Chil­dren’s

Torah Tigers

Dr. Miri­am Ada­han; Mena­hem, Hal­ber­stadt, illus.; Dr. Shmuess, trans.

  • Review
By – January 13, 2012

This pic­ture book of short sto­ries in rhyme is based on Dr. Adahan’s vic­to­ry method,” which she explains in her intro­duc­tion. The intend­ed audi­ence is obser­vant Jew­ish fam­i­lies. The adorable hand drawn and bright­ly col­ored illus­tra­tions por­tray a fam­i­ly in which the youngest is dressed as a tiger. Each rel­a­tive; sib­lings, par­ents and grand­par­ents, then must over­come a chal­lenge, be it tak­ing med­i­cine, sit­ting nice­ly for the den­tist, or hav­ing the young tiger” col­or in a school note­book. As each rel­a­tive con­trols his/​her tem­per or com­pletes the chal­lenge, they are praised. The sto­ries are intend­ed to be read as encour­age­ment for chil­dren as they, too, over­come chal­lenges in life. Chil­dren can eas­i­ly relate to the sto­ries and the edu­ca­tion­al mes­sage that Dr. Ada­han pro­motes. Ada­han has suc­ceed­ed in bring­ing her par­ent­ing phi­los­o­phy to a lev­el that that chil­dren can under­stand. These sto­ries are appro­pri­ate for ages 3 – 8.

Dro­ra Arussy, Ed.D., is an edu­ca­tion­al con­sul­tant who spe­cial­izes in inte­grat­ing Jew­ish and sec­u­lar stud­ies, the arts into edu­ca­tion, and cre­ative teach­ing for excel­lence in Jew­ish edu­ca­tion. She is the moth­er to four school-age chil­dren and has taught from pre-school through adult. Dro­ra is an adjunct pro­fes­sor of Hebrew lan­guage at Drew University.

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