asulin—who teaches full-time at the Springfield JCC, has three children of her own and sits on several local boards—distance learning was the only way she could return to school and work toward a Master of Jewish Education.

Once hooked in by ECI Online's convenient format, educators are finding much in its content to apply in the classroom. "We have all become much more cognizant of Jewish values and the impact we can have on children and parents," says Carlin Trietsch, director of the Springfield JCC's Early Childhood department, "and our teachers are working values lessons into the curriculum."

Positive reactions from teachers and educational directors alike have made Ina Regosin, Early Childhood Institute founding director and Hebrew College dean of students, bullish on the future of ECI Online. Regosin now seeks qualified faculty around the country to recruit a community of educators in their area to participate in ECI Online or a similar program. "We think we have a model that's ready to be replicated nationally," she says.

In essence, that model is an export of a product that the ECI has been perfecting since 1986, when Regosin founded the Institute at Hebrew College's Shoolman Graduate School of Jewish Education to boost Judaic knowledge among early childhood Jewish educators, and, in turn, their students. "Our overarching goal has been to integrate training in Judaica and early childhood education theory so that educators can seamlessly translate their Jewish knowledge and identity into early childhood practice," she says.

To achieve that goal, the ECI has provided three "commandments" to the hundreds of teachers it has trained: first, study Hebrew language and Jewish texts and examine the meaning of those texts for yourself and your students; second, learn how to teach Jewish values, traditions and culture to children and parents using the latest research in child development and cognitive growth; and third, commit to regularly examining your personal relationship to the Jewish content.

This approach has resulted, Regosin says, in state-of-the-art preschool classrooms where Jewish content reigns.

"The ECI has raised the bar for early childhood Jewish professionals, adding a crucial component to the Judaic teaching in our schools," says Lisa Ridge Kritz, director of the Erna and Julius Hertz Nursery School of Temple Israel in Sharon, Mass., and a graduate of the Early Childhood Directors Institute, an ECI offshoot. "We are Jewish preschools first and foremost now."

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