Looking for an alternative to overcrowded classrooms, dwindling per-student funding, metal detectors and mediocre curricula--not to mention social pressures, conflicting values and prohibitive private school costs--a growing number of parents are opting out of the American education system. They're taking the biblical imperative more literally than ever and educating their children at home. Once the bastion of fundamentalist Christians, home schooling is attracting a growing number of Jews.
JHEN connects you to Jewish homeschoolers throughout the country and world-wide. It is a quarterly newsletter filled with thought-provoking articles, letters from readers that provide open dialogue on a wide range of interesting topics, mouth-watering recipes, creative holiday and craft ideas, stimulating book reviews, a Jewish calendar chock-full of information and original ideas, help columns with practical how-to advice on homeschooling. It is the only place you'll find the columns "Homeschool Hannah" and "Aunt Rachel's Bookshelf".
Torah Tots products combine the zaniness of their Mitzvah characters with educational fun. You'll find cassettes, audio CDs, videos, and interactive CDs.
This list is for Jewish homeschoolers in the New England area, including CT, NH, VT, ME, RI, MA. Members include Orthodox Jews, Conservative Jews, Reform Jews, Reconstructionist Jews, and secular Jews.
This website is offered by a Jewish vegetarian homeschooling family. You'll enjoy reading about their experiences and how they combine their faith and homeschooling.
The Pedagogic Center is a specialist unit within the Department for Jewish Education, JAFI. It offers professional support and development services to the Department's educational divisions and geographical desks, as well as to Jewish educators and lay leaders world-wide in both formal and informal education. They cover resources in formal and informal Jewish education, with a particular emphasis on materials for youth, students, adults and the educators themselves
Zig Zag World features Hebrew games and activities.
This articles details many of the reasons Jewish families choose to educated their children at home, including being able to teach the Torah in the context of daily life, for religious reasons, and concerns over the academic and social quality of schools.
This site offers word games, geography and trivia quizzes, Jewish clipart, and more.
Behrman House Publishers is recognized for its distinguished Jewish educational materials used in schools throughout North America and in English-speaking countries around the world.
Finding published curriculum for Limudei Kodesh even for a regular Yeshiva is virtually frustrating. Most Yeshiva day schools have their own curriculum that they make available for their teachers and parents. Most parents don't bother asking about it as they completely trust the teachers and the school to educate their precious children. It's the Jewish homeschooling family who's decided to do it all or partially who is not only curious but find themselves totally dependent on such a curriculum to help them tread through the journey of homeschooling their children in Limudei Kodesh.
This is an international forum for Jewish and Torah-observing homeschoolers/home educators using Sonlight curriculum, or other literature-based curricula or methods. For support, encouragement and discussion about Sonlight curriculum, literature selections and with specific reference to Jewish education, calendar and life-cycle, etc.
Hachai Publishing is dedicated to producing high quality children's literature with Jewish themes. Their books promote universal values such as sharing, kindness and charity, and teach Jewish history and tradition. They feature the work of exciting new authors and artists to create books that you and your child can enjoy over and over again.
The purpose of this list is to sell or trade used Jewish books, games and music, cookbooks, holiday guides, textbooks and Yiddish or Hebrew books for homeschoolers interested in learning or sharing books which are explicitly Jewish in nature.
Learn about where Jewish schools come about and it can be returned it to where it should be.
A discussion and support group for Jewish homeschoolers and parents considering homeschooling who are using a relaxed, gentle, unschooling parenting approach.
It must be clear at the outset that there are no sure-fire rules of education that apply to all children at all times. Reishis Chachmah quotes a Midrash that it is easier to raise a legion of olive trees in the Galilee, where the soil and climate are not conducive to growing olive trees, than to raise one child in the Land of Israel, even though Israel is conducive to proper education, since the atmosphere itself helps to imbue one with wisdom and holiness. Children are not objects to be fashioned at will, but rather human beings who have their own free will and can reject, if they so choose, even the best education. The most a parent can hope to achieve, as Chiddushei HaRim points out regarding all learning, is to put the words of Torah on the heart of the child so that when the heart opens up, the Torah found on it will sink into the receptive heart.
This list, Jewish Home Educators of New York City, is a meeting place for homeschooling or unschooling Jewish parents (or those just thinking about it) living in or around New York City. It is a place to discuss issues unique to New York-area Jewish homeschoolers and unschoolers and a place where friendships will be formed and meetings will be planned.
At the Israel Book Shop, you'll find educational games, resources, and toys, along with Jewish books and gifts.
The focus of this list will be to provide homeschooling support and resources to Jewish homeschoolers of all levels of observance. Topics include curriculum choices, teaching tips, and holiday observances.
This group is for Sonlight curriculum-users who are actively homeschooling/ home-educating from a Jewish or Messianic perspective, and those who are interested in learning more about Messianic Judaism, and how it relates to parenting and specifically to home-educating their children.
Babaga Newz features online games for Jewish children, along with ideas for family activies, Jewish holiday craft projects, recipes, and more.