A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, there was a student who wanted to have a Star Wars Shabbaton…
Okay, so it wasn’t that long ago, and it’s totally in this galaxy (although some may see the Jewish South as a “galaxy far, far away”). When I first visited congregation Agudas Achim in San Antonio, Texas, in August 2013, the director of their school told me that part of my work with them would be writing programing for their annual religious school February Shabbaton, or Sabbath/weekend retreat.
She also informed me there was a student who wanted to give me ideas about said Shabbaton. Zachary.
Zachary loves Star Wars, and he just could not understand why we had never made Star Wars the theme of the Shabbaton. So when I returned for my fall visit in November, Zachary and I went out to lunch to discuss all his ideas.
Over the next few months we all worked hard to put together a weekend full of Star Wars and Jewish learning. You may be familiar with the concept of The Force, but did you know there is a “Force” in Judaism, too? God gave people free will and intelligent minds to use as we please. In the same way that Jedis can use the force for good or for evil, Judaism believes that every person has a
yetzer ha-tov (good inclination) and a yetzer ha-ra (evil inclination)
that they choose to follow. In both situations, we have to learn to master our powers and use them to make the world a better place.
This was the theme of our weekend. We staged relay races and a scavenger hunt to help students learn about Jewish values and how these values lead us to use our powers for good. The whole weekend was a great success, and I never would have come up with the theme if not for Zachary. He explained all the intricate details of the Star Wars characters and showed me how their personalities and talents could teach us Jewish content. I was so impressed by how he had thought this through. This was an amazing example of the fact that students learn best when you teach them in a way they can relate: Zachary loves Star Wars, so we used that to teach him and his classmates about related Jewish concepts.
I really enjoyed the experience of working with Zachary, and not just because it made my job a little easier. It was so rewarding to see a student excited about Jewish learning for himself and his classmates. The activities of this weekend taught these students in a way they could relate to without diluting the Jewish content. I hope this can be an example I take to other communities, and I hope it can inspire you, too.
What are the interests of your students? How can those interests become an avenue for teaching Jewish content? I would love to hear from you about how you accomplish this in your schools.
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