The Gan Yeladim Project (Children's garden)

Congregation Beth Sholom's Gan Yeladim (Children's Garden) project seeks to establish working gardens for our community with the help of preschool and religious school parents and students. Creating this garden together will build community around the shared experience of nurturing life, and growing the food that is central to so many of the Jewish holidays we celebrate. Working with the youngest members of our community, we are instilling a deep respect for an excitement about our relationship to our planet. We have applied for a PG&E grant to purchase modern-day cisterns to harvest rainwater for our gardens, to teach our children how our ancestors collected rainwater to irrigate their crops all year long. By installing and using the cisterns they will learn how water is a precious gift from God. Children will also build a relationship with biblical plants by hearing about them in our sacred stories while they care of them in our garden.

Shomrei Hagan (Keepers of the Garden)

Joti Levy
Professional school garden coordinator and Jewish nature educator hired to coordinate the project with a generous grant from Hazon, the world’s largest and most influential Jewish environmental organization.

Rabbi Aaron Philmus  
Director of Congregational Life and Learning at Congregation Beth Sholom. Long-time Jewish nature educator and co-developer of Gan Yeladim Project.

Tina Eshaghpour  
Preschool and religious school parent, Steering Committee member at Health and Environment Funders Network, Hazon grant writer and co-developer of Gan Yeladim Project.

Elin Cohen
Preschool and religious school parent, Hazon grant writer and co-developer of Gan Yeladim Project.

GOALS: The goal of the garden project is to integrate hands-on Jewish environmental education into our preschool, religious school, and the greater Beth Sholom community. Through the garden and rain harvest program the children will learn very practical ways to take care of our environment and gain a greater appreciation of the connections between the Agrarian calendar and the Jewish holidays. We believe that the garden program will facilitate interactions and build between congregants of all ages.

ACTIVITIES: Our Gan Yeladim committee will meet in October to plan for the building of our raised beds and cisterns. On Sunday, January 23, in honor of Tisha B'Av, we will have a garden work party to build raised beds, install cisterns, and start planning.

EXPANSION: Our goal is that by the fall of 2011 we will be able to expand the garden so that the preschool children and the religious school children can work in the garden on a weekly basis throughout the year. Once we have established the garden and cisterns in the preschool and religious school, we hope to create a havdallah ritual spice garden on the third floor deck of our sanctuary. We will use the space to perform the ritual of smelling fragrant herbs with wine, candles, and song at the close of Shabbat.