Hebrew Literature: Hebrew Novel ADV

This course, offered to seniors as an alternative to sequentially-leveled classes, is similar to an English course in the sense that students will have the opportunity to analyze different pieces of Hebrew literature, according to High School Principal and Associate Head of School Dr. Marc Lindner.

“Obviously the level of Hebrew required is going to be extensive and I think part of what they’re looking to do is to have students not just learning the Hebrew language but actually engaging in a learning process with the Hebrew language exclusively and studying literature,” Lindner said.

American Film

The course catalog explains that this elective teaches students the history of film in America. Examples of this are different genres, directors, vocabulary and techniques.

“In the arts department, we’d love to grow a film program and so step one is having a film course where students can watch and talk about and learn about some of the great works of American cinema. Debra Herman Berger Director of Arts Education Dr. David Solomon said. “So students will be video blogging in this class their responses to the films.” 

According to Solomon, CESJDS used to have an American Film class in its English department that focused on the lingual and analytical components of film rather than “creative expression.”

21st Century American Identity

Required for seniors starting next year but currently an elective for the class of 2019, the course will focus on teaching students how to critically analyze modern American history that some U.S. history courses do not cover.

“This is designed to give students the context that informs who they are,” History Department Chair Mark Buckley said. “At this age coming through high school, students are developing their own identities, they’re trying to figure out where they fit in the world … and the best way to do that is to understand where the history and context that their existing in came from.”

Robotics and Engineering

Due to popular demand, this class is the continuation of JDS’ Robotics and Robotics Workshop classes and requires either one of those classes as a prerequisite or the permission of a STEM teacher. According to former STEM organizer and current Director of Instructional Technology Ginger Thornton, more complex robotics instruments will be used. The class will have a close connection with JDS’ robotics club which will be participating in the FIRST Tech Challenge robotics competition this year. 

“We were looking for a class that we could add that would be a little more engineering and sort of compliment the computer, science and coding stuff that we were offering but also have a little more structural engineering and some of that kind of stuff in it,” Thornton said. 

This story was featured in the Volume 36, Issue 1 print edition of The Lion’s Tale, published on Aug. 28, 2018.