I am proud to share the next entry in the Student Guest Blogging series. I hope you enjoy.

There are many things that I value and appreciate about being an 8th grade student at MJDS. One of the many is Mishpachot. The word Mishpachot is a Hebrew word that translates to mean family. I enjoy this program is because it gives the 8th graders an opportunity to take on leadership roles, and interact across all of the grade levels. I feel that Mishpachot has allowed all of the students to feel more comfortable and close with each other. In other words, we are all a part of the MJDS community, but within each Mishpacha, there is another unique family that has formed.

MJDS started a program called Mishpachot last year. Once a month on a Friday, the 8th graders lead Mishpachot. There are about one to two children per grade in each Mishpacha. Beforehand, we have a planning day, where we come up with our “lesson plan” for that session. We usually base the lessons off of upcoming Jewish holidays, or just Jewish topics in general. We had teachers explain to us how they create their lesson plans for their classes. This helped us create our own lesson plans and activities in which we wanted to incorporate in our Mishpachot.

Every group’s Mishpachot runs a little differently. However, the basic outline of Mishpachot is as follows:

We begin Mishpachot by doing “Kabbalat Shabbat.” Kabbalat Shabbat is when we sing Shabbat songs, light the candles, do the kiddish, and say the Hamotzi. We call upon the children from younger grades to help us. Next, we read a book. The book we read often relates to the current Jewish holiday.

One of the many highlights of Mishpachot is the project, activity, or games we do! Depending on the Jewish holiday or focused topic, we plan certain actives accordingly. For example, to celebrate Tu B’shevat, we planned a scavenger hunt! We hid different foods that were closely tied to Israel, the seven kinds, or Tu Bishvat. The scavenger hunt consisted of the children finding clues about each food we hid, and then getting a taste of that food.

Another fun project we did was around the Fall season and Thanksgiving. Each child in each Mishpachot wrote something or someone they were grateful or thankful for in their life on a paper leaf. At the end, we gathered all of the leaves and put them on the huge tree we created by the office. This symbolized a major Jewish value of having gratitude.

Having gratitude is a key value in celebrating Shabbat. That is one of the many reasons why I look forward to having Mishpacha, as it helps me to get in the Shabbat spirit!

The knowledge I am acquiring through Mishpachot can be used in the real world, after I graduate MJDS. The leadership, planning, organizational, and interpersonal skills will help us through high school and beyond.