I am just bursting, so I had to share. I went to my daughter’s Kindergarten class and told the kiddies all about Hanukkah. Yes, even though I am a godless heathen now, back in the day, I was valedictorian of my Hebrew School, and was Bar Mitzvahed at the Wailing Wall. So I got the cred. Even if it was hypocritical.
We read a Hanukkah book, then my daughter and I showed them all how to play dreydel, and then we broke into groups and played. My daughter lost and was slightly a bad sport about it. As I was leaving, I made like Hanukkah Harry and gave them each Hanukkah gelt (chocolate in the shape of coins covered with gold foil) and little dreydels for them to take home.
Funnily enough, so did I. I’m a godless heathen too!
I do feel slightly odd about it, but it is culture, heritage, history and folklore, even if you don’t buy into the religious aspect. It’s also a healthy counter-balance to all the Christmas bombardment we’ve been subject to since October.
My son and I lit the candles for his pre-Kinder group, and I told them the Hanukkah story.
Next week, my boy is shepherd #4 in his music school’s nativity play. :rolleyes:
The one Jewish kid at our elementary school (yes, there was only one) was in my class. I still remember with fondness the day in 4th grade that his mom came to class and told us about Hanukkah, and taught us how to play dreidel with pennies.
Yeah, it’s more just a tradition than anything else for me.
You know, my 5-year-old daughter feels the same way as you do. “It isn’t even Thanksgiving yet!” She was averting her eyes at Christmas commercials in November.
Did you let them play with dreydels? These kids went nuts! “C’mon Gimel! Baby needs a new pair of shoes!”
As one godless heathen to another, isn’t this sort of thing a violation of the separation of church and state? I mean explaining it to them is one thing, but having them do the play sort of crosses the line for me.
No, I don’t have one and didn’t have enough advance warning to get one sent out. It would have been nice, I agree.
Well, where we live, the Dominican Republic, there is no separation of church and state, not in practice anyway. We send our son to the most diverse school in the city, which makes a point of not celebrating any religious festival but will teach the children about many beliefs and cultures, and my visit to talk about Hannuka was part of that approach.
The nativity play isn’t a school activity: it’s being put on by the private music school my son attends one afternoon a week. I try to treat the nativity play as folklore, culture, etc. After all, it is his father’s religious heritage. Funny thing is that my husband is not a practicing Catholic and was more skeptical about the whole thing than I was.
Does this mean that in the US, state schools don’t put on nativity plays?
Several years back I saw a comedy drag queen act and she sang a Hanukkah song. I still remember the first part.
To the tune of Rapture by Blondie (the slow part)
Lo ah ong ago
there was a terrible war
People fighting
Temple was destroyed
only had 'nuff oil
to last for one night
but it lasted eight night
That was the very first
Hanukkah
She went on to do the entire rap part but I was laughing so hard I could barely breathe.
There are 3 or 4 Jewish kids in my son’s kindergarten class, so they have been talking about Hanukkah this week.
Wednesday, Zack came to me and announced that his tadpole celebrates Hanukkah, and so do the dog and the fish. We are Methodists, so I am wondering how the pets converted while I wasn’t looking!
Another kid in his class told the teacher that he wants to move to South Africa, then move to Hanukkah.
Too funny! But at least they are talking about it. Being a private school, they can perform any kind of holiday program they want, and they have always done a very generic “holiday” program, not catering to any religion over another.
I found a dreydel (sp?) at the soccer field the other night, so I told my son (he’s six). He said, “Lemme see, lemme see!” So I showed him and he immediately pointed out the different characters and told me what they were called. I was stunned. Turned out they’d been playing in class this week. Sometimes this multiculturalism stuff is pretty cool.
I don’t actually know; I know that they didn’t in the suburbs of Long Island when I was growing up (~30 years ago). I would bet that they do in the south, but I bet they do a lot of “no separation” activities in the south that in the north would be looked on with raised eyebrows, to say the least.
Then again, there are the Peanuts and South Park versions of the nativity plays, ostensibly occurring in public schools, so what do I know?
How the heck did a nice Jewish girl end up in the Dominican? (I’m assuming, perhaps wrongly, that you’re originally American? But when you’re on the internet, you could be anywhere, so forgive the assumption!)
Reminds me, I got the BEST GELT EVER, at Trader Joe’s. It had euros and quarters and loonies and toonies and pesos! The euros were on the backs of old European coins - francs and Irish pounds, too.
I gave it out to my coworkers yesterday. And today I went to Dunkin’ Donuts and got a bunch of doughnuts for work. Okay, so they were mostly not the jelly-filled sort, but any doughnut is good for Hanukkah, I figure, it doesn’t have to be a sufganya. I am now popular in the office.
I’m not American. A Brit, married to a Dominican man. We met through my work, which is international development.
You’d be surprised though: this evening we were at our son’s school show which barely touched on the Christmas theme. It is definitely the most alternative/progressive school in the country.
Not only are there a good number of Israeli children at the school; there are at least two other couples like us (Dominican Catholic-non Dominican Jewish). After the show we went to one of the Israeli-owned falafel places in town, where we all took part in the lighting of the candles. Crazy world.
I think that’s what real Euro coins are like. One side is the Euro symbol and the other is the old currency design. Sort of like the state quarters in the USA.
Is it then? Color me unobservant, then, because I know I have seen euros and I don’t remember this. (Last time I was in Europe was before the conversion to euros, but my parents had some from their trip last year.)
Each country designs euro coins with its own set of obverses, yes, but I don’t believe any of them are former currency designs (though some of them have themes from former currency; the monarchies have their kings and queens, naturally, and France has the Semeuse.)
I went to public school in North Carolina from kindegarten through grad school, and I’ve never seen a nativity play put on in a public school. I do remember holiday concerts that often featured Christmas songs as well as songs about Hannukah and generic ones like “Winter Wonderland.” Usually, the Christmas songs were in Latin or were gospel music. YMMV.
This sort of thing does not violate the separation of church and state because the school (in this case, acting as an agency of the state) is not endorsing or “pushing” a particular religion. Schools are allowed to educate *about *religions, they are not allowed to *endorse *one. If you’re a teacher, this can be a tricky line when you’re teaching about your own religion. Most simply choose not to. By having a mom come in and present material like this, there’s no real way the school or the teacher could be construed as having endorsed Judaism. I did the same thing a few years ago, but came in to talk about Winter Solstice. The Jewish mom was there the day before. A Christian dad tried to set the record straight about Christmas. I thought it was a pretty good way to go about it.
I’ve never seen a nativity play in a public school, although there are lots of Christmas and a few Hannakah songs at the “Winter Concert” every year. But they also throw in an “African” song or two to cover their asses. We’re in a pretty mixed Christian/Jewish area in which 23% of the residents are black.
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A Brit, married to a Dominican man. We met through my work, which is international development.