Leading up to Shavuot, students in the JEC Lower School’s early childhood department have been busy learning all about the Torah and the Jewish people coming together as a nation.

This week, they also had a unique opportunity to try their hand, literally, at safrut. Rabbi Rosenblum of Living Legacy conducted a pre-Shavout workshop that demonstrated how Torah klaf, or parchment, and quills are used for scripting and shared with the children an array of other details that go into the kosher writing of a mezuzah, Tefillin and Torah scroll.

Students were given the opportunity to feel the various animal skins that Rabbi Rosenblum had brought with him, and were amazed to learn how they were transformed into klaf for the writing of Jewish scrolls.

Students then were challenged to experience what it is like to be a sofer and were given the opportunity to write the aleph bet using quills and ink. From the neat and steady results, it appears that a number of students definitely have what it takes for this holy work!