A High School in Israel

[Haveil Havalim is up at Shiloh Musings.]

My daughter entered ninth grade this year. This year she has "the best teacher and the best class." She was able to request a number of friends, and they'll be together for the next four years.

Her school has six grades, each with about eight classes of thirty girls. The six grades are divided into three batim (lit. houses), each with its own building, vice-principal, secretary, advisor, and two teachers who serve as grade-level coordinators.

The school operates several large volunteer projects:

1. All ninth graders volunteer in a public gan (kindergarten) once a week. My daughter catches a van from school at 7:30 to take her across town, where she assists the teacher for two hours. Girls coming from out of town, like the ones in my younger daughter's gan, volunteer close to the school so they don't have to commute twice. They gave the girls (unfortunately bright green) t-shirts so they will be recognized. Good marketing, so long as I don't have to wear that color.
   
2. The school runs a country-wide organization to collect used appliances and furniture and redistribute them to the needy. Seventh-graders work in the warehouse; during the summer my daughter took a few shifts answering the phone to schedule pickups.
3. Students volunteer in the special-education gan right on school premises. My daughter hasn't worked there yet, but girls in her class have.
   

The school is handicapped accessible, has an ethnically heterogeneous population (Jewishly speaking), and boasts the third highest bagrut (matriculation exam) scores in the country, after two secular schools in Haifa. It discourages graduates from enlisting in the army but many still do (my daughter isn't interested).

When my kids were younger someone told me that I would be happier with the girls' schools in Israel than the boys'. The girls don't have the pressure of gemara (Talmud), leaving little time for anything except the bagrut requirements.

[I tried to stay positive all the way through.]

Tolerance in the Religious Zionist Community

On Ynet, Yael Mishali writes about meeting with the parents and teachers of her son's seventh-grade class at the yeshiva high school Nechalim. One mother asked that the yeshiva officially oppose mixed dancing at bar mitzvah celebrations, so that the boys can avoid temptation. The mother asserted that mixed dancing is not in the "spirit of the yeshiva." 

Mishali dislikes the mother's superior tone. She goes on to describe the various ways she has seen parents send the message that families less stringent in some areas are inferior and should not be associated with. This could be because the mother doesn't cover her hair, they watch Power Rangers, or even that the family waits "only" three hours between meat and dairy. She has watched as parents set up "torani" ganim (kindergartens) and schools, requiring strict levels of kashrut certification and more religious studies (she mentions requiring learning parshat shavua (weekly Torah portion) with Rashi's commentary -- in gan). 

She ends by saying that she chose this yeshiva because it did not require a stringent dress code for parents. She suggests that the mother in question teach her child to avoid temptation instead of expecting others to accommodate him. He'll be meeting these challenges in the real world, and temptations of all types abound even in the most stringent yeshiva environment. 

It's distressing to see our community focus on subtle differences and use them to exclude others. In one elementary school interview, a neighbor's suitability was questioned because the husband studied in Yeshivat Har Etzion (considered the left of the political/religious spectrum). Do we need different (elementary!) schools for children of parents who want their children to attend Har Etzion, and those who aspire toward Merkaz Harav?

Thanks to Jameel and Rafi, who each sent me the link.

The woman who never says hello

I have never felt completely comfortable in our synagogue. We fall within the norm for age and religious level, and even our large family is not unusual. But we are the only native English speakers, and most families send to a different elementary school. Sometimes I speak to a few of the women after shul, but I have virtually nothing to do with them otherwise.

There is one group of women who attend shul regularly and have children close in age to my younger ones. One or two are friendly to me, another one or two acknowledge my existence, but there is one who ignores me. If I catch her eye after shul, she averts her eyes. Sometimes, to make a point, I "get in her face" and wish her Shabbat Shalom. She replies and even smiles a bit. But she never greets me first.

I'm convinced that she holds no grudge against me, nor is she a snob. I am just not on her radar screen. She has her own friends, and I don't fit into her picture of her social circle. If she ever thought about me, which I doubt, she would figure I had my own friends to greet. Why would I need her?

One year we had children in the same gan. When I saw her, she treated me the same way she did in shul. Then one day we both arrived a few minutes early. Several of her friends from shul had children in the same gan, but they weren't there that day. She came over, sat down next to me, and struck up a conversation.

This year she again has a child in gan with mine, but her friends' children have all graduated. I wonder what will happen.

Revisiting the Misgeret, or Is Preschool Necessary

It's bound to happen at one time or another when you are out with your toddler. Your neighbor asks you the question you were wondering yourself earlier that day, as you tried to talk on the phone while your son climbed the bookcase: "Isn't he bored at home with you all day? How old is he again? [Insert any answer here.] Shouldn't he be in a misgeret?"

In honor of my 4-year-old starting gan in a few weeks (we did have an informal two-child playgroup, technically a misgeret I suppose), I share my answers to the suppositions of nosy and rude advice-givers. They don't deserve a reply. But at times we must address concerns of family members, or, more likely, we ourselves need the reassurance.

• "The child needs to get used to being in gan for half the day." Or, "She will be behind academically." When I mentioned to one mother that our three-year-olds would be in gan together the following year, she asked how I could send her when she hadn't been in gan at age two. According to this theory, children need a year in a misgeret to prepare for the next misgeret.
  
• [This one is for late talkers.] "Gan will help him learn to talk." This is just wrong. Children in gan generally spend little time talking one-on-one to an adult. And the less the child communicates through speech, the less verbal attention he is likely to get from teachers. Children develop speaking skills at vastly different ages and unless you have reason to suspect a problem, it's safe to let them develop at their own pace. Gan will not make a huge difference either way.
  
• [For olim] "The child needs to learn Hebrew." Gan-aged, immigrant children still have plenty of time to become fully bilingual. But language is a balance. If your child spends most of her day in a Hebrew-speaking environment, her English vocabulary will be smaller. And vice versa. You can teach him Hebrew yourself, or make playdates with Hebrew-speaking children, to ease the transition. But immigrants to all countries have survived the experience; emotional maturity is more important than language. [My daughter is concerned about this despite more than adequate Hebrew skills.]
  
• "He needs to play with children his own age." I question this assumption "milechat'hilah." The younger the child, the less equipped to compete with others for the attention of adults. Since making aliyah the age of starting group care has lowered, while time spent in care increased. Children learn social skills mainly from their parents, and they can play with other children while parents are present. If all neighborhood children are in gan, they can meet in the afternoon or on weekends. They don't need thirty hours a week away from parents to learn cooperative play. Unfortunately, preschool for fewer hours is unheard of in Israel. (Let me qualify that--I heard of a gan run by the city of Tel Aviv where you can leave a child on a drop-off basis.)
  
• "Immigrant children need to develop a tough, Israeli exterior." (I mentioned this here.) Okay, but at what cost? I read of a doctoral student who spent months observing three-year-olds in an Israeli gan. She reported of a complex social structure that included children bringing treats to appease bullies. The children's teachers remained unaware. When put into such an environment children may learn healthy ways of defending themselves. Others become aggressive, or conversely, withdrawn.
  
• "Aren't you bored?" Mothers are supposed to be doing adult activities, not playing games all day with their children. (See my next point.)
  
• "Do you sit with her?" I get this all the time; they are asking whether I use worksheets or teach letters and numbers. (I visited a highly-recommended gan where three-year-olds did worksheets each day.) The short answer is no; I enjoy a loose daily structure. We read, play, color, go to the park, run errands, do chores, and meet other mothers and children. The children who are interested pick up letters, numbers and even reading. They play by themselves a good deal of the time while I do "adult" things. In turn, I expect frequent interruptions.
  
• "Your child is too shy/aggressive/wild/attached to you/disobedient/spoiled/slow/bossy. It's because you don't send him to gan." Every child develops different and has personality problems challenges, even the ones who attend gan. Who doesn't? But if you keep your child home, you will be blamed for those issues.
  

Over a million American children are being homeschooled for elementary and/or high school. Surely that puts keeping a two-, three-, or four-year-old at home for another year in perspective.

(I wish I didn't need to add this caveat: I am not trying to convince parents to keep their kids out of gan, or quit their jobs. I do wish to support parents struggling with this issue.)

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My response to Rachel

New immigrant Rachel is undergoing culture shock on behalf of her children.

A friend once told me that I do my children a grave disservice by delaying their attendance in gan until they are 3, 4 or 5. She claimed that they need the gan experience in order to develop that tough exterior so useful in Israeli society. I don't know if she's right or not, but every action involves a tradeoff. If you only associate with American families, they will not learn Hebrew as quickly nor the ins and outs of Israeli society. And Israeli culture has positive values such as love of the land, close extended families, and less materialism. Even "protektzia" is positive when you are the beneficiary.

Rachel raises three specific issues.

1. Neglect and benign abuse that are considered normal. Stick by your American standards regarding safety issues. Make sure the mother giving your kid a ride puts a seatbelt on him, and isn't planning to leave the house when he is visiting. Check who is supervising your kids' school trips and youth activities. Some parents will give you a hard time, but others will thank you even if it's only in their "hard" (as my 4yo puts it). Schools are allowed to release kids after 12:45 (not sure from what age, but definitely upper elementary grades) without notifying the parents. Your kids have to know what to do in that situation.
   
2. Junk food. I've gathered that junk food is also a huge problem in the US. I've given up this battle for the most part, I'm sorry to say. My first-grader's classmates are constantly reminded not to bring junk, but the quantity given out at school makes up for this. I still control what I buy, but not always what comes into the house. My 4yo told a playgroup mother that we had had homemade pareve ice cream with food coloring and chemicals on Shabbat. In reality, a guest had brought cookies filled with colored gel. My kids know what's healthy and why we don't buy certain things.
   
3. Manners. When we see others push into line, we can explain to our children how it feels to be pushed and the prohibition against "gezel zman" (stealing the time of others). Saying thank you and you're welcome is important. However, our ultimate goal is for children to feel gratitude and be sensitive to others. I don't insist that my children use these words, but hope they will follow my example. And they generally do. But that is more about my parenting approach than cultural difference.
   

Here are more tips on keeping kids close.

• Send them to gan as late as possible. Less junk food and bullying, fewer parent meetings and birthday parties--what more could you want?
• Look for like-minded parents, including Israeli ones. Find people who will teach you about the system, in order to understand and influence it.
  
• Focus on the positive--both in your children and in Israeli life. Israel has improved in many areas such as safety awareness and handicapped access.
  
• Limit the amount of time your kids spend with friends and get to know the parents. Remember that just because someone is American doesn't mean they have the same values and standards as you.
  
• Invest time in building up a support network for your family.
• Depending on where you live, you may be exposed to a much wider variety of cultural experiences and mindsets than you were in the US. The parents who are unaware of safety issues may have grown up in a home where those issues were not on the radar screen.
  
• Limit time spent in gan, daycare and afterschool programs, hugim (afterschool activities), and youth groups, and stay on top of what happens there.
  
• Let your kids know why you do things differently, without criticizing other parents. Their approaches may be valid, especially in a different cultural system.
  
• Be realistic and avoid stereotypes. Are kids in American dayschools always welcoming to new kids? Do teachers always have complete control of the class? Do all American parents put their kids in seatbelts every single time?
  
• Teach children to respect their own individuality and that of others. Give them the confidence to withstand negative social pressure.
  

Two children go missing from gan; found safely three hours later

According to the local paper, two children aged 3.5 and 4 disappeared from gan (preschool) without anyone realizing. At around 11 AM, the ganenet noticed that they didn't return to the gan after playtime in the fenced area outside. After a thorough search of the premises failed to locate the children, the staff realized that they must have gotten out. The ganenet set off in search of them, going as far as the children's homes.

During this entire time the ganenet failed to alert any authorities about the disappearance. Finally, at 1:15, she called the police and the children's parents. The children were found at 2:20, about five blocks from the gan. They would have had to have crossed several busy streets.

Update:
I've been thinking about this since I posted, and all I can say is, "What was this ganenet thinking?" The fact that the kids escaped is scandalous enough, although that is not an uncommon occurrence in Israel. But once she realized they were lost, she chose her own reputation over the safety of the children. She hoped to find them herself, and no one would be the wiser. But even if she had found them, they were old enough to talk and presumably would not have been able to keep such an adventure a secret.

Just think how much easier it would have been to find them, had they only been gone ten minutes when she called the police.

Another bizarre part of the story is that no one found the children wandering around this busy area of town (they ended up near the bus station). Israelis tend to get involved when they see children in dangerous situations.