Educational Philosophy
Beth Yeshurun Day School accepts students from early childhood — age 15 months — through the Fifth Grade. Our educational philosophy, which combines a comprehensive preparatory program in math, science, humanities, and the arts, with an inspiring Judaic studies and Hebrew language curriculum, is centered on active, challenging, and multi-sensoral learning. Pervading our school teaching is the perspective that all children can shine and succeed when we strive to know each child’s unique talents and seek to develop each child’s capacity for personal and academic improvement.
At Beth Yeshurun, the term “excellence” is not used casually. Teachers and staff all work to promote our school’s mission by participating in advancing our professional learning community, which means that we are “looking out the window” to search for best practices in other schools, take in current research, and embrace the best in educational wisdom; conversely, we spend little time “looking into the mirror” which can aid the complacency we seek to eliminate. Our joy and celebration is centered on the goodness that springs from pursuing our mission.
The Jewish values of Torah learning, asking questions, respecting others, serving the community, caring for our world, and knowing and honoring our traditions – all contribute to the nascent ideals of commitment and leadership in our students. For the educators in our school – and this includes teachers, administrators, and parents – whether we are teaching in the classroom or chaperoning on field trips, planning our curriculum or participating in Jewish learning, our aim is to set a positive example for the children and to grow from our collective wisdom.
We see the fullest realization of learning when these three elements are manifest in the child’s daily experience: identity, inquiry, and imagination.
- Identity means cultivating one’s individual Jewish identity as well as growing one’s knowledge and appreciation of one’s Jewish heritage and traditions; identity means developing one’s own confidence through the cultivation of “voice,” which is one’s innate, G-d given style or place in this world.
- Inquiry is the growth and application of critical thinking; inquiry means both asking questions and interpreting information; inquiry is the facility to explore, examine, analyze, and assess.
- Imagination is the free exercise of inner vision; imagination refers to each person’s quest to create, to amplify possibilities, and to conceive of a better world; imagination is the flow of energy that leads to problem-solving and helps children to awaken and enlarge their sense of human experience.
Our Beth Yeshurun Day School philosophy, stated simply, is to cultivate the ideal of learning in our community, in a manner that is in service to our Jewish faith, so that our lives and our world may be ever-enriched.
