Gematria

As part of my practicum at the Heschel School, I introduced students to the study of Humash through Mikraot Gedolot, focusing on Parashat Lech-Lecha. This marked their transition from weekly Torah summaries to engaging with the text as a primary source while learning essential navigation skills, including Gematria. Under my mentor teacher's guidance, I designed and taught a foundational lesson on Gematria. The lesson introduced the numeric values of Hebrew letters and connected these to mathematical concepts like expanded form and place value.

Taught in Hebrew as part of Heschel's Ivrit B'Ivrit approach, the lesson allowed students to apply Gematria values in both word formation and basic arithmetic. Building on this, my mentor introduced terms like pasuk and perek to deepen their textual navigation skills. This experience reflects my commitment to fostering students’ religious literacy, critical thinking, and a love of Torah (Torah Lishma).