Clean your mezuzah!

Article: There is a practice of touching and/or kissing a mezuzah with your fingers when leaving or entering a room. A 2009 study by Israeli doctors of 70 mezuzot in an Israeli hospital found significant bacteria on the mezuzot, suggesting that touching them can lead to spreading disease. However, doctors at a Brooklyn hospital recently repeated the study with 100 mezuzot and did not find the same results. While the mezuzot had some microbes, they did not reach the level of growing infectious diseases. At the Israeli hsopital, the mezuzot were never cleaned, for fear of ruining the mezuzot. At the Brooklyn hospital, the staff were told to clean the mezuzot regularly.

Questions for Kids:

• Do you ever touch or kiss mezuzot? Why do some Jews have this custom? 
• How do germs get on the mezuzot? 
• Why do you think diseases-causing microbes were found in the Israeli hospital mezuzot but not in the New York ones? 
• What other things are touched regularly that should probably be cleaned to avoid spreading germs?

Can Some Babies Already be Smarter than Other Babies?

Article: A new study has found that 18 month old babies from wealthier families (median incomes greater than $69,000) already had a language advantage over their poorer peers (median incomes of $24,000). The study tested this by showing 18 month-olds pictures of things they could recognize by pointing to (dog; ball); the babies from wealthier families could identify the images much faster and in the following 6 months, their vocabularies grew by 30% more than the babies from poorer families. The study attributed this to the fact that wealthier families speak with their babies more and reinforce vocabulary more. These babies thus not only have more words, but eventually will have better reading comprehension in school. The end result is that even by the time they are only 18 months old, the academic outcome for these babies far surpasses poorer babies.

Discussion:

• How does knowing a lot of words help you read--and understand what you are reading--better? How does reading, spelling and vocabulary help you succeed in school more?
• How does your school performance help you later in life? (Getting into university; getting a job, etc.)
• Why are people worried that babies not knowing as many words could impact them for life? 
• What are solutions? (Starting public preschool at earlier ages). How would this help?

Ugandan Female Soldier in the IDF

Article: Or Meidan, a non-Jew from Uganda, just entered the Israeli army as a soldier. She moved to Israel two years ago with her family. At first they lived on a Kibbutz, Yad Mordechi, and rockets were flying into the Kibbutz every day from Hamas controlled Gaza. She planned to enroll in university upon arrival but decided to become a soldier instead. She was inspired by her step-father, a native Israeli. She proudly wants to serve her country. At first, this was a really hard choice. She didn't speak much Hebrew and had to enroll in ulpan (Hebrew immersion). She was then drafted into the Air Defense Command, charged with operating the Iron Dome system which protects Israelis from the very rockets she and her familiy were threatened by when they arrived in Israel. She hopes to become an Iron Dome commander one day and train others to save lives. Although she is not Jewish, she intends to convert. She says converting to Judaism, "just feels right."

Discussion:

• What do you think were the hardest parts for Or when she moved to Israel? 
• Why did she want to join the IDF? 
• What makes her story unusual?

Nobel Prize Winners!

Article: Every year, Nobel Prizes are given to the most influential people in the world in various fields. This year, the Nobel Prize was given to at least four Jews, which is remarkable considering that out of the world's population, Jews make up less than 0.2%. The winners were physicist Francois Englert of Belguim, 80, a professor from Tel Aviv University and a Holocaust survivor; Chemistry Professor Arieh Warshel, an Israeli born on a kibbutz who now lives in the U.S.; Chemistry Professor Michael Levitt, a Jew from South Africa who made aliyah and now lives in the U.S. and Israel; and Chemistry Professor Martin Karplus, an Austrian Jew who fled to the U.S. before the Holocaust. They are all sharing the $1.25 million prize.

Discussion: 

• Some ask why Jews win so many Nobel Prizes, much more than statistically they should. Why do you think? What Jewish values do you think push Jews to excel in their chosen fields?
• How did the Nobel Prize begin? The history is fascinating. Alfred Nobel, a Swedish chemist and inventor in the 1800s, was famous for inventing dynamite and other things used to to create weapons of destruction. He became very rich. One day, his brother died and by accident the newspaper printed Alfred's obituary with the title, "Merchant of Death Dies." Nobel was so disturbed that this was how he would be remembered, he changed his will and created the Nobel Prize, which annually awards a financial prize for intellectual and peace-seeking feats of excellence.

 

Israeli Spies Revealed to Iran

Article: Each country has spies that they send to find out information about other countries. Israel relies heavily on spied to protect itself and know what is going on in Arab countries. For decades, the Israeli Mossad has used Turkey as its base to meet with its spies, particularly those from Iran. Turkey apparently knew about this but kept quiet until recently, when they disclosed to Iran who Israel's Iranian spies were.

Discussion:

• What is a spy? Give examples of how spies do their job.
• When Turkey leaked the information of Israel's spies to Iran, who is this dangerous for? Who does this hurt? (The spies themselves; Israel; the Mossad agents)
• What must Israel do now? (Find new spies) Will this be easy or hard? 
• How can a country know that they can trust their spies?

Corruption; A Chinese Circus

Follow up to last week's video/article about the Palestinian Authority: According to a new report by the European Court, the PA has "lost" nearly €1.95 billion in aid money due to corruption and mismanagement. (Speak with kids about how much money this is and how sad it is that it has all been wasted; what can be done in the future, etc.)

Today's Article: My son requested a current event about animals. Here goes. In China, animal performances are outlawed. However, a circus was still scheduling animal performances. The shows would have included bears twirling flaming sticks while lying on their backs; tigers riding horses; moneys riding goats. Animal rights activists organized a boycott and succeeded in getting the circus to cancel its shows.

Questions:

• What is a boycott? Why are they successful? 
• Why did these animal rights activists want to boycott the circus? How was it going to hurt/exploit animals? 
• What is a way to have a circus without hurting animals? (Cirque du Soleil as an example)
• Bonus: here's a video of a circus that doesn't hurt animals (but notice they dress up as animals)

Bar Ilan's New Dean: A Female Haredi World-Renowned Mathematician

Article: Share this story with your kids of this remarkable woman. Last week, Malka Schaps became the first ultra-Orthodox woman in the world to be appointed dean at a major university, Bar Ilan. Until now, she has served as Bar Ilan's financial mathematics program head. Schaps is 65 years old and the grandmother of 17. Her story is remarkable.

Malka Schaps was born Mary Kramer, to a non-Jewish, non-religious Protestant home in Cleveland Ohio. Her father, a professor of American history, pushed her to excel academically. When she was 19 and in college at Swarthmore, she converted to Orthodox Judaism. She was inspired by her time as a foreign exchange student in Germany and her studies of the Holocaust. She met her husband, David, at college and they both did their graduate studies at Harvard. He is now a professor at Bar Ilan in the classics. They made aliyah in 1972. They live in Bnai Brak, where Schaps said most of the women have no idea of her career or would even be able to understand the type of math she does. She is the author of more than 50 academic papers, a globetrotting lecturer, and bestselling author (under the name Rachel Pomerantz) targeting Orthodox readers. They have two children and have fostered four other children. She encouraged her boys to serve in the Israeli army. She says that she does a lot of work by email, to accommodate her roles as mother and grandmother.  

Here's a picture.

Here's her books: http://www.amazon.com/Bells-and-Pomegranates-ebook/dp/B0093B7MA8/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1381860339&sr=1- and http://www.amazon.com/Mountains-Around-Jerusalem-Rachel-Pomerantz/dp/1583303510/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1381860339&sr=1-2