Embracing Beginnings

This Rosh Hashanah I have asked myself the question: What do our children know about Rosh Hashanah that can help to make our celebration more meaningful or relevant? This question, focusing on new beginnings, seems especially appropriate given the alignment of our new school year and the New Year in the Jewish calendar. This convergence of beginnings has allowed me to experience all of the exciting and scary aspects of new beginnings personally, religiously and professionally all at the same moment.

Last week I was meeting with one of our classroom teaching teams about the “big ideas” of Rosh Hashanah – reflecting on what aspects of this holiday they might want to highlight in the classroom. After the teachers rattled off several key ideas involving apples and honey, the sound of the shofar, and the hopes for a sweet New Year, I began to reflect on what the children would contribute on the topic of new beginnings. I suddenly saw an irony that we, adults are teaching the children about beginnings – for they are experiencing beginnings each and every day. In our classrooms nearly EVERYTHING is new for the children – for many, this is a new school, and all of our students are experiencing new teachers, a new classroom, new routines, a new cubby, new snacks, new friends, a new garden rooftop, and so much more. We do not need to teach them about the core theme of beginnings which underlies Rosh Hashanah – they are experiencing it intimately.

I have recently embarked on a beginning myself. This past month I began to study guitar with my 11-year old daughter, Emma. After almost fifteen years of saying I wanted to learn, we took the plunge together. We are practicing together sometimes. I grip the guitar awkwardly, trying to reach the frets, and finding myself clumsily making cacophonous sounds. My heart races as I struggle to remember not only the placement of my fingers but also the names of the notes. Emma gently, supportively reassures me – telling me that I am doing it right, that I am getting closer, and that it sometimes hard for her too. I fight the instinct to abandon the project – the feelings that I am busy, I don’t need to learn to play, I shouldn’t hold Emma up as I struggle to find the notes emerge from this box of wood and strings. I am realizing that more than needing more practice with the guitar, I need more practice trying something new. I need more practice being inexperienced, being incompetent, being an amateur.

We ask our children to be beginners all the time – we ask them to try new materials, new foods, new activities and new friends. We ask them to work at the art table and then kick a soccer ball, work independently and then happily collaborate with a large group. And for the most part they comply with our demands. If we put ourselves in their shoes, we can realize that none of this is easy. But our children have a great deal to teach us about being open to the sweetness of beginnings. They can teach us about trusting the new people in our lives and being open to the possibility of building deep relationships. They can teach us about throwing away rigid assumptions about how things should be done based on how they were done before. They can teach us about taking risks, making mistakes, and trying new things. They can teach us about asking questions with our words and sometimes with our eyes or even with one inquisitive pointing finger. They can teach us about the trepidation and the delight of moving in new directions.

This Rosh Hashanah I am hoping to embrace beginnings as they do – trusting that with beginnings come enormous possibilities, new directions and new blessings.

Wishing you all a sweet and happy new year filled with wondrous beginnings.

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Ilana Ruskay-Kidd

Ilana has been serving the Jewish educational community in New York City in multiple capacities for the past twelve years. Most recently, she served as the Director of The Saul and Carole Zabar Nursery School at the JCC in Manhattan. Prior to being named to this position in 2006, she worked at the JCC as Director of Young Families and then as Senior Director of Family Life, supervising programs serving families and children from birth to eighteen years old. Ilana began her teaching career at the Central Park East school in Harlem and went on to become a founding teacher at the Ella Baker School, an alternative public school in Manhattan. She then worked as an Early Childhood Curriculum Consultant for the Children's Aid Society where she developed curricula with directors and teachers in day care, Head Start and private nursery school programs throughout the city.

Ilana received her B.A. from Harvard College and a Master's Degree in Education from Bank Street College. She was born and raised on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and now lives there with her husband and three children.

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