Many of our readers are familiar with the popular NLE Thinking Gemara Series. As many of our readers know, NCSY has recently launched an Education website for teachers, teen advisors, and Jewish Education professionals. As of late, this site began putting together source sheets to facilitate high-level Gemara learning for teens to learn with mentors (yeshiva guys).
The source sheets are based on Dovid Lichtenstein’s popular book “Headlines: Halachic Debates of Current Events” and cover a wide range of fascinating topics such as:
- A Kosher Cheeseburger? The Halachic Status of Synthetic Beef
- Viewing Israeli News Broadcasts that were Filmed or Posted on Shabbos
- The Gilad Shalit Deal: Exchanging Many Terrorists for One Israeli
- Shooting Down Hijacked Planes: Killing a Few to Save the Lives of Many
- Hurricane Sandy: Rescuing Those Who Put Themselves in Danger
- Leiby Kletzky and the Insanity Defense in Halachah
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The most recent one is called: Chanukah Candle Lighting at the White House.
Each source sheet includes halachic sources in Hebrew and in English with visual diagrams to explain the more complicated parts.
Click this link to see the full Headlines collection.
If you or your institution would like to learn more about how you can use these source sheets, feel free to reach out to NCSY of Greater Washington. They are currently running a program in which teens learn the Headlines sheets on a weekly basis with mentors in the community. The program gets the kids into the beis medrash and gives them the taste of real Gemara learning.
In the coming months ahead, NCSY will be coming out with new sheets all the time. If you would like to receive updates when they publish a new sheet, you can email firstr@ncsy.org.
