Teaching Torah Through Texting: Using Technology in the Classroom

It’s not every teacher who asks you to grab your cellphone and text in class. But then, not every teacher is Mrs. Rivky Krestt.

This past summer, the AVI CHAI foundation sent 10 Jewish educators to the annual International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) conference, including BT Dahan High School’s Judaics Department Chair, Mrs. Krestt. At the conference, the teachers learned new ways to incorporate technology into their classrooms, exchanged best practices, and developed a network to facilitate an ongoing exchange.

One colleague introduced Mrs. Krestt to polleverywhere.com – a site that allows users to text in responses to polls posted on the site. “Rather than confiscating phones, I decided to use this tool for good,” explains Mrs. Krestt. While teaching 12th graders about the Tree of Knowledge, she posted a comic related to the story above the board and asked student to text in their suggestions for a cartoon caption.

The response was…instantaneous.

“The idea is very cool, and the results appear real time on the screen and at the end,” comments Noah F. ’12. “The results were great, allowing creativity in an unconventional media for a classroom, but one that is second nature to the youth of today.”

While teaching the story of Kayin (Cain) and Hevel (Abel), Mrs. Krestt posited the following question: Was this a first degree murder, second degree murder or manslaughter? Students texted in their vote for the interpretation of this famous incident, and then learned the commentaries that supported each of the three explanations.

Shani T. ’12, who voted for the first degree murder explanation, reports that the class eagerly embraced the use of texting in class. “It’s a breather. People will focus more because they enjoy it. You will want to participate.”

And if texting in class wasn’t enough… Mrs. Krestt asked her seniors to create their own glogs that answer questions discussed about the Garden of Eden.

What is a glog? It’s an online, multimedia poster, of course!

Some of the questions addressed by the students included:

What kind of tree was the Tree of Knowledge?

What were consequences of eating the fruit?

What was the snake’s motivation for tempting Adam and Chava to eat the fruit?