The sixth grade girls at JKHA took part in a special bat mitzvah-focused program all week long. At this time in their lives with physical, emotional and religious changes taking place, the programming focused on helping them transition into this next phase. The program started with an introductory exercise to imagine their house as a metaphor for the foundation of who they are as a Jewish young woman. To think of all of the things that are added to their house—be it windows and shades, doors, landscaping, a neighbor’s house—as metaphors for the influences in their life that they choose to let affect who they are and who they are becoming. These include friends, teachers, neighbors, social media, camp. They then continued with a session about female role models, with several of the female teachers presenting personal stories to the sixth graders about the women in their own lives who have and continue to shape and inspire them, with an emphasis on which qualities these women embody that make them role models.
On Tuesday, the students enjoyed a rebbetzin panel, where different rebbetzins from Livingston, Springfield and West Orange came to answer questions and share their perspective on what it means to be a part of a community and becoming bat mitzvah. The rebbetzins also shared who their role models are and what makes someone a role model. The girls continued with the theme of role models and broke into groups to learn about the imahot in round robin style. Each group learned about the imahot and what makes them role models. They also created a hashtag to summarize what value they learned from each woman.
For day three, they learned about doing chesed in any way they can.
Raizy Rubin from Albany, New York, came to speak about doing for others in University at Albany. In addition to the big moments like serving 100+ students on a Friday night, simply helping bring out the best in someone or remembering their name and something about them, can make them feel cared for. Chesed is about empathy, doing something with others, being tuned in and sensitive to another person’s needs (physically, spiritually, emotionally). They heard stories and different ideas of how to make chesed fit into their lives for the people around us. JKHA/RKYHS parents Dara Orbach then came to speak about the importance of being involved in chesed in one’s own communities, at any age. Some examples were Naomi’s Challahs, visiting others and Friendship Circle. It was beautiful to hear how even as young girls they can get involved and have such a great impact on their environment.
Students then did an activity to show how every little candle’s light makes a big difference. They also packed candles for people who might not know about or light Shabbat candles yet. Students were enthusiastic and felt so special to be involved in chesed in a hands-on way.
On day four, students created inspiration boards that included the messages they want to take with them. They were tasked with creating their own hashtag that describes who they want to become and create a collage of images that relate to their hashtag. The students were excited to use their creativity and create these keepsakes.
