Riding for a Buddy Who Can't
Jason Lipeles, Contributing Writer, Jewish Journal
On Tuesday, about 85 3-to 5 year-olds from Kehillat Israel's Early Childhood Center rode their bikes, tricycles and scooters around a minitrack to raise money for Beit Issie Shapiro, an Israeli-based organization that treats developmentally disabled children. The ECC at the Reconstructionist congregation in the Pacific Palisades was one of the approximately 25 Los Angeles area schools that hosted a Cycles for Smiles fundraiser this year.
Young Children Heal The World
Tikkun Olam is a very important part of the curriculum in the Early Childhood Center.Each Shabbat the children are encouraged to bring tzedakah for their individual classroom projects.We have many other opportunities throughout the year for the children to find ways to make this world a better place to live.
This year for Tikkun Olam, each classroom will engage in its own age-appropriate Tzedekah project. With guidance from their teachers and a parent coordinator, the children will be intimately involved in how the Tzedekah they bring in each week will be used. With their ideas in hand, we hope to bring the concept of Tikkun Olam to them, and make it an exciting learning opportunity. Here is a short description of what the other classes will be doing in the coming months:
Blue Room: Mental health and social services /Hollygrove (collect toys/games for kids living in the foster care system)
Red Room: Diaper Drive
Purple Room: Environmental Awareness / Trees (Tu B?Shevat)
Green Room: Homelessness - Adopt a family
Yellow Room: Environment Awareness / Temescal beach clean up May 3rd!
Turquoise Room: Children's disease : special focus on EB (Epidermolysis Bullosa ) to help Brandon in the Turquoise room.
ECC Tzedakah helps Lia in Israel
The other 1/2 of the children's tzedakah money from the classrooms is going to a little girl named Lia who lives in Israel. Lia has Rett Syndrome, a debilitating condition by which the child develops normally for her first year or two and then begins to deteriorate, particularly in her speech and motor functioning.
Lia goes to a special school called Beit Issie Shapiro. They have, over the years, developed particular expertise in the care and education of girls with Rett syndrome and they have found that intensive and prolonged treatment can minimize the deterioration and maintain some function.
The money that the children are bringing for Tzedakah will be used to help Lia with her treatments. We now have a photo of Lia in each classroom. We also will be sending art work from our children to Lia, along with pictures from each of the classes, so that Lia can get to know her new friends at KI ECC.
The ECC?s Tzedakah program is helping one of our own by donating 1/2 of the children?s tzedakah money from the classrooms to the EBMRF, a non-profit Foundation run by KI members Paul & Andrea Joseph to raise funds and awareness for Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB) which their 4 year old son, Brandon was born with. Brandon, a student in the Purple Room, suffers from this rare, and life threatening genetic disorder which causes the skin to tear and blister at a slight touch and requires daily bandaging of the wounds. There is currently no cure for EB. The Foundation is an all volunteer organization, no salaries are paid. To make a donation or learn more about the disease go to www.ebkids.org
Our Kids Collect Tzedakah
The understanding and practice of ethical behavior is a basic part of our Religious School curriculum. The collection of Tzedakah and being involved with tzedakah projects is just one of many ways our students experience Tikkun Olam.
Each class collects tzedakah monies on an ongoing basis with both students and teachers working together to decide on distributions to a variety of organizations. We are working towards having ongoing Tikkun Olam projects in place for each of our grade levels.
In addition, we have also initiated a new school/temple wide values program named Menschlekeit Matters, which will incorporate ideas from the national Character Counts Program! and places them in a uniquely Jewish perspective.
Visit the Tikkun Olam: School Tzedakah archive