Education >> Early Childhood Education >> Shiurim >> Archive >> August 2006

Shiurim

USCJ EC Staff Meeting Shiur - August 2006

Joshua ben Perahiah and Nittai the Arbelite received [the oral tradition] from them [their teachers]. Joshua ben Perahiah says: provide a teacher for yourself; acquire a friend for yourself; and judge everyone favorably.

- Pirke Avot 1:6

Questions for Discussion:

  1. Diana Ganger says that the experience usually called “separation” is better viewed as “creating new attachments.” As children come back to school, one of the first important things a teacher must do is help them and their families create these new attachments so they may have a successful year. What do the rabbis consider to be important attachments?
  2. In an online article, Rabbi Fredi Cooper describes finding a friend and teacher in one classmate when she began rabbinical school. She writes, “What a blessing in life when the teacher and the friend reside in one individual... and what a blessing when this person comes into your life when you least expect it!!” (http://www.jrf.org/pirke-avot/comment-ch1-1.htm) In your life, when have you provided yourself with a teacher, or acquired for yourself a friend? Have you found both in one person? How has this been a blessing in your life?
  3. In the Talmud, Taanit 7a, the rabbis teach that a friend serves three functions. The first is as a catalyst for increased success in Torah study, the second is in offering constructive criticism (and being offered constructive criticism in return), and the third is in providing good advice in all areas and acting as a discreet confidant who can be trusted with all life’s secrets and challenges. What other functions would you assign to a friend? What functions would you assign to a teacher?
  4. As we help children and families create new attachments and acquire new friends, how can this quote from Pirke Avot guide our intentions? How can you insure that you are a teacher whom each child and family would seek to provide for themselves? How do you help children make friends who will help them face life’s challenges and achieve their potential?

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Maxine Segal Handelman
Consultant for Early Childhood Education,
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism

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