Our Curriculum

Our school's curriculum is based on the spiral curricular concept in which students visit similar areas of study each school year (Bible, Hebrew, values, history, holidays, etc.) but on an increasingly sophisticated and theme-specific level. We recognize that certain topics must be studied each year to fully understand the cycle of Jewish life: however, we understand that as children grow intellectually, spiritually and physically, they wish to explore new facets of these Jewish experiences, and bring new knowledge and increasing intellectual sophistication to bear on their studies.

Our students

• express the Jewish values they learn in their personal behavior as well as their communal behavior, as we take on the task of repairing our world through acts of loving kindness.
• learn Hebrew as the language of the Jewish people, develop reading and comprehension skills, as well as feeling of comfort with the prayer book.
• regularly participate in prayer experiences, Shabbat services and grasp the meaning of our prayers.
• experience holiday celebrations and life cycle events.
• develop a personal connection to God and strengthen their Jewish identities.
• discover the meaning of community and become actively involved in living Jewishly.

Our curriculum

embodies the best of informal Jewish education combined with innovation in teaching and learning: our students feel that our school is more like a home in which they can have fun and learn at the same time, a safe space where they can experiment and grow as members of our Jewish community.

Core Concepts & Jewish Literacy

We believe firmly that a Jewish education must be rooted in a certain set of core concepts and values, and that every student should develop a kind of Jewish "literacy". We expect that our students will grapple with these ideas as they construct their own interpretation of Judaism. Our school's curriculum outlines for each grade a specific set of terms, concepts, vocabulary and values that we have deemed essential for our students to know and understand to grow up to be literate adult Jews.

Essential Questions

To achieve this broad-based foundation of concepts and values, we have created a curriculum based on "essential questions," the rubric under which all our learning in any given year will be organized. An essential question is a commitment to focus learning on a bigger picture, and helps to form a scaffold for a young person's learning. What understanding, what meaning will emerge from a child's learning in our school? What will endure? What is the big picture that we want our young people to grasp? Our essential questions will refine our students' learning and will convey to them and to our families the structure as well as the most important elements of our curriculum. The essential questions our school's curriculum hopes to answer are found within the description of each grade's course of study.

Aenne Hahn Religious School
Our Programs
Religious School Faculty
Aleph - First Grade
Bet - Second Grade
Gimel - Third Grade
Daled - Fourth Grade
Hay - Fifth Grade
Vav - Sixth Grade
Zayin - Seventh Grade
New Teen Programming
New Youth Programming
Religious School Committee
Yad B'yad: Tot Shabbat
Religious School Registration 2010-2011
Tz'irim Registration 2010-2011