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<!doctype html>
<html class="no-js" lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8" />
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" />
<title>Foundation | Welcome</title>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="css/foundation.css" />
<script src="js/vendor/modernizr.js"></script>
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</head>
<body>
<a class="button" href="index.html" id="homebutton">
<label style="color:white;">Home</label>
</a>
<!--
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<ul id="drop" data-dropdown-content class="f-dropdown" role="menu" aria-hidden="false" tabindex="-1">
<li><a href="#heckle">Israeli Embassador UC Heckle</a></li>
<li><a href="#exodus">"Exodus" -Bob Marley</a></li>
<li><a href="#alicia">"No One" -Alicia Keys</a></li>
<li><a href="#ethiopian">Ethiopian Soldier Beaten and Israel's Protests</a></li>
<li><a href="#FeldPoem">"We All Stood Together" - Merle Feld</a></li>
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<div class="headingimage center">
<img src="img/jerusalem1.jpg" class="headingimage2" alt="Responsive image"></img>
<div id="promptstext">
<h1>Prompts and Provocations</h1>
</div>
</div>
<ol class="prompts">
<li id="heckle">Show the video footage of former Israeli Ambassador to the U.S., Michael Oren, being
heckled by pro-Palestinian activists at U.C. Irvine. Ask students: How does this make you
feel?
<div class="flex-video">
<iframe width="200" height="150" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/WsdtafcbqrE" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
</div>
</li><li>Throw a bagel to every person in the room. Ask: In what ways does this bagel
represent and embody the Jewish experience and in what ways not? Consider in
chevrutah.
</li><li>Give every student $7. Challenge them to donate a dollar a day for one week. Come
back a week later and discuss.
</li><li>Read the Bereshit account of Jacob wrestling with the “angel”. Ask students: In what
ways has Jewish history embodied or reflected this origin as “wrestlers”?
</li><li>Read the morning prayer, “Elohai HaNeshama”. Ask students: What comes up for you
when you read this prayer? What might it mean to say that the soul is “pure”?
</li><li>Give everyone a copy of “Modeh Ani” and have folks recite it upon arising every
morning for one week. Come back together and discuss.
</li><li> Watch the Israeli band A-WA’s single “Habib Galbi”. Discuss.
</li><li id="exodus"> Watch a quality version of Bob Marley’s “Exodus”. Ask students: To what extent is this
a “Jewish” song – To what extent does it present the tropes and themes of the Jewish
story – both historically and spiritually? To what extent not?
<div class="flex-video">
<iframe width="360" height="115" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2SFXXDO4LHA" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
</div>
</li><li>Study a map of the Land of Israel that includes both major Jewish and Arab
population centers as well as clearly delineates the “Green Line”. Ask students if they
have any questions.
</li><li> Invite students into a private Facebook group entitled “Gratitude Reflections” and
challenge each member of the group to post three “things” they’re grateful for each
day.
</li><li> Bring a group of students to a rally or protest. Have them create signs and posters
based on values from their Jewish tradition. Following the rally, go get pizza and discuss.
</li><li> Bring a group of Muslim students to meet a group of Jewish students. Have dinner
and then have each group generate as many questions as they’d like to ask the other.
Come back together and take turns going back and forth, answering as many of the
questions as possible.
</li><li> Watch the Curb Your Enthusiasm episode, “Palestinian Chicken”. Ask your students
to explain the last scene.
</li><li> Invite Erika Davis (author of the “Black, Gay, and Jewish” blog) to visit a group of
students.
</li><li> Purchase every student a copy of Heschel’s “Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity”.
Read any essay. Discuss.
</li><li> Find an online description of the Chofetz Chaim’s stringent rules around gossip and
Lashon Hara. Ask students what role gossip plays in their lives and if they can
understand the rabbi’s stringencies?
</li><li> Host a Tu B’Shvat seder. Download the Hazon “haggadah” for the occasion. Real
wine is a must.
</li><li> Pass around a lulav and an etrog. Discuss.
</li><li> At the start or end of a semester, study the midrash of Nachshon ben Aminadav. Ask
students in what ways that embodied the chutzpah of Nachshon over the past semester
and in what ways they wish they had embodied his chutzpah.
</li><li> Watch the short (30 min.) Israeli movie “Barriers”. Ask students to name ten
different types of barriers represented in the movie. Discuss widely.
</li><li> Read the entirety of the Shema. Ask students: How would you relate to the 2nd
paragraph if you were a Cambodian sustenance farmer? How would you relate to it if
you were “ancient man”? How do you (might you) relate to it as you yourself?
</li><li> Borrow a handful of sets of tefillin and a bunch of tallitot and gather a bunch of
students for whom these ritual items are not familiar. Have everyone take turns
“wrapping and donning”. Discuss.
</li><li> Gather ten students in an open space for the sunset. Recite the evening “Ma’ariv”
prayer. Sit in silence.
</li><li> Look at a collection of hanhagot from various Jewish writers. Have students
compose their own hanhagot – based on the language and style of the historical ones.
</li><li> Open up the claf of a mezuzah. Ask students to explain this ritual technology. Have
students compose their own mezuzah scroll – give them pushpins to affix these original
scrolls to their doorposts.
</li><li> Gather a small group of really intellectually intense students. Purchase each of them
a copy of Buber’s “The Way of Man”. Gather on several occasions to read a chapter
from this small book.
</li><li> Read the original “10 Commandments” and then read Archie Gottesman’s “New Ten
Commandments for the Jewish People”. First discuss. Then have the students compose
their own individual ten commandments. Discuss.
</li><li> Cut up a whole lot of little slips of paper. On half of them write, “The entire world
was created for me”. On the other half write, “I am nothing but dust and ashes”. Give
one of each to 10 students. Ask them to pull out the former when they’re feeling glum
and to pull our and read the latter when they’re feeling overly proud. Have them do that
for a week. Gather and discuss.
</li><li> On Erev Shabbat, have students go around and fill in the following blanks: This
Shabbat I want to unplug from ________. This Shabbat I want to plug into ________.
</li><li> Introduce the Kabbalistic practice of gerushin (wanderings). Take a handful of
students and walk aimlessly around campus for an hour trying to get in touch with the
exile of the Shekhinah. Discuss.
</li><li> Give a tutorial on various online Israeli and Jewish news culture websites. Let
students survey them on their own for a while. Present favorite articles.
</li><li> Read the first chapter of Bereshit – slowly. Discuss as you read.
</li><li> Study Rav Yosef’s statement in the Talmud (Ketubot 48a) that “There must be close
bodily contact during sex…” Ask students why Rav Yosef insists on two people being
naked? What’s up with nakedness?
</li><li> Study the midrash’s story of Noah planting a vineyard with Satan. Prepare to answer
questions about the Jewish Satan. Ask students: What’s this midrash trying to
communicate to us about the complexity of getting drunk and being stoned?
</li><li> Get a bunch of siddurim and have students flip through the section of Birkat
Nehenin. Tell them they are on a “Brachot Scavenger Hunt”. Can they identify one
blessing that is surprising? One that they have recited at some point in the past? One
that they find beautiful? Etc.
</li><li> Cut up the weekly parsha verse by verse. Place all the verses in a hat. Pass it around
– everyone randomly selects a verse. Have students go a sit alone for 15 minutes
reflecting on how the verse speaks to them and “where they’re at” in life. Come back
together and share in chevrutah.
</li><li> Study the very first mishnah of Mishnah Berachot.
</li><li> Read A.B. Yehoshua’s critique of diaspora life published in Ha’aretz several years
ago. Discuss.
</li><li> Print copies of the summary of “the PEW poll”. Give students 15 minutes to peruse
and discuss in small groups. Come back together. Discuss.
</li><li> Give students 30 minutes to answer the question “Why be Jewish?” Answers must
be fewer that 50 words. Do the same exercise but require answers to be 20 words or
less. Do one more time – 5 words. Then 1 word.
</li><li> Read Matisyahu’s Twitter post (along with accompanying photo) from 12/13/</li><li>
Discuss.
</li><li> Gather a group of students. Ask them how we might understand and relate to the
idea of angels. Chant “Shalom Aleichem” (as a niggun, without the words) for 15
minutes. Discuss.
</li><li> Print out copies of the Rambam’s enumeration of the 613 commandments. Give
students 15 minutes to explore the list. And give them a set of scavenger hunt questions
to guide their exploration. A commandment that’s surprising. One they already were
familiar with. One they’d like to find the time to perform. One that is morally troubling.
</li><li> Watch the “Double Rainbow” Youtube classic. Pair this with a Heschel text on
“wonder”. Discuss.
</li><li> Invite a Jewish LGBT activist to visit with your students.
</li><li> Invite a young Orthodox Jew to meet with your students for a session entitled,
“What’s going on in the mind of a young Orthodox Jew?”
</li><li> Sometime around Hannukah, read David Brooks’ piece, “The Hannukah Story,” in
the NYTimes from 12/10/</li><li> Discuss.
</li><li> Look at the commandments prohibiting tattoos. Ask students: What right does the
Torah have to tell you how to live your life?
</li><li> Place a bacon cheeseburger in the center of a group of students. Discuss.
</li><li> Play Omer Avital’s song, “New Middle East”. Ask students: What does this song
mean?
</li><li> Read Allen Ginsberg’s poem, “Jaweh and Allah Battle”. Read it again. Discuss.
</li><li> Have students try and retell the Purim story.
</li><li> Ask students about the personal significance (or lack thereof) of fasting on Yom
Kippur.
</li><li> Ask students to make sense of the fact that many Jews who eat cheeseburgers all
year long abstain from bread during Pesach.
</li><li> Have students consider Kaplan’s statement: “The ancient authorities are entitled to
a vote, but not a veto”. Discuss.
</li><li> Consider the mitzvah of Kibud av v’em / Honor your father and mother. Break
students into chevrutot to talk about the depth and possible limitations of this
commandment. Have students write letters to their folks.
</li><li> Have students look at the calendar of Jewish months and holidays. Answer
questions.
</li><li> Have students read the liturgical text for Amelioration of Bad Dreams. Ask students:
What power (of lack thereof) might dreams have in your life? Get into chevrutot and
share a dream that has “stuck with you”. Why?
</li><li> Read the Rambam’s “13 Principles of Faith”. Discuss.
</li><li> Bring a Sefer Torah into a room with a group of students. Allow them to hold it and
sit with it. Kiss it. Open it up and roll it from start the finish – pointing out unique
“typographic” and narrative moments in the text. Answer questions.
</li><li> Bring in falafel – with all the “salatim” fixings. Have a student facilitate a “Felafel
Tutorial” demonstrating how to properly stuff a pita.
</li><li> Read the Torah’s narrative about Moses not being permitted to enter the Land of
Israel. Ask them to reflect on a time in which they too were not able to make it to a long
desired “destination”.
</li><li> Invite a Russian Jewish immigrant to tell his/her story.
</li><li> Ask students if the institution of Bar/Bat Mitzvah should be nixed – or significantly
altered. Should it be postponed until the age of 21?
</li><li> Ask students: What does the title “Birthright” mean? Do you have a “Birthright” to
the Land of Israel? Discuss.
</li><li> Have students attend Friday night Kabbalat Shabbat davening as “Religious
Ethnographers”. Over Shabbat dinner, discuss findings.
</li><li> Watch “Kourtney and Kim Take New York” episode, “True Colors” in which Scott
Disick has a mini Jewish awakening. Ask students: What’s going on for Scott? Discuss.
</li><li id="alicia"> Watch Alicia Keys’ music video, “No One”. Ask students: What is this song about?
About a relationship between two people? Or about a relationship between a person
and God? What evidence in the music video might suggest the latter?
<div class="flex-video">
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rywUS-ohqeE" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
</div>
</li><li>Bring in some
Kabbalistic poetry. Ask students: What’s the relationship between spirituality and
eroticism?
</li><li> Consider several cases of medieval Jewish martyrdom. Ask students: Would you
choose death rather than “forsake” your Jewish identity?
</li><li> Find an interesting analysis of “Jewish American Princess”. Have students read it
together. Ask students how they feel about this terminology and its function.
</li><li> Have students consider the injunction in Vayikra, “Reprove your neighbor”. Bring in
some commentary from interesting sources. Break students into chevrutot and have
them think about whom in their lives deserves careful reproach of this sort?
</li><li> Take students to a mikvah. Allow them to immerse (privately) if desired. Discuss.
</li><li> Read the Israeli Declaration of Independence. Discuss.
</li><li> Read George Washington’s “Letter to the Hebrew Congregation at Newport”. Ask
students: Do they identify primarily as Jewish Americans or American Jews?
</li><li> Ask students to talk about their “Hebrew Names” – their origins, etc. Lead a
discussion about any subject, where students must refer to one another by using their
Hebrew names.
</li><li> Have students tell each other their “Jewish stories” by describing a 1) person, 2)
experience, and 3) Jewish idea that have had major impacts on their lives.
</li><li> Play a good version of the “Hora” and have students lift each other one by one up in
chairs. Discuss.
</li><li> Using their cellphones, have students take portraits of one another with different
facial expressions for a variety of Jewish “things” – including, Yom Kippur, Israel, the
Shoah, Bnei Mitzvah, etc. Post pictures on Facebook.
</li><li> Have students explore Ritualwell.org. Break students up into groups of 4 and have
them design new rituals for “Upon a Hard Break Up”, “Upon Acceptance into College”,
and “Upon Leaving Your First Year Dorm room”.
</li><li> Watch an interview with Rabbi Menachem Froman z”l. Ask students: What does Rav
Froman mean when he says he lives in “the state of God”?
</li><li> Ask students: Are Jews white?
</li><li> Watch a collection of recent videos showing police abuse of people of color. Ask
students: Considering the injunction in Devarim, “You must not remain indifferent”,
what actions have they considered taking to address the injustices that continue to
surround race in America?
</li><li id="ethiopian"> Watch the video of two Israeli police officers beating a Jewish Israeli of Ethiopian
decent. Watch videos of the ensuing Ethiopian protests in Tel Aviv. Discuss.
<div class="flex-video">
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/QAi2fIZNqyQ" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
</div>
</li><li> Have students turn to one another in chevrutot. Ask them to discuss their
relationship with and experience of God.
</li><li> Have students write a list of “10 Contemporary Plagues” that impact our global
society. Have them read this list at their family seders.
</li><li> Have students read Rebbe Nachman’s short tale, “The Turkey Prince”. Discuss.
</li><li> Ask students if they’ve received particular “messaging” from parents or
grandparents about the need to marry a Jew. Discuss.
</li><li> In a group of students, read selections from Jean Amery’s essay, “On the Necessity
and Impossibility of Being a Jew”. Discuss.
</li><li> Ask students: Is it cool to be Jewish? Discuss.
</li><li> Have students interview their oldest living relative about what being Jewish “means
to them”. Each student will present.
</li><li> Have students perform a “Welcoming Assessment” for a selection of campus Jewish
organizations and institutions. Students present findings.
</li><li> Read “The Epistle of the Baal Shem Tov” with a group of students. Discuss.
</li><li> Instruct students to light a menorah (during Hannukah) in a public space in order to
“publicize the miracle”. Come back together and process the experience.
</li><li> Watch the Israeli movie, “Sallah Shabati”. Discuss.
</li><li> Watch “Fiddler on the Roof”. Discuss.
</li><li> Consider how the Torah describes all generations of Jews as having stood at Sinai at
the giving of the Torah.
</li><li id="FeldPoem"> Read Merle Feld’s poem, <a href="http://www.on1foot.org/text/merle-feld-%E2%80%9Cwe-all-stood-together%E2%80%9D-spiritual-life-jewish-feminist-journey-p-205">“We all Stood Together”</a>. Ask students
to envision what they would have been doing, how they would have been feeling,
where they would have been standing – at Sinai.
<br>
</li><li> Teach students how to give a “Dvar Torah”. Then give them all various short
selections from Torah. They have 10 minutes to develop “Divrei Torah”. Present.
</li><li> Facilitate a “Lechayim Tutorial”.
</li><li> Have students compose their “Jewish Soul Resumes”. Present.
</li><li> Teach students the lyrics of “Hatikva”. Sing together as a group. Discuss.
</li>
</ol>
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