Frequently Asked Questions
What is Integrative Learning?
Integrative Education is inspired by the awareness that the world around us, our experiences, our cognitive processes, and our social, emotional and moral lives are multi-dimensional, interdependent and interconnected phenomenon.
Integrative learning empowers students to study topics, themes and questions through an interdisciplinary lens. It involves the discovery of key concepts and essential questions that are common to diverse subject areas, and the re-framing of these concepts questions as a new locus of study.
The Harvard Schoool of Education describes Integrative Education as the essential mode of learning for the 21st century:
Some questions simply cannot be addressed through a single discipline. Decisive shifts in knowledge production characterize the turn of the twenty-first century. Collaborations by medical doctors, engineers, computer scientists, and molecular biologists are revolutionizing medical care through new, minimally invasive surgical technologies. Pressing social issues from poverty to climate change and global health challenge scientists, historians, psychologists, and artists to converge on solutions that transcend single-disciplinary perspectives. Interdisciplinary understanding (i.e., the ability to integrate knowledge from two or more disciplines to create products, solve problems, or produce explanations) is a hallmark of contemporary problem-solving and discovery—and a primary requirement for relevant education today. (http://www.pz.gse.harvard.edu/id_global_studies.php)
At the Lola Stein Institute we explore the significance of Integrative Learning for spiritual, moral and religious education. We believe that traditions with deep historical, religious, and cultural roots take seriously the spectrum of human experience, and therefore are paradigms for integrative learning. We seek opportunities to collaborate with communities interested in exploring modes of teaching and learning which integrate cognition, ritual, spirituality, and ethics. In our age of global integration, only a fully integrative can adequately prepare our children to thrive in the future
Integrative learning empowers students to study topics, themes and questions through an interdisciplinary lens. It involves the discovery of key concepts and essential questions that are common to diverse subject areas, and the re-framing of these concepts questions as a new locus of study.
The Harvard Schoool of Education describes Integrative Education as the essential mode of learning for the 21st century:
Some questions simply cannot be addressed through a single discipline. Decisive shifts in knowledge production characterize the turn of the twenty-first century. Collaborations by medical doctors, engineers, computer scientists, and molecular biologists are revolutionizing medical care through new, minimally invasive surgical technologies. Pressing social issues from poverty to climate change and global health challenge scientists, historians, psychologists, and artists to converge on solutions that transcend single-disciplinary perspectives. Interdisciplinary understanding (i.e., the ability to integrate knowledge from two or more disciplines to create products, solve problems, or produce explanations) is a hallmark of contemporary problem-solving and discovery—and a primary requirement for relevant education today. (http://www.pz.gse.harvard.edu/id_global_studies.php)
At the Lola Stein Institute we explore the significance of Integrative Learning for spiritual, moral and religious education. We believe that traditions with deep historical, religious, and cultural roots take seriously the spectrum of human experience, and therefore are paradigms for integrative learning. We seek opportunities to collaborate with communities interested in exploring modes of teaching and learning which integrate cognition, ritual, spirituality, and ethics. In our age of global integration, only a fully integrative can adequately prepare our children to thrive in the future
Where were the Lola Stein programs developed and piloted?
All programs were created, piloted and honed over the past 19 years at The Toronto Heschel School. All are original, inventive and unique in form and content.
Can any of the workshops be presented in other cities in North America?
Our workshops comprise a flexible series. Each can easily be transported to different locations and may be adapted for different tutorial situations. A workshop might be presented as a stand-alone presentation during PA days or in combination as a three day workshop. It is the Lola Stein Institute's goal that our workshops are amenable to presentations in various forms as required by different schools and communities. If you are interested in any of our workshops, please fill out our workshop interest form.
Why does LSI host a Senior Educators forum with the Shalom Hartman Institute?
The LSI understands that teaching excellence requires inspired educators who are committed resiliently to both the teaching of children and their own learning.
We believed that cultivating collegiality amongst the leadership of Toronto Jewish education would support teaching excellence, and we conceived a forum where Toronto’s senior educations could study together as a cohort of individuals who are each engaged in creating the Jewish future.
The Shalom Hartman Institute fields a roster of Jewish scholars whose innovative research and breadth of focus are at the highest level in the Jewish world. In 2011 the LSI established the Senior Educators Forum and invited the Shalom Hartman Institute to lead a monthly session for the leadership of Toronto’s Jewish educators. The LSI sees that connection to Hartman scholarship motivates and enhances educators’ devotion to Jewish education as well as gratifies their own love of Jewish learning.
We believed that cultivating collegiality amongst the leadership of Toronto Jewish education would support teaching excellence, and we conceived a forum where Toronto’s senior educations could study together as a cohort of individuals who are each engaged in creating the Jewish future.
The Shalom Hartman Institute fields a roster of Jewish scholars whose innovative research and breadth of focus are at the highest level in the Jewish world. In 2011 the LSI established the Senior Educators Forum and invited the Shalom Hartman Institute to lead a monthly session for the leadership of Toronto’s Jewish educators. The LSI sees that connection to Hartman scholarship motivates and enhances educators’ devotion to Jewish education as well as gratifies their own love of Jewish learning.
Who should read Think Magazine?
Think magazine will be enjoyed by readers who want to consider education more comprehensively, including parents, teachers and all manner of interested parties. If a reader is interested in topics relating to raising children, schooling or community engagement from a social, psychological, educational or just a new Jewish point of view, they will find reading the magazine well worth their time.
How can I get the latest issue of Think Magazine?
We are happy to send you the latest issue of Think magazine and put you on our mailing list for future issues. Please fill out our request form with your contact information and we will send you the magazine.
Are there other LSI publications?
New collections of the “Best of Think Magazine” are in the works for publication in the fall, 2015. Look for:
- Think: Jewish Thinking
- Think: Environmental Education
- Think: Early Years
- Think: School Community
- Think: Junior High
- Think: What makes Toronto Heschel curriculum unique