The new school year brings an exciting new addition to the fourth and fifth grade boys’ schedule: a weekly class in halacha l’maaseh with JEC Lower School Principal Rabbi Uzi Beer. Each week the students learn practical halachos and then apply their learning in a creative and hands-on way. Over the past few weeks, the boys learned about different styles and designs of sukkahs, as explained in the Mishnayos Maseches Sukkah, including the technical and halachic terms and concepts of tefach, amah, gud asik, lavud and others. Each of the boys designed a sukkah referenced in the Mishna through a variety of mediums, including Legos, cardboard, popsicle sticks, 3D pens, digital presentations and hand drawings. The students expanded on this topic as they began building a sukkah with a screen door as one wall, lattice as another and four strings as a third wall. With the addition of different forms of schach, each student’s sukkah would be kosher for sitting and eating in, as well as making the bracha of lesheiv basukkah. Future projects will continue to incorporate halacha in a hands-on and l’maaseh, practical, way.