Schechter Shavua: May 4, 2020

Spotlight into Schechter's Academic Support Team

Our Schechter faculty are a group of truly dedicated individuals. While you might be aware of all the amazing things going on in the classroom, there is a group of teachers who work tirelessly, often behind-the-scenes, to provide academic support to students who need it. Providing this support from a distance poses its challenges, but that doesn’t deter our team of thoughtful, hard-working, and nurturing teachers! Here is a snippet into what goes on each day in Academic Support:

Trish Dabney (pictured bottom right) is one busy teacher! She has been supporting students in grades 1 - 6 with their curriculum work and additional individual work in the areas of reading, writing, science, math, and Judaic Studies. In order to provide the best academic support for our students, Trish joins in on classroom lessons in each of these grades to learn the way each faculty member teaches about the material; she also participates in focus lessons and small group meetings in order to best support individual students. In one-to-one Zoom meetings with students, Trish helps students review lessons and complete assignments while developing a wide range of skills, from reading comprehension to phonics to math skills to all stages of the writing process in order to produce descriptive fantasy stories. She even plays educational games with the students!

Trish says, “I really enjoy the time I spend with the students in our one-to-one sessions. It provides me with the opportunity to say hello, find out how they are doing academically and emotionally, and let them know that I am still available to support them and that I care for their well-being.”

Joanne Lerman (pictured bottom left) writes personal weekly letters (via US post office) to each student in the Rimonim class, and she even has a few pen-pals who write her back! Joanne makes her letters both fun and educational: “I have added a scavenger hunt, info about sea turtles with a coloring page, Israeli stamps, info about Mr. Zip (zip codes), and this week I will include riddles with my letters.” In addition, Joanne has a weekly Facetime check-in with five students and reads several books each day on SeeSaw for Rimonim.

In her one-to-one work for Language Arts and math, she went above and beyond; Joanne provided materials (boxes, basket manipulatives, and a workwall) to create an "office" for the student and she develops daily math worksheets for the assignment which they use before they complete the math in the workbook.

Rhiannon van Bindsbergen (pictured top) works both individually as well as in the broader class forum in order to best engage and encourage middle school students in the new digital learning platform. Through screen sharing, personalized classwork activities, and homework assistance, Rhiannon strives to reach each student through the methods that best suit him or her.

Todah rabah to each of these teachers for finding creative and fun ways to support our students both academically and emotionally!

Celebrating Israel's 72nd as a Community

Schechter wasn't going to miss an opportunity to celebrate our love for Israel just because we couldn't all be together in person! Our teachers and Israeli Emissaries (who are back in Israel!!) coordinated an amazing morning of songs, dancing, art, trivia, and more! Everyone loved being back together in celebration!

Click HERE to see the joy and ruach for yourself!

8th Grade Passion Projects Closeup

Our 8th graders were given a challenge: for two weeks, delve deeply into a topic that inspires you. Make a plan, set goals, and investigate. We asked each of them to share some of their findings, successes, and any insights they gained from stumbling along the way.

Our Facebook page will feature detailed stories about these dedicated 8th graders over the coming week. Click HERE to read about Miriam!