Vayak'heil-P'kudei: What Can Tweens Give?

It happened nearly everyday when I picked up my sixth-grader from school.

"How was your day?" I asked.

"Fine."

"What happened at school?"

"Nothing."

"Come on!" I teased. "You gotta give me something!"

She looked at me from the back seat, her backpack nearly bursting, her eyes tired from a long day at school.  And yet she might as well have been barefoot and empty-handed, with the pockets of her cut-off jeans turned out: "Nothin', Mom. I got nothin'."

This week, we have a combined Torah portion, Vayak'heil-P'kudei, in which Moses relays God's instructions for building the Tabernacle and other structures.  He tells the Israeli people that if their hearts are so moved -- that is, if they feel like it -- they should give their finest goods to God: their gold, silver and copper; their linens and yarns; their animal skins and wood; their oil and spices; and their precious stones. These will be used as raw materials for the building effort.

And what do the people do? They give their possessions willingly, with outstretched hands.

How did they get all this stuff? The Torah tells us that the Egyptians let the fleeing Israeli people have all their silver, gold and clothing. God intervened, we're told, and made the Egyptians look favorably on the former slaves.

But I think that subsequent verses hint at a more profound answer as to how the Israeli people were able to offer valuable gifts.

You see, the Torah goes on to explain that among the Israelis were designers and artisans and crafstmen -- people with specific and useful skills and abilities. It was the job of these skilled people to take the people's gifts and use them to fabricate the Tabernacle.

In this way, I think this portion helps us to understand that we all have gifts to share -- even when, as my daughter so eloquently put it, we think that we "got nothin'." The people, though only recently liberated from slavery, were willing to share anything they had -- and in so doing, they helped build the means to see God.

I knew that my daughter had many "gifts" she could give me when she got in the car every afternoon. She could tell me about an enjoyable conversation she had with a good friend, or a step she took to help someone, or a story about how someone helped her. She could tell me about a teacher who said something that made her feel good about herself, or a moment when random sparks connected in her brain and miraculously, an idea was formed.

But it was up to her to decide when her heart was so moved as to share these gifts with me.

Which means that it was my job to be there when her arms were outstretched and the gifts were there for the taking. It continues to be my job to do just that.

I'm reminded of a scene in the movie "Pretty Woman" -- not necessarily an appropriate movie for middle schoolers, or even a very good movie at all, but there's a moment in it that I like. It's near the end of the movie, when Julia Roberts is about to leave, and Richard Gere is sorry to see her go. "Impossible relationships," he mutters. "My special gift is impossible relationships."

As she walks toward the door, she gently tells him, "I think you have a lot of special gifts."

Middle schoolers have a lot of special gifts. And that's one of the most precious bits of knowledge that a parent can ever own.

Ki Tisa: The Roar of the Crowd

There's a scene in the Jimmy Stewart movie "It's a Wonderful Life" that's always bothered me. Yes, I know this is a Torah blog and that's a Christmas movie, but work with me.

Jimmy Stewart plays George Bailey, a man in crisis who gets the chance to see how the lives of his relatives and friends would change had he never been born. Even if you've never seen the movie, you can probably guess that their lives are greatly diminished in his absence. But I've always been more interested in the rest of the community. You see, with George Bailey as a community leader, the streets of Bedford Falls are neat, the shops are quaint, and the people are warm and friendly. But without George Bailey, the town -- now named Pottersville -- is seedy, the streets are lined with bars and X-rated clubs, and the people are mean and grouchy.

It's always troubled me, this view of group dynamics, which holds that people sink to their basest level without a strong and charismatic leader. According to this theory, it's the role of the leader to quell people's natural tendencies toward degeneracy, and to spur them to more cooperative and productive activities.

I think of this indictment of groups when I read this week's Torah portion, Ki Tisa. In Ki Tisa, we learn what the Jewish people have been doing while Moses has been up on Mount Sinai receiving laws from God. It's not a pretty picture! The people have created an idol -- the famed Golden Calf -- to worship, and they are dancing, drinking, and otherwise being, as Moses later puts,  "out of control."

As teachers and parents, we encourage our kids to behave like leaders. We portray individuals like Moses and Martin Luther King Jr., like Abraham of the Torah and Abraham of the Lincolns, as role models worthy of emulation. But in doing this, I think that we miss part of the picture. Psychologists tells us that middle schoolers hate to stand out. They want to look like everyone else, dress like everyone else, and act like everyone else. In short, they want nothing more than to blend in with the crowd.

Shouldn't we respect their inclinations, and try to figure out what makes a group successful -- even in the absence of a stand-out figure?

Why does one class of students continue to work if the teacher needs to leave the room for a moment, while down the hall, the kids will climb on their desks and hurl pencils at one another? Why does one group of middle-schoolers spend a Saturday night on their own, peacefully eating pizza and watching a movie in someone's basement, while another group of kids gets into trouble unless they are under the constant supervision of a parent? It can't be due entirely to the character of the individuals involved, since we all know children who act one way with one set of friends and the complete opposite way with a different set. What is the tipping point that turns Bedford Falls into Pottersville?

Can you find months an example in the Torah of a leaderless group that nevertheless behave cooperatively and productively? How does that group differ from the one in Ki Tisa? 

Above all, I think we need to recognize that groups -- whether families, school classes, or communities -- can do great things on their own. After all, there won't always be a Moses, or even a George Bailey, around.

T'rumah: Oh Those Group Projects!

It's 2:30 in the afternoon, and I know what's coming as soon as I pull up to the curb at school and see the scowl on my sixth-grader's face. She climbs into the car, kicks her backpack, and skulks down in her seat.

"Guess what," she tells me angrily. "We have another group project!"

Group projects are the bane of a middle schooler's existence. They require patience, diplomacy, restraint, and a big-picture perspective -- characteristics and skills that don't always apply to your average twelve- or thirteen-year-old. Add to that all the drama that informs a middle-school environment -- crushes, shifting friendships, misunderstandings, hurt feelings -- and it's it's hard to imagine that any group project would have even remote chance of being completed.

My daughter is one of those kids who likes to stay on task, work diligently, and finish her assignments early whenever possible. So inevitably she gets grouped with at least one easy-going type who refuses to knuckle down until the eleventh hour. My daughter starts to make demands, the free-spirit calls her "bossy," the other kids take sides, someone winds up in tears, the teacher tells them to work it out, someone forgets to do his or her piece, another someone gets sick and stalls the whole process...

If there's one saving grace, it's that teachers tend to grade group projects fairly leniently. I think they know about the battle scars that inevitably result, and they try not to add to the pain. And some, no doubt, believe that the lessons kids learn about cooperation and collaboration may be more important in the long run than the quality of the finished product.

Funny enough, I've also discovered that middle-school groups tend to turn out some pretty special projects. Okay, maybe they're quirky and unusual, but that's what make them so interesting. As a parent and as a teacher, I've seen the most wonderful group projects appear -- posters, imovies, dramatic skits, painted crafts, and even decorated cakes -- that reflect a host of different personalities, and could never have been created by one student alone.

I think of middle schoolers and group projects when I read T'rumah, this week's Torah portion. In T'rumah, God issues directions to the Jewish people for building the Tabernacle, a kind of portable house of worship that will accompany the Jews through the desert. God tells Moses to have the people donate precious metals, skins, and specific types of wood. And God lays out dimensions and specific design requirements for the structure.

I can't help but see this task as a kind of group project, and I wonder how the Jews brought the thing to fruition. Did the strict rule-follower have the gold overlays ready before the acacia-table was built, and did this cause an argument? Did the free spirit want to play loose with the dimensions to see if the table might function better as a result? What if some of the group members were tired because they stayed up to watch American Idol the night before, so they lost count of the number of gold rings they were making? What if one of the members hadn't kept another's secret, and now the two of them were in a fight about just how long a cubit actually was?

How does the middle schooler in your life take to group projects? What role does he or she play? Does completing one group project help the next one go more smoothly? Is there any way to lessen the group-project stress?

Knowing what I do about human nature, I suspect that the Tabernacle didn't come out exactly as God specified.

And I suspect that ultimately, it was good the way it was.

What if Noah said NO?"

A few years ago, my sixth graders and I happened upon a Plaut Commentary that was missing several pages -- the whole Noah story, in fact, and some of Abraham and Sarah. I guess we were in a silly mood, because we began joking about how Noah and the others had fled the Torah, and then we began imagining why they might have wanted to escape and what we might do to get them to return.

We had so much fun letting our imaginations go wild, we decided to write a chapter book centering on this fantastical concept.

So each student took one or a group of characters and envisioned where he, she, or they might go. Each student then created a fictional version of herself (the class was all girls that year) and placed herself in the story, as the heroine who ultimately helps make the Torah whole.

There were only a few requirements for the students: They had to create a whole chapter, with a beginning, middle, and end; they had to determine why their character(s) left the story and where the character(s) went; and they had to make a convincing case for an ultimate return.

There were many interesting aspects to this project -- but the one that stands out in my mind is how many of the stories the students created involved being afraid. The student who chose Noah decided that Noah left the Torah because he was scared to take responsibility for all the animals' lives. The student who chose the dove decided that the dove fled because she knew that at the end of the story she would leave Noah for good, and she was scared to go out on her own. The student who chose the animals (led by a grumpy elephant) decided that the animals were scared to believe in Noah's predictions about a flood and to put their lives in Noah's hands.

As I read their stories, it occurred to me that fear is a big component of a sixth-grader's life. Sixth graders fear being ostracized, they fear feeling left out, and they fear that their friends will let them down. They're scared of failing tests, they're scared of missing buses, they're scared of being late to class or being yelled at by a teacher for some infraction they didn't intend. They're scared of being considered a "baby," -- but they're also scared of growing up.

So I read these stories with particular interest in how each student's fictional persona would behave. And I was impressed with what I read. The students' alter egos were all calm, kind, and understanding individuals who made compelling cases for abandoning fear. Noah came back, for example, because his heroine convinced him that the beauty of the natural world was too precious to abandon; the dove returned because her heroine helped her understand that there comes a time when you have to leave the nest -- or, in this case, ark -- but you can always come back to visit. The elephant decided to lead the way back because his heroine helped him notice a cute lady elephant, and he realized he wanted to move forward with his life.

And as they convinced their characters to come back, my students also wrote in some rewards for being brave -- specifically, Noah got a cup of ice cream to enjoy, and the elephant -- well, he ate some peanuts while he deliberated his fate.

I hope that when my students have to deal with fear, they get the same kind of comfort their alter egos gave to our missing Torah characters.

And I hope that those who comfort them realize that a little nosh goes a long way!

Haazinu: Why A Rock?

Not too long ago, I took a class about God led by a very imaginative rabbi. When we arrived, there were several items placed on table in the center of the room, including a bunch of wildflowers, a clock, a Bible, and a container of Elmer's Glue. He asked us: Which of these items most closely match your concept of God?

It was a provocative and intriguing task. Who would chose the flowers, believing that God was expressed in nature? Who would choose the clock, thinking of God mainly in the passage of time and the experience of different life stages and lifecycle events? Did God mainly exist for some of us in the realm of prayer, religion, and sacred texts? Or was God the glue that held us together during our darkest moments?

The most interesting result of this exercise was not what we chose, but how strongly we felt about our choices. Each of us had a specific concept of God that was expressed in one of the items on the table.

I think of these lessons and teachings around this time of year, when I discuss Haazinu, one of the last portions in the Torah, with my students. Sometimes called "The Song of Moses," this portion is part of the set of instructions that Moses offers shortly before he is to die, and includes a section written in verse that seeks to express the relationship between the Israelites and God.

The song describes God as "The Rock--whose deeds are perfect," and later "an eagle who rouses its nestlings." My students' reaction, in a word, was "Why?'

Why a rock? Why an eagle? Why compare God to anything? Why not say what God is, instead of what God is like?

The thing is, 11- and 12-year-olds, they crave concreteness and certainty, and they hate ambivalence. They live in a world of tests and grades and rules, where the answers are clear, and right and wrong are obvious. They want to know what God is. They hate that I have no answer.

So they tell me their own images of God, perceptions they've had as long as they can remember. Some cling to the age-old image of an old man with a beard. Some continue to use the pronoun "he," even while asserting that God has no gender, because God is not a person.

Then I ask them if they can find any answers in Moses' words -- "The Rock!"

And they tell me:

A rock is strong.
A rock is forever
A rock is dependable
A rock is always there.
A rock doesn't really change.
And finally... a rock is as large and unmoveable as a mountain, but also as small and portable as a pebble in your pocket.

I think they know more about God than they realize.

Yom Kippur: Is it all about the Rules?

Not too long ago, my teenage son was invited to join a group of friends who were attending a nearby event. Now, I don't know exactly what was going to happen at this event, but whatever it was, my son said he was uncomfortable going. 'Nuf said.

Still, he didn't want to be the guy who wimped out, so he asked my husband and me, "Can I tell them you guys are making me do something else that night?"

"Of course," we said. "Blame it all on us. Make us the bad guys. We're happy to be the heavies."

Even when you're a teenager, authority can sometimes come in handy.

I think of that story at this time of year, which can be an anxious time for sixth graders. Yom Kippur is just days away, and as twelve year olds, they think it's the last time they can decline to fast and not feel guilty about it.

"Next year, we have to fast," one says.

"I'm going to try this year," another comments.

"But you don't have to," a third responds. "Next year, you have to."

Inevitably this leads to a conversation about different family members and their Yom Kippur habits and routines. One student mentions that her mother refrains from eating but still drinks a morning cup of coffee, or else she'll get a migraine. Another says that his grandfather passed out in synagogue one year when he hadn't eaten, and since then he has never fasted. All fully understand that when one's health is at stake or one may truly suffer physical distress, then it's okay to eat on Yom Kippur.

But for these young, strong, and able-bodied students, no waivers are acceptable -- at least according to them. As far as they're concerned, there are no exceptions when you're thirteen.

I understand their anxiety. Not eating from sunset to sunset is hard! Plus, it's an experience they've never had. All they know is that when lunchtime comes at school, they're hungry, and if they go to a restaurant where there's a hour wait, it's almost too much to bear. They don't know how their body will respond as the hours go by. They don't yet know what coping mechanisms they will use to get them through.

But at the same time, their view of this solemn holiday troubles me. It's not a marathon, it's not endurance test, and it's definitely not a competition. There's no finish line and no medal given once the 24th hour as passed. Fasting is less about the absence of food and more about the decision behind that absence. Its's less about what you're doing and more about why.

In the past, I've tried to offer this alternative way of thinking to my sixth graders, but typically they refuse to enter this more nuanced realm of thought. "No you have fast at thirteen," they tell me. "You have to."

Common wisdom tells us that preteens and teens abhor rules. Tell them what to do, experts say, and they'll rebel; it's best to give them the tools to make a good decision on their own. And yet, sometimes kids this age appreciate rules (even though they'll never admit it). Rules trump doubt and ambivalence, so they can sometimes be a great help in relieving anxiety.

So I've decided that this year, my sixth graders can talk about rules.

So maybe in a year or two, they can talk about reasons.

Nitzavim: "And I'll Be Watching You"

I remember the day my daughter decided she wanted to walk home from school. She was in eighth grade, so it seemed a reasonable request, but the path home took her across a five-cornered intersection that even an adult would find challenging. Of course, she had to cross streets by herself sometime; I couldn't guard her from oncoming traffic for the rest of her life. And so I agreed that she could do it -- if she consented to a few simple instructions.

"Make sure you press the button and wait for the 'walk' sign," I said.

"I will," she agreed.

"But it's not enough to just wait for the 'walk' sign," I added. "Don't start to cross until you see that all the cars have stopped."

"Okay," she said.

"A complete stop."

She nodded.

"But don't just assume that the drivers know you're crossing, even if the cars are stopped," I said. "Make eye contact with the drivers so you know they see you."

She nodded.

"And call me just before you cross, so I know when you've started."

"Okay."

"And call me again after you reach the other side, so I know you got there safely."

She sighed. "Forget it, Mom," she said. "Just pick me up in the car like usual."

I like to tell this story to my sixth graders when we study the portion Nitzavim, because I find it to be one of literature's most beautiful expressions of parental love. Moses, who will be allowed to view the Promised Land but will die before he can ever enter it, speaks to the Israelites like a parent about to bid goodbye to a cherished child, giving final instructions before he must leave them to fend for themselves.

You can feel the urgency in his voice, the pressure of time bearing down, as he urges his followers to keep God's commandments, to love God completely, and above all, to "Choose life" whenever the opportunity to make such a choice arises.

So I ask my sixth graders to think about the times when their parents felt like Moses did -- and then, I ask them to think about a time when they may have felt like Moses. When, I ask, did you ever have to go away and let someone else take care of something you loved?

Not surprisingly, the subject of pets often comes up during this discussion, as many of my sixth graders have had to say goodbye to a beloved dog or cat upon leaving for summer camp or vacation. Some of them describe the elaborate instructions they give parents or grandparents, detailing how their cherished animal should be fed, stroked, and put to sleep at night.

Ultimately, my students come to realize that my concern for my daughter, like their worries about their pets and Moses' exhortations to the Israelites, is not about power or control; it's all about love.

And yes, I did insist that my daughter take my warnings with a grain of salt, and walk home that day.

That was all about love as well.