<HTML>I am teaching a course at Midreshet Lindenbaum called "Seminar in Jewish
Education," and would like to deal with the topic of "Critical Thinking in
Jewish Education." I would be very happy to hear what other mechanchim
have to say about teaching critical thinking in a religious Jewish
educational setting.
Most of us probably agree that we want our children and students to be
able to read and think critically. (I myself especially like to sit with
my children and show them how advertisements/commercials attempt to
manipulate the consumer, in an attempt to make them critical consumers,
and to be wary of the Western consumer culture.)
Does training our students to be critical readers/thinkers pose a problem
for us as Jewish religious educators? How critical of our texts do we
want our students to be? Most of us probably want them to read
Chumash/Talmud critically enough to see the problems in the text, and to
then try to work through the mefarshim. But how far do we want their
critical facilities to go in limmudei kodesh? What if it leads to their
feeling "manipulated" by our texts, rituals, etc.?
What is the role of age in all of this?
I welcome your communications.
David I. Bernstein, Ph.D.
Dean, Machon Pardes</HTML>
