Teaching Thinking Skills in the Judaic Studies Curriculum - By Rabbi aharon Hersh Fried
THE MAJOR SUBJECT AREAS WE TEACH IN OUR LIMUDEI KODESH classes, Chumash with Rashi. Mishna, and Gemara, probably require more analysis and synthesis of complex ideas than do any other subjects our students will ever meet in school. These subjects require not only basic skills in reasoning, but also skills Of textual analyses and linguistic skills. The student of a pasuk of Chumash with Rashi must be able to recognize anomalies and inconsistencies in the text, infer special meaning from them, and reason logically to arrive at an understanding of what the Torah is coming to teach him.1
It is somewhat surprising in light of all this how little emphasis is placed on the DIRECT teaching of thinking skills in our day schools and chadorim.
Our approach to teaching children how to think has been to expose them to the thinking of Rashi and of Chazal with the expectation that by hearing and understanding the thinking of these great men our students too will learn how to think. This is an INDIRECT approach, one which may work for only the very brightest in our classrooms, those who least need our help.
Hearing and being able to repeat what somebody else has said is no guarantee of one's having understood it. It is certainly no guarantee of one's having acquired and internalized the thinking processes involved.
It is somewhat surprising in light of all this how little emphasis is placed on the DIRECT teaching of thinking skills in our day schools and chadorim.
Our approach to teaching children how to think has been to expose them to the thinking of Rashi and of Chazal with the expectation that by hearing and understanding the thinking of these great men our students too will learn how to think. This is an INDIRECT approach, one which may work for only the very brightest in our classrooms, those who least need our help.
Hearing and being able to repeat what somebody else has said is no guarantee of one's having understood it. It is certainly no guarantee of one's having acquired and internalized the thinking processes involved.
1. If the reader at this point finds himself protesting, "The child doesn't have to
do all that. He merely has to understand what Chazal and Rashi say!" then he has
proven my point before I've even tried to make it. There is no way to fully
appreciate what Chazal derive from a pasuk without being abte to go through
the thinking process which led to it.
do all that. He merely has to understand what Chazal and Rashi say!" then he has
proven my point before I've even tried to make it. There is no way to fully
appreciate what Chazal derive from a pasuk without being abte to go through
the thinking process which led to it.
104 / THE JEWISH ACTION READER
