18 Jul LEARN, PRAY, EAT
Upon finishing a Mesechet of Gemara we read the text of the “hadran”. It contains all sorts of peculiarities, one of which is the listing of the names of the ten sons of the Amora and business magnate, Rav Pappa. It is an enigmatic tongue-twister of a sentence, allowing for the Mesechet-finisher to show off their Aramaic fluency, leaving the audience bemused and somewhat perplexed. Like all things Torah, there is more to it than meets the eye. One explanation provided for the listing of Rav Pappa’s sons, is to remind us of what cause all of them to became scholars like their father: their inspiration for learning was fuelled by the lavish parties (siyumim) Rav Pappa would throw upon completing each Mesechet.
Food and learning are uniquely Jewish combination. Our people appreciate the power that a danish has to recognise a learning milestone and create positive memories of learning that will inspire a life-long commitment to Torah study. Indeed, some have the custom that young children lick honey off the Hebrew alphabet when they first learn them, ensuring that Torah establishes the same Pavlovian relationship as does the viscous sweetener.
It is in this spirit, that one of our foci this semester has been to reach significant milestones in learning with our students and then to celebrate them with a traditional siyum. Some of these milestones included:
- Our prep students, under the guidance of Morah Sue and Morah Tzippy, celebrated completing the Aleph Bet this week. As part of their celebration, students brought in special accessories relating to their studies. Some brought shirts, hats, Aleph-Beth lego creations and even a 3D printed letter Aleph. Students concluded the siyum with the receipt of certificates and delicious cupcakes.
- Our Year 5 students have been working diligently on completing the first Perek of Mishna in Mesechet Brachot. Year 5B finished the Perek last week, and celebrated with a special Pizza party. In the following lesson, Chananya – one of our illustrious Hesder bachurim – joined the class to test the students on their knowledge, lead them in the saying of a hadran, and led the class in song accompanied by the guitar. Year 5A are hot on the heels of Year 5B and will be’ezrat HaShem be celebrating their siyum at the start of Term 3.
- Our Year 7, 9 and 10 Gemara students have experienced siyumim for a range of milestones reached in their learning of Perek Eilu Metziot, Keitzad HaEdim and Shnayim Ochazin respectively.
A few years back we had Dr Jared Cooney-Horvath, an expert in the field of Educational Neuroscience, speak to staff at Yavneh. At the conclusion of his talk, I chatted with him about the relationship between food and learning. He shared that his research had also pointed to a correlation between ingesting food while studying and the subsequent retention of learning. Perhaps, by taking food into our body and consuming it, we simulate what we want the learning to do – to cease being something external and instead merge with our personality and identity.