Blog

From the desk of the Director of Jewish Interactive It’s a busy time in the Jewish calendar and soon after Yom Kippur is Sukkot, the festival of happiness ‘Zman simchateinu’. As Jewish educators we often spend time teaching our students about Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur – and just do not have the time toRead more

The 8th Biennial Educators Conference of the Zionist Federation of Australia, held at Bialik School in Melbourne, brought together Zionist Jewish schools from across Australia for two days of professional development and discussion.

Thanks to the great Eliezer Jones (Yeshiva University) and Twitter, I recently looked up the site dipity.com No it isn’t a character from The Magic Roundabout! It is a fantastic site that helps you create your own visual timelines. The usefulness of this goes without saying to all teachers out there- from making a timeline ofRead more

The last three years in my position as Head of the Martin J. Gottlieb Day School, a K-8 Schechter Network Day School of nearly 130 students located in Jacksonville, Florida, has overlapped with an explosion of interest in 21st century learning and educational technology.  In large ways, our school has been shaped by the worksRead more

Guest blog by Simon Thomas (@thomas9ine) of 9ine Consulting – cross posted with kind permission. Simon Thomas worked with NAACE (a.k.a. “the ICT Association”) to produce this study. The study looks at the use of iPads at the Longfield Academy, where a large scale 1 to 1 iPad program was implemented last year. A brief overview of this groundbreaking studyRead more

Jewish Interactive are running a competition on their website for schools to win an iPad. The criteria for entry was that children should create a piece of digital homework based around one of the units on their Shabbat Interactive software. This got me thinking. I (of course) wanted my school to win the iPad so howRead more

Assessment  – a word that sparks emotions of all sorts in teachers around the globe – satisfaction, dread, anxiety, stress…. As a teacher I was very careful to assess in all areas as I understood the need to pitch your lessons correctly and meet each child’s individual need, could only be achieved through efficient assessmentRead more

Reposted with thanks to Rabbi Tzvi Pittinsky   World ORT Naomi Prawer International Seminar for Digital Technology in Jewish Education, Johannesburg, South Africa One of the most important things to realize about educational technology is that the education must always drive the technology and not the technology driving the education. I love bells and whistles as muchRead more

One of the advantages of Jewish Interactive being based on a school campus is that we can participate in meetings that would otherwise be inaccessible to us! Today was one such meeting. World ORT (#ICTWO12) is holding their Naomi Prawer Kadar International Seminar for Digital Technology in Jewish Education this week on the King DavidRead more

I recently lectured in London at the Department for Education conference on 21st Century learning environments and apps that could enhance lessons. I showed teachers how free apps like Puppet Pals and StoryKit can be downloaded free in seconds and can enhance Jewish studies lessons dramatically. I have in mind Purim with Puppet Pals, and HebrewRead more