Last week, juniors in Morah Racheli’s Navi class presented a grand gallery walk for faculty and students that showcased their culminating projects for their unit on Sefer Zechariah. Students were tasked with examining one of the prophecies from the series of visions Zecharia experienced during the time of the building of the second Beit Hamikdash. Students had to explain the vision according to three meforshim – a rishon, an acharon, and a modern bible scholar – and make their own source sheets, as well as create a visual depiction of the vision to be presented to the class.
Students were extremely creative and brought Zechariah’s visions to life through art, clay, painting, 3D printing, stop motion video, and multi-media in a variety of innovative ways. Students also explained their artwork to the visitors of the gallery walk and discussed why that particular vision was canonized, how the message of that vision was meant for the Jews of that time and how it might apply to our lives today. Rabbi Pittinsky blogged about the project – and another example of project-based learning – here.
“Project-based learning, like this example from my classroom, is the best way for students to tap into their ability to self-introspect, and inspires them to think of what they’re researching and how it applies to them and their lives today,” said Morah Racheli. “This project comes at a critical time in juniors’ lives, when they are getting ready to go to Israel and college. I’m in awe of how creative my students are and the beautiful projects they create.”
