Family Education @ B’nai Mitzvah: A Moving Traditions Convening

Now, with data collected from over 1,300 parent and preteen pairs who have participated in our family education program, on June 10, 2021, Moving Traditions will gather a select group of scholars, edu...

Moving Traditions looks forward to welcoming frontline practitioners, educational leaders, and funders from across Jewish life to explore questions about today’s preteens, their parents, and how Jewish teachings and community can help families explore what it means to “become a teen” and “parent a teen,” today.

June 10, 2021
1:00 p.m. – 4:30 p.m. ET/10:00 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. PT

Schedule highlights:

  • Opening panel featuring Dr. Jean Twenge, author of iGen: Why Today’s Super-Connected Kids are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood, Dr. Jess Shatkin, MD, MPH, of the NYU Child Study Center, where he is Vice Chair for Education and Professor of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry and Pediatrics at the NYU School of Medicine, and Dr. Arielle Levites, Managing Director of the Consortium for Applied Studies in Jewish Education at George Washington University’s Graduate School of Education and Human Development.
  • Discussion by Jewish educators and clergy working with b’nai mitzvah families in partnership with Moving Traditions about their experiences and findings.
  • Breakout groups to explore engaging b’nai mitzvah families on core issues of identity and community, including: race, gender, sexuality, interfaith and multifaith, neurodiversity, mental health, citizenship, and activism.
  • The opportunity to think with colleagues about how applying Jewish wisdom and social-emotional learning to family education at adolescence might help us go beyond our institutional boundaries to reach, meet the needs of, and engage more families, in this unique moment.
Time Session
1:00 – 1:20 p.m. ET Welcome & Opening Activity
1:20 – 2:10 p.m. ET Setting the Stage Panel: Dr. Jean Twenge, Dr. Jess P. Shatkin & Dr. Arielle Levites
2:10 – 2:25 p.m. ET Breakout Working Groups: Locating these trends in your work
2:25 – 2:35 p.m. ET Closing Statements from Dr. Jean Twenge, Dr. Jess P. Shatkin & Dr. Arielle Levites
2:35 – 3:05 p.m. ET BREAK
3:05 – 3:25 p.m. ET Voices from the Field: Moving Traditions Partner Panel: Rabbi Noah Arnow, Rabbi Janice Elster, Rabbi Bethie Miller & Rabbi Matt Shapiro
3:25 – 4:10 p.m. ET Breakout Working Groups: Deepening the Practice and Reach
4:10 – 4:30 p.m. ET Call to Action: Reflections, Next Steps and Closing

 

Special thank you to Lippman Kanfer Foundation for Living Torah and The Covenant Foundation for helping to support the convening.