Ideas for chumash project

amother

Sat, Oct 20 2012, 7:54 pm

I teach grades 9, 10, 11 chumash (bereishis, shmos, and bemidbar respectively). I want to give them a project, because I want to grade on something other than tests. The project should be fun and creative, but also test serious skills, especially as relates to their ability to understand meforshim and other sources. Also needs to be not too babyish for high schoolers. I am unsure yet if I would want them to work in pairs or alone- there are pros and cons to both approaches. So, who has ideas? TIA.

V'shavu Banim

Wed, Oct 31 2012, 12:37 pm

How much class time would you allot for this project? One idea that might be good, but that uses a lot of class time, is to let your students teach a lesson to the class. They can create the lesson in any format that they want I.e. lecture, worksheets, powerpoints, etc. The students can have the opportunity to choose a topic from the sefer being learned that really interested them and that they would like to learn more about (or you can create a list of topics you think will interest them and have them choose). If you want, you can specify how many mefarshim you want incorporated into their lesson. This project allows the students to be creative, engage in research, and utilize their Chumash skills. It also allows them to experience being the teacher.

pobody's nerfect

Wed, Oct 31 2012, 1:18 pm

v'shavu banim's idea is great!
if you don't have the classtime to spend on the presentations, you can have a 'torah fair' (even for all 3 grades!) where each student chooses/is assigned a topic and must make a trifold with information, and something to go on the table, like a 3-d model, snack that pertains to the topic, or fun sheet for people to take home.

no matter what project you give, it would be helpful to give a rubric for grading. I know that in secular subjects I sort of knew what was fully expected of me but it was not always so clear in judaic subjects.

b.chadash

Tue, Nov 06 2012, 7:49 pm

You can have them produce a newspaper of the times, for ex, if you're in the beginning of shemos, you can have them write about the current events in mitzrayim, with the babies being snatched and thrown in the river, the mass divorces of the hebrews, amram's remarriage...etc. it can include different perspectives, focusing on different meforshim etc.They can include advice column, recipes (having to do with the subject) and photos...
Another idea I have done, is more of a homework for a few pesukim, but its fun and creative, and an outlet for those artists in the classroom. I have them draw a sequential story, cartoon style. The idea is to use as many facts from the pasuk. For example, we did this in balak, on the story of bilaams journey to go curse...there are a lot of details, such as the malach with the drawn sword, and the three "stations", and his crushed foot...so I had the girls draw the pictures and write as many words as they could from the passuk. It gets them to really look at the pesukim. (I did this for 8th grade, but I don't know the level in your school)