UbD + Student Teaching = The Plan

All the rage in education is an approach to curriculum writing called Understanding by Design. I've been working with this model as an educator for the last few years and it is the main focus of the second year pedagogy class at PEP.

So I decided to use this model in planning for my visit to the US, by setting out my goals for the visit and then arranging my calendar accordingly. I met with my coach for a half hour (we've been talking about this for a while, though) to flush out my ideas, and I walked away with a good list of questions and ideas that I want to test in the US.

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Rabbi Marcus

My sister called this morning and left a message telling me that Rabbi Marcus passed away. I hadn't seen the man in quite some time (It's been a while since I've been to Toronto, even longer since I've been to Bnai Torah and almost forever since I last spoke with the rabbi - probably at my aufruf a few years back). I did know that he was sick, but I never really process these things well (out of sight, out of mind?). And as inevitable as the news was for some, it really caught me off guard. The first time I met the rabbi I was a five year-old kindergarten student at Eitz Chaim. Over the course of the year we had been learning our Aleph Bet , earning stars for every letter that we covered along the way. I, of course, had procrastinated for most of the year so that, by the end of the year, I had only gotten as far as the fifth or sixth letter (not for lack of knowledge, mind you). With time running out, I tried to corner my teachers to have them listen to me run through a...

Try, try again

It's been a while since my last blog (the Israel trip) and, of course, a lot has happened since then. But it would take me too long to go back and recap the past month, so I'll just take it from the top. Israel expenses keep adding up: I was sick to my stomach for a lot of the time that I was in Israel. When I got back I went to see a GI and he ordered an endoscopy. Needless to say, these things aren't free. And since I got sick on the way to Israel, I decided to add it to the expense of the Israel trip (it's all the same back account, but mentally, it helps). Then came the credit card bills. Well, that was a bit of a shock. When it's on the card, you really don't feel it. Our most expensive days were those "second days" that we opted out of. Maybe G-d is punishing me for keeping only one day of Chag (or maybe I was just too irresponsible with my money). I just remind myself that spending money in Israel is a Mitzvah. Finally, despite trying to figure ...

Full Trasnparentsy #transtorah

One of the steps in the process of understanding the concept of “transgender” is to recognize that society assigns one of two gender roles to people, based on their sex at birth. When someone is born with a penis, society labels them as male and projects certain expectations onto that person (i.e., blue clothing, sports-lover, stoic, etc.); when someone is born with a vagina, society labels them as female and projects other expectations onto that person (i.e., pink clothing, princess-aspiring, emotional, etc.). Transgender people do not fit the typical binary expectations of society, with some even identifying as non-binary and/or gender fluid. This week’s Torah portion - Parshat Toldot - begins with the story of the birth of Yakov (Jacob) and Eisav (Esau). Almost immediately, each of the children were assigned specific identities, which the Torah presents as binary (and which, perhaps, can be mapped onto gender roles): Eisav emerged first from his mother’s womb, covered in hair f...

Life of Spud

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